The Annual Dialogue & Friendship Dinners host distinguished guests representing various religious and cultural establishments and community members interested in dialogue. In addition to the presentations by guest speakers, the round table discussions provide a unique opportunity to share our experiences and learn from each other.  read more »

The Foundation for Intercultural Dialogue (FID) extended its dialogue and friendship dinners to Flagstaff in November 2008. The first dinner in this town of Northern Arizona was organized at High Country Conference Center in the Flagstaff Campus of Northern Arizona University. With more than seventy participants, the dinner brought together a variety of guests from the local institutions.

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Foundation for the Inter-Cultural Dialogue successfully organized the Fifth Annual Dialogue and Friendship Dinner on 24th October at Hyatt Regency for the fifth time in Phoenix with a stupendous response. The sole purpose of the dinner was to raise awareness towards peace in Arizonians and help them to meet people from various walks of life through a peaceful atmosphere.

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An awareness notice was put up throughout the State to various organizations and at notice boards to notify people about this event and they were supposed to RSVP so as to be a part of the event. The number of guests far exceeded our expectation and the interest of the participants was obvious from the eyes through the halls crammed with people on the day of the event. Over two hundred participants from

The Annual Dialogue and Friendship Dinner 2008 was held at Student Memorial Union Ct., North Ballroom. The event was a huge success. It was hosted by Dan Marries, KOLD News 13. Prof. John Olsen was the keynote speaker and Rabbi Thomas Louchheim, Sr. Karen Berry, Basheer Shahin and Rev. Elwood McDowell made speeches about the importance of dialogue and friendship. A traditional art of Ebru/ Water marbling performance was presented with the recital of a Turkish acoustic instrument Kanun, at the end of the program.  read more »

The 4th Annual Dialogue and Friendship Dinner

Now becoming a tradition in Phoenix, our 4th Dialogue and Friendship Dinner took place in Hyatt Regency Hotel, on Thursday, September 20. We were so happy to see over 150 distinguished guests at our dinner, including journalists, artists, government officials, and representatives from several cultural and religious groups and many others who had an interest in intercultural dialogue.

The night started with the opening speech of the President of FID, Ismail Karatas who gave brief information about the educational and social activities of FID and emphasized the significance of intercultural and interfaith dialogue.

After the opening remarks, keynote speaker Prof Thomas Davis of Arizona State University ascended the pulpit to give his keynote speech, which he assigned to the importance of diversity and how it is achieved.

The greatest surprise of the night was a live calligraphy performance by the Turkish calligrapher Aydin Cayir, who came from Turkey. His ten-minute performance was watched with great interest by our guests, who were surprised to learn that their names were already written on small cards to be given them at the end of the night as a special gift of FID.

Having the aim of promoting ‘dialogue’ and ‘friendship’, we allocated the last section of the dinner for a round table discussion, when our guests had the opportunity to know each other better and discuss how promoting interfaith and intercultural dialogue can be used to solve conflicts in our society.

The night ended with the closing remarks by Robert B. Kaiser (journalist-writer and the President of Jesuit Alumni in Arizona), and AZ State Representatives Mark Anderson and Steve Farley, who all expressed their appreciation of the efforts of FID in promoting dialogue.

Robert B. Kaiser made an emphasis on things that bring us together: “art and stories which cut through abstraction.” “The real test for all of us is to be proactive and to live dialogue and friendship by going beyond the words discussed by the speaker” said Kaiser.

Mark Anderson stated how grateful he is for being part of the Foundation for Inter-Cultural Dialogue. He pointed the high spirit of love and peace among the members of FID and expressed his appreciation of the efforts of FID in promoting dialogue. He also reminded us the following day being International Day of Peace proclaimed by the UN. “In that regard, the dinner had a special significance providing a medium for peace and harmony for those of us seeking for the commonalities, which are the foundation for friendship and working together” said Anderson.

Steve Farley, who participated to a recent FID trip to Turkey, said that he was deeply affected by people in Turkey for that they honestly opened their hearts to their guests. He said that “opening our hearts is absolutely the key for what we need to do in the world today.” “The only way to proceed forward and maintain world peace and be able to bring it here on earth is to keep hearts open no matter how hard that is. I think we have shown an example how to do this. We must carry that forward.”

Since 2004, Foundation for Inter-Cultural Dialogue (FID) has been organizing dialogue and friendship dinners to bring the members of different faiths and communities of Arizona together. We aim to increase intercultural awareness in our community.  read more »

Since 2004, Foundation for Inter-Cultural Dialogue (FID) has been organizing interfaith dialogue dinners to bring the members of different faiths and communities of Arizona together. We aim to increase intercultural awareness in our community.

FID hosted its 3rd Annual Interfaith Dialogue Dinner at the Phoenix Marriott Airport Hotel on 12 October 2006, Thursday, at 7:00 pm. About 150 guests from various religious and cultural groups attended the dinner. The dinner was co-sponsored by the Global Cultural Connections Foundation (GCC) of California.  read more »

More than 150 guests attended the 2nd Annual Interfaith Dialogue Dinner on October 22nd, at Hilton Garden Inn Hotel, Phoenix.

The theme of this year's dinner was "The art of Living Together". The event started with a video presentation and continued with speeches of Dr. Paul Eppinger, Executive Director of Arizona Interfaith Movement, Rev. Doug Bland, Pastor of Tempe Community Christian Church, Mr. Ramazan Kilinc, Vice-President of Foundation for Inter-Cultural Dialogue, and Mr. David Wm. Engelman. The distinguished speakers stressed the importance of getting to know other faiths, cultures and traditions as an integral part of peacefully sharing the community we live in. It was emphasized that Intercultural Dialogue becomes the means to achieve such a goal, because it is through dialogue with others that one finds out the universal values that make us all human. Once such shared similarities and universal values are understood one comes to respect different cultures. As a result dialogue helps us understand each other through celebrating difference be it at a local level, national or international. The speakers also pointed to the fact that world religions have more similarities than differences, and it is through the understanding of similarities that one comes to tolerate others, respect difference and avoid conflict.  read more »

The Foundation for Inter-Cultural Dialogue (FID)'s 1st Annual Interfaith Dialogue Dinner was held at the Phoenix Sheraton Airport Hotel on November 6, 2004. The theme for this year's dinner was "Multicultural Awareness and Diversity". This important night was honored by special guests from different religions. The night started with FID presentation that discussed the importance of dialogue among the members of our society and ended with live Sufi music performance. We would like to thank all the guests that joined us for this event.  read more »