Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA) Executive Director Aram Hamparian commended In Defense of Christians on a year of progress in protecting Christian communities across the Middle East, while calling on U.S. leaders to elevate America’s response to global suffering, threats to faith, dangers to democracy and diversity worldwide, from the field of politics to the plane of morality.
Hamparian’s remarks came during Tuesday’s inaugural press conference for IDC’s 2017 Summit, “American Leadership and Securing the Future of Christians in the Middle East,” cosponsored by the ANCA, The Philos Project, Religious Freedom Institute (RFI), The Institute on Religion and Democracy (IRD) and the Lebanese Information Center. The press conference began with poignant remarks by His Beatitude Moran Mor Bechara Boutros al-Rai, the Maronite Patriarch of Antioch and all the East and His Beatitude John Yazigi, Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Antioch and All the East, moderated by IDC Vice-President and Senior Policy Advisor Andrew Doran.
“We are great when we are good. We are great because we are good,” said Hamparian. “Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. And this is a city full of folks who will try. We need not choose between being strong or just. We can, and must, be both.”