Bill Tammeous on Hizmet Movement EN скачать в хорошем качестве

Bill Tammeous on Hizmet Movement EN

I have become aware of Hizmet some years ago, through the work of a branch of Dialogue Institute based in the Kansas City area. As a journalist, I write about interfaith matters and the Dialogue Institute was promoting Interfaith Dialogue and Understanding. Through various programs advocated by the Gulen movement in Turkey and elsewhere around the world. Over the years, I particularly enjoy the Interfaith annual dinners, that the Institute is sponsored. Those dinners have helped others see people of faiths, other than their own, as fellow human beings deserving of respect. What I came to appreciate especially about Hizmet is that in Turkish, the word “Hizmet” means “Service”. And in my experience, the Dialogue Institute has dedicated itself to Service, especially in supporting Turkish families in the Kansas City area who have been cut off from their families because of the dictatorial actions of Turkey’s authoritarian President Erdogan. I even wrote a column about some of the sufferings of such families. The Gulen Movement has become an enemy of Erdogan who has accused it of trying to overthrow the regime, his regime. If a movement is known by the enemy as it attracts, Hizmet is attracting the right kind of enemies. Hizmet describes itself as being based on moral values which is why it is an advocate of universal access to education, civil society, tolerance, and peace. It is pretty hard to stand against such generative values. In fact, those values are needed more today than ever in the U.S. and the West, generally, given the toxic political atmosphere that we are in. Adopting Hizmet’s values might make it possible for Americans to talk to one another again with civility. The three words I would use to describe people associated with Hizmet are open, servants and learners. So, as long as the movement stays with its’ Universal humanist values, I will see it is worthy of support. And I hope you will too.