Events - Reports

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Second Joint International Conference of Christian and Muslim Women

Gothenburg on 3-7 September 2008

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

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

Click to read report

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Declaration from Hindu-Jewish Summit in Jerusalem, February 2008

click to download page one

click to download page two

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

My Cherished Experience 

‘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. 

Om Shanti!! Om Shanti !! Om Shanti !!! 

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