Source: Star Tribune
On June 8, 2002 the Star Tribune reported that "Anant Rambachan, professor of religion at St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minn., is in Rome this weekend, one of 10 religious experts from the world invited to the Vatican to discuss religious tolerance... Seven major religious traditions - Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, Sikhism and indigenous religions such as those practiced in Africa and Australia - have been invited by the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue to gather at the Vatican." Rambachan, a Hindu active in interfaith dialogue around the world, "wants to find constructive solutions to the world's violence by encouraging the world's major religions to find common ground, common voices and common values. When genuine interreligious dialogue begins to happen, he says, then much of the religious rationale for hatred and violence will end... 'Dialogue is difficult, risky and challenging, but it is a necessity of our times. We are no longer geographically isolated. We either solve our problems together or they will not be solved.'"