October 21, 2009 – Bogota, Colombia….[IAD Staff]
A first ever International Religious Liberty Conference took place last month in Bogota, Colombia where more than 300 leaders from dozens of religious denominations participated in the historic event.
Dr. Alvaro Uribe Velez, President of Colombia, addressed the leaders with a message of peace for the nation.
It is “a meeting of unity regarding a profession of beliefs that all contribute to the ethics of a human being,” said President Uribe. “I'm so glad Colombia can say to the world 'Colombia is a country which connects liberty with ethics.'”
Organized by Colombia's Coalition for Religious Liberty, Conscience and Worship, or CONFELIREC, and hosted by the Adventist Church, the conference also included national and international leaders.
Dr. John Graz, International Religious Liberty Association director for the Adventist World Church, and Pastor Roberto Herrera, Religious Liberty director for the church Inter-America, spoke on the importance of guarding religious liberty as a fundamental human right, an expression of human dignity.
Representatives from the Jewish, Muslim, Anglican, Evangelical, Catholic, Baptist, Pentecostal, Lutheran, Church of the Latter Day Saints and the Adventist Church were among the religious denominations represented.
At the end of the two-day conference, CONFELIREC secretary Pastor Hector J. Pardo of the Evangelical Church, and Pastor Alvaro Nino, Religious Liberty of the church in Colombia, handed Dr. Graz and Pastor Herrera a resolution in which they were requesting to be accepted by the international organism as a sister entity in the promotion and defense of religious liberty.
