Interfaith Information Online

At the initiative of Rabbi Shlomo Riskin, a meeting was arranged last month in Jerusalem between Sheikh Abu-Khader Ja'abari of Hebron and Pastor John Hagee, Founder of the Cornerstone Church in San Antonio and of Christians United for Israel. The three clergymen spoke for two hours about the need to reject violence and develop greater tolerance between religious communities. “It is critical that the clergy of the three major religions of the world – Judaism, Christianity and Islam declare together their united belief in a God of love, morality and compassion,” Riskin remarked. Hagee added, "This conversation was illuminating and in many ways inspired my hopes for peace and I pray that is only the first of many such meetings."
Bringing together Hagee and Ja’abari was a coordinated effort between Riskin’s Center for Jewish-Christian Understanding and Cooperation and the Interfaith Encounter Association, led by Yehuda Stolov. Also in attendance of this meeting were Dr. Ashraf Ja'abari and Noam Arnon Spokesman for the Jewish Community of Hebron. “It was truly a moving moment to see these major leaders representing each faith community share their commitment to peace and finding meaningful ways to build trust and hope for a better future in the Holy Land,” Stolov remarked.

Report on the Global Conference on World Religions after 9/11

September 7, 2011, (by Juli L. Gittinger): Over two thousand people gathered at Montreal's Palais de Congres for the 2nd Global Conference on World Religions after 9/11 to listen to a variety of speakers and scholars address the ongoing project to educate and inform the public about religious traditions other than their own. Starting off the morning with His Holiness the Dalai Lama, and rounding up the afternoon with a diverse panel of scholars in the field of religion, the Conference was a resounding success, generating incentive and inspiration for sharing knowledge between faiths.

One of the goals of the Conference was to pass three resolutions long term commitments to the global discourse of world religions. The resolutions are as follows:
1. Resolved that a course in World Religoins should be taught wherever the confessional study of religion is carried out--in a seminary, or yeshiva, or madrassah, or Hindu Matha, or Buddhist monastery--provided that is has been approved by the apex body of that religion
2. Resolved that violating the sanctity of the scriptures of any religion amounts to violating the sanctity of the scriptures of all religions
3. Resolved that the religions of the world should come together to formulate a Universal Declaration of Human Rights by the World's Religions, which would embody their vision of human flourishing and which would supplement the current U.N. Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

The Dalai Lama's talk, "The Ethics of Peace", expressed his ongoing concern for interfaith dialogue and cooperation between religious institutions. Alongside his general message of tolerance ("Believe in one religion, but respect all religions"), he underscored the need for more contact between the religions and more engagement on a local level.

Step Forward for UN Decade of Dialogue By Marcus Braybrooke, President, World Congress of Faiths.
Hopes for a UN Decade of Dialogue took a big step forward last week with the creation of a Coalition of faith-based, interfaith and value-based organisations, pledged to work together to realise this vision.

The meeting was in response to a UN General Assembly resolution, approved unanimously in November 2008 and sponsored by 78 Member States which requested “the Office for Economic and Social Council Support and Coordination in the Department of Economic and Social Affairs of the United Nations Secretariat, which plays the focal point role on inter-religious, inter-cultural and inter-civilizational matters, to coordinate with the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization in facilitating consideration of the possibility of proclaiming a United Nations decade for inter-religious and inter-cultural dialogue, understanding and cooperation for peace”[1]

Over fifty organisations, including representatives from all the great world religions, took part in the meeting to form the coalition, which was held at the Maryknoll Centre at Ossining, near New York. Among those taking part were representatives of the World Council of Churches, the Chief Rabbinate of Israel, the Roman Catholic International Union of Superior Generals of Religious Congregations, Religions for Peace and the World Scout Movement. The meeting ended with a briefing session in the Eco-Chamber at the United Nations.

The President of the UN General Assembly, H.E Miguel D’Escoto Brockmann, expressed his strong support for the initiative, saying, ‘As we rush to prevent the immediate social devastation that is already seen in the world, we must keep clam and keep our eye on the prize – long-term peace and justice for all citizens of this beleagured planet. In this lies the strength of your Coalition.’ Rev Dr Marcus Braybrooke, representing the World Congress of Faiths and the Three Faiths Forum said, ‘The Decade will be sign of hope. It will help the UN reconnect with ordinary people and challenge faith communities to make their priority the search for peace and justice, the relief of poverty and the preservation of the planet.’
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[1] See Resolution A/63/L.24/Rev.2 of 13 November 2008. Paragraph 8.


Stein Villumstad (Religions for Peace), Gerardo Gonzalez (Coordinator for the Initiative), Joan Kirby (Temple of Understanding) and Yoland Trevino (United Religions Initiative)	Stein Villumstad, Gerardo Gonzalez , Marcus Braybrooke (International Interfaith Centre) and Yoland Trevino

The Second Joint International Conference of Christian and Muslim Women with the theme of ‘Women as Peacemakers through Dialogue’ with participation of 20 women from Iran , America, Senegal, Ethiopia, Pakistan, Finland, Germany, Bosnia, Palestine, Greece, Turkey, and Syria, took place in Gothenburg on 3-7 Sep.2008 and shared thoughts on Cultures, Religion , Politics & Life .

The three year conference on ‘Women as Peacemakers through Dialogue’ is a joint project between the Institute for Interreligious Dialogue (Tehran, Iran) and the World Council of Churches (Geneva, Switzerland). The First conference, with participation of 20 women from different places around the world, took place in Tehran, Iran in Nov.2007. The second one took place in Gothenburg, where the participants tried to clarify the basis of building Peace thru Religion. It is decided to hold the third conference in Senegal.

For three days, there was 45 minutes every morning for spiritual sharing in which they shared their Christian and Muslim spiritual sources to reflect on the subject of the day (Prayer, Fasting, Charity).

At the First Conference 3 groups of Education & Religion, Health & Development, Communication & Media, formed to study the role of religious women on peace which continued their work at the Second conference in Gothenburg 4-7 Sep.2008 .

Compiling of declaration of the role of women in peace, from the Group of Education & Religion, giving effect to world Health with regards to this fact that Peace will happen only when Health is exists in society from the Health & Development Group, and finally Publicizing the achievement of this Christian-Muslim meeting thru the website of Conference, from the group of communication, were the main outputs of this 3 days event which is going to be carry out in next phase. Group of Health & Development is supposed to study all aspects of methods for keeping human health to be protected against HIV by holding oral panels and its result with a written report will be submitted to IID & WCC.

Group of Education & Religion decided to compile a declaration on role of religious women in peace. To write this declaration 5 members of this group are supposed to write essays about different topics and also to answer the questions which will be sent to them in near future by WCC to recognize the obstacles & existing opportunities for peaceful Christian & Muslim women activities.

Group of Communication, considering the view points of participants from different perspectives, decided to collect a book, make a Clip &Film from this conference and give a full report to the Media.

All participants had a meeting with the Bishop of Gothenburg, the bishop specially welcomed Iranian women and gave his word for further cooperation. Visiting a primary school in Gothenburg, Antenatal Clinic, Swedish Newspaper and visiting women in key-positions in Church of Sweden, also visiting Lundby medieval church and Bosnian mosque, were other activities besides meetings.

At the closing ceremony, after evaluating the Tehran conference, the outputs of the second meeting became clear and specified which will be carried out in Third meeting by the participants.
Among ten Iranian participants were 3 Christian women and likewise there were 3 Muslim women from WCC participants.

Find out more about interfaith in Iran at www.iid.org.ir

WCRP Conference: THE EUROPEAN INTER-RELIGIOUS ENCOUNTER 2008: A MEETING FOR MAKING COMMITMENTS.

Today’s Youth at World Spirit Forum (WSF) 2008: Inspiring and Active. 18th to 21st January 2008.

‘Opportunity’ - this idiom means a lot. Opportunity helps us to manifest our intentions. Opportunity can be fruitfully seized by people who strive to realize their dreams often. I am pleased to say that I had a golden opportunity to attend a conference in Switzerland which was based on spirituality. I had always dreamed of visiting the mesmerizing country of Switzerland, and finally, due to this conference, I grabbed my chance!

This spirituality-based conference was titled: “Today’s Youth at World Spirit Forum (WSF) 2008: Inspiring and Active” which was held on 18^th to 21^st January 2008. In the conference there was interaction on the topic of Global spirituality and Global warming. The foremost questions of the conference were: Does global climate change demand a global spirituality, and How to use our knowledge wisely? The participants were constantly involved in interaction hoping to arrive at concrete answers to these questions. Through these discussions I feel that I learnt many things. We were able to discuss various options and agreed that everyone should make a definite commitment so that when they returned home, they could put it into practice. For example, I planned to run “Raising Awareness” campaigns, for the youth groups I work with, encouraging them to clean up, re-use and re-cycle. All of the participants greatly appreciated each others efforts and ideas.

Everyone was so kind and helpful to me during the conference. Through attending this conference I have gained strength, understanding and now recognize more of my own potential. I will always be grateful to Sesto Ji for giving me the chance- as a Nepalese Youth- to participate in the program. I also thank my GURU Dr. Chintamani Yogi Ji for supporting and believing in me as a young person to represent YSP (Youth Society for Peace) and Nepal. I would also like to thank Reinhard Ji for generously sponsoring me.