Swami Amritaswarupananda Puri, Vice-Chairman of the Mata Amritanandamayi Math, represented Sri Mata Amritanandamayi Devi in UAE at Abu Dhabi’s historic ‘Global Conference of Human Fraternity’. The conference, that aimed at nurturing brotherhood and tolerance between religions, based on the understanding that all faiths were founded to create peace for humanity, concluded with a historic meeting between two of the world’s most prominent religious leaders: His Eminence Dr. Ahmed El-Tayeb, the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar Al-Sharif and Chairman of the Muslim Council of Elders, and His Holiness Pope Francis of the Catholic Church.

In his address, Swami Amritaswarupananda, Vice-Chairman of the Mata Amritanandamayi Math said, “We need to have constant awareness that if we harm or destroy any aspect of creation under the sun — seemingly significant or insignificant — we are, in fact, harming or destroying part of our own selves, an element of our own being.”

The conference was attended by more than 700 religious leaders as well as a number of prominent intellectual, cultural and media figures from around the world and addressed three main themes: ‘Principles of Human Fraternity,’ ‘Common Responsibility to Achieve Human Fraternity’ and ‘Human Fraternity: Challenges and Opportunities’.

This was Swami Amritaswarupananda’s second interfaith event in Abu Dhabi since November last year, when he accompanied spiritual leader and humanitarian Sri Mata Amritanandamayi Devi to the Abu Dhabi Interfaith Summit aimed at Protecting Child Dignity in the Digital World.

Sri Mata Amritanandamayi Devi (Amma)

Amma has delivered addresses at the United Nations several times and has spoken twice at the Parliament of the World’s Religions. Among other accolades, she has received the Gandhi-King Award for Non-violence in Geneva, the James Parks Morton Interfaith Award in New York, and an honorary doctorate from the State University of New York. In 2014, at the invitation of His Holiness Pope Francis, Amma was one of 12 religious and spiritual leaders to travel to the Vatican to sign a joint declaration against modern slavery. Throughout her life, Amma has embraced and comforted more than 3.8 crore people. When asked where she gets the energy to help so many people while also building and running a massive humanitarian organization, Amma answers: “Where there is true love, everything is effortless. Love transforms.”