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* Juliet Hollister; Worked for Religious Tolerance

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Juliet Garretson Hollister, 84, housewife who started an international educational group called Temple of Understanding. Hollister was born in Forest Hills, N.Y., and studied comparative religion at Columbia University and Union Theological Seminary. As a woman she found her pursuit of a career in theology stymied. She married a prominent Manhattan lawyer named Dickerson Hollister but did not abandon her interests in world religions. She was a Connecticut housewife who was eating a peanut butter sandwich with a friend one day in 1959 when she began to wonder what the world would be like without religious conflict. That conversation led her to found the Temple of Understanding in 1960. Her idea was to convene religious leaders from all over the world in a dialogue to reduce religious strife. The organization received an early boost from Eleanor Roosevelt, the former first lady, who arranged for Hollister to meet with Jawaharlal Nehru, then India’s prime minister, and other world leaders. The Temple of Understanding has held six “spiritual summits” with religious leaders since 1969. The first was held in Calcutta. Later meetings were held in Oxford, Moscow and Kyoto, Japan. Other supporters have included Albert Schweitzer, Pope John XXIII and United Nations Secretary-General U Thant. The New York-based organization has advised the United Nations and is registered with the United Nations as a nongovernmental organization. One of the primary sponsors of the interfaith prayer service at the annual opening of the U.N. General Assembly, it is the oldest global interfaith organization in the United States. On Nov. 26 at her home in Greenwich, Conn.

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