Director General of Islamic History, Art and Culture Research Center (IRCICA) and Ambassador Prof. Dr. Mahmud Erol Kılıç met with the lecturers at the “professional talk” organized by the Faculty of Islamic Sciences at Selcuk University.

Dean of the Faculty of Islamic Sciences Prof. Dr. Ramazan Altıntaş, at the opening of the conversation at the Selçuk University Museum Building, stated that he believed the program would have significant benefits. He gave information about Mahmud Erol Kılıç’s working life and works.

IRCICA Director General and Ambassador Prof. Dr. Mahmud Erol Kılıç said that he continues his duty at Marmara University-Faculty of Theology. Expressing that he served in the Parliamentary Union of the Member States of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation between 2008 and 2018, he was later appointed as the Ambassador of the Republic of Turkey to Indonesia, and stated that he has been carrying out the duty of IRCICA General Director since 2021.

Noting that the Islamic History, Art and Culture Research Center is a sub-institution and cultural center of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, Kılıç said, “There should be a goal in madrasa and lodge connoisseurs, in the street and in the poetry. Purpose is an important concept and element. We modern humans have forgotten the purpose and moved away from it. Why did we come to earth as human beings, what did we come to do or where did we come from and where are we headed? We are faced with an inevitable reality of death. We are born and grow old. After a while, we will deliver the inborn relics. Besides, these are the most fundamental questions of life and philosophy. The meaning of life is shaped by these questions. Thus, life becomes a school of search for meaning.” he said.

Describing “tradition” as a chain that reaches from hand to hand, Kılıç said, “We have a tradition of thought, just as even an institution has a tradition. Tradition is not a historical turning back. Tradition is a dynamic process that works towards the future. There is a touching saying attributed to the respectable Mevlana: “Our compass has a fixed foot. We tie our fixed foot to our own tradition, and with the other foot we travel seventy-two nations.” If both feet are stable, we call it fanaticism.”

Selcuk University Vice Rector Prof. Dr. İlhan Çiftci, deans and lecturers attended.