Rome, Italy—The fourth UPF-Italy Think Tank meeting was held on the theme "Cultural Diplomacy as a Tool for Conflict Resolution and Prevention."
The speaker at the online meeting on September 30, 2022, was Professor Marco Lombardi, the director of the Department of Sociology at the Catholic University of Milan. He is also the director of the ITSTIME research center, a member of the scientific committee of the Master in Cultural Diplomacy in Rome branch of the Catholic University, and the director of the School of Journalism.
Professor Lombardi is among the first Ambassadors for Peace, a recognition he received in Korea in 2000 on the occasion of Rev. Dr. Sun Myung Moon's 80th birthday celebration.
Incidentally, before we met him in person at the university in Milan, Professor Lombardi had already contributed to the UPF magazine Voci di Pace, writing an article about Kashmir. On that occasion, he told us of the wonderful experience he had in Seoul during the 2020 World Summit, which he attended as part of the Italian delegation.
Click here to read Professor Lombardi’s words at the fourth Think Tank. At the end of his talk, he stated:
I am convinced that this issue of "cultural diplomacy" is an extremely important issue for UPF. To me UPF is one of those few large entities that globally has a tension that connects heaven and earth very well. That is, we work here to improve ourselves and improve others, but always with a vision that goes far beyond that. So it has a spiritual dimension, a political dimension and a cultural dimension, in my opinion. UPF is an organizational dimension, and, I would add, it has a vocation. In my opinion, UPF could definitely be one of those global bodies that to address the critical global issues of the world, in this perspective, it could be part of its ropes. That's why I really like to talk about it in our context.