Nguyễn Văn Thanh, head of the VFF Central Committee’s board for religious affairs. — VNA/VNS Photo

HÀ NỘI — The Standing Board of the Vietnam Fatherland Front (VFF) Central Committee held a meeting in Hà Nội on Friday to look into religious solidarity affairs during the first half of 2023.

The meeting was an open forum for relevant agencies to share information about the religious situation and the reinforcement of religious solidarity; draw lessons from the reality; and boost coordination to improve the implementation of religion-related tasks, attract religions’ resources for national development, and build up the great national solidarity.

Nguyễn Văn Thanh, head of the VFF Central Committee’s board for religious affairs, reported that in the first half of 2023, the religious situation was basically stable. Religious activities complied with the charters and statutes of their religions as well as legal regulations. The VFF committees and administrations at all levels actively coordinated with and assisted religious organisations to successfully hold many major religious events, attracting a large number of both followers and secular people.

Subsidiary organisations of the VFF Central Committee stepped up the communications work, paid attention to the material and spiritual lives of their religious members, and worked with authorities to implement programmes on economic, cultural and social development, new-style countryside building, and sustainable poverty reduction for religious communities, he went on.

Vice President of the VFF Central Committee Hoàng Công Thủy spoke highly of religious organisations’ contributions to the great national solidarity, noting that they have actively engaged in environmental protection, climate change response, health care, education, humanitarian activities, and traffic safety ensuring.

In particular, he noted, at the ceremony calling for donations to the construction of houses for the poor in Điện Biên and other northwestern provinces on May 13, 12 religious organisations, dignitaries, and businesses linked with religions donated tens of billions of đồng to the drive.

Thuỷ held that in the future, it is necessary to press on with the communications about religious and belief affairs while fully and properly carrying out relevant policies and legal regulations to ensure their efficiency and consistency nationwide. — VNS