The Meeting was initiated with a welcome speech by Dr. Seyed Abolhassan Navvab, president of the University of Religions and Denominations in which he stressed on the importance of such programs in order to take more steps toward a violence-free world.

The head of US delegation Ms. Dena Merriam, founder of GPIW & “Contemplative Alliance on the importance of Iranian-US Inter-Religious Exchange” was the second speaker in this meeting who emphasized also on the importance of non-political groups^, involvement in such programs to encourage the governors to change their policies to more peace-friendly ones.

After the opening session the participants had two three-hour sessions to exchange their viewpoints on problems such as: “What do we mean by human unity” and “sharing world views of the religious traditions” in group discussions.

Some speeches by Dr. Fatima Tofighi, and Naeeme PourMohammadi, URD faculty members and some of the American guests were another part of this dialogue.

On the next two sessions the two sides discussed issues like cultivating unifying values and overcoming misperceptions and steps for deepening the inter-religious exchange.