Maryland Institute for Dialogue honors highly distinguished six members of Maryland for their efforts to promote intercultural dialogue and tolerance in community. The 2006-2007 MID Dialogue Awards recipients include Attorney Sheela Murthy Esq., President/CEO of Murthy Law Firm for MID Intercultural Dialogue Award; Dr. William Destler, Provost of University of Maryland for MID Diversity Award; Dr. Louis Cantori, Political Scientist and Expert on Islam and the Middle East for MID Education Dialogue Award; Dr. Peter Bechtold, Chairman-Emeritus, North Africa-Middle East Department of FSI at the US State Department for MID Peace Award; Reverend Daniel R. Hamlin of the Greenbelt Community Church for MID Interfaith Dialogue Award, and Ms. Karen Olson, CEO-Adhesives Research Inc. for MIS Business Dialogue Award respectively.
The Honorees expressed their strong support for the Maryland Institute for Dialogue's vision and activities to promote intercultural dialogue locally and globally. MID Intercultural Dialogue Award recipient, Attorney Sheela Murthy, Esq. mentioned the Institute's activities in general and its intercultural trips in particular. She noted that the Institute's intercultural trips to Turkey are quite unique in terms of providing the participants with an opportunity to learn about the culture and interact with local people. MID Diversity Award recipient, Dr. William Destler, Provost of University of Maryland, suggested that many more people should be aware of such activities to intercultural dialogue and that the next year's dialogue awards ceremony should be attended many more people. MID Education Dialogue Award recipient, Dr. Louis Cantori of UMBC, globally acclaimed political scientist and expert on Islam and the Middle East , noted that the origins of all religions are the same and the similarities are much more than the differences. He suggested the members of Abrahamic religions can an should join together to tackle the common problems facing humanity. MID Peace Award recipient, Dr. Peter Bechtold, Chairman-Emeritus of North Africa and Middle East at the US State Department's Foreign Service Institute, emphasized the importance of understanding other cultures better in order to develop sustainable relations with the nations of those cultures. MID Interfaith Dialogue Award recipient, Reverend Dan Hamlin noted many prejudices and bigotry among the religious circles are simply result of the lack of knowledge about the other religion or culture, and that more dialogue is needed to overcome those prejudices. Lastly, MID Business Dialogue Award recipient, Karen Olson, CEO of Adhesives Research Inc. draw attention to the growing multicultural environment of the business world and noted that intercultural dialogue and mutual understanding is necessary to benefit from the increasing diversity in the business world.
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