Ameen Rihani Organization

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In commemoration of the 130th anniversary of the birth of Ameen Rihani, Notre Dame University (NDU) of Lebanon celebrated the event and unveiled the bust of Rihani on their main campus in Zouk Mosbeh, Lebanon, on March 1, 2007, at 12: 15 p.m.

The program started with the Lebanese national anthem followed by a video and PowerPoint presentation entitled “Ameen Rihani: Voice and Image”. Speeches were delivered by Mr. Suheil Mattar, Director of Public Relations at NDU, who gave a PowerPoint presentation on Rihani’s biography; Rev. Fr. Walid Moussa, President of NDU, who outlined the objectives of the National Pantheon project at NDU and emphasized the role of Rihani as a national and international thinker and role model for developed and developing nations in the 21st century; Mr. Talal Salman, owner and Editor-in-Chief of Assafir Newspaper in Beirut, who gave a tribute to Rihani as the Lebanese Arab and contemporary thinker; and H. E. Ambassador Fouad Turk who highlighted the significance of Rihani’s modernism and contemporary concerns and trends of thought based on liberalism, globalism, and human advancement. In closing, Dr. Ameen Albert Rihani focused on the “Great City” stressing the fact that Rihani had determined its framework early in the 20th century, and NDU is now endorsing and advancing it at the early days of the 21st century. The ceremony ended with the unveiling of Rihani's bust at the main entrance of the university leading to the Administration Building and Main Library.

The ceremony was attended by a large audience exceeding 300 students, professors, men of letters, and media reporters. A pamphlet entitled “The Great City” was distributed during the event, which included excerpts from what Rihani wrote on the subject, in Arabic and English, as selected from Ar-Rihaniyat and The Book of Khalid.