Declaration of the 10th World Assembly of Religions for Peace, 2019
Preamble
We – 900 women, men, and youth – have gathered in Lindau, Germany, coming
from 125 countries for the 10th World Assembly of Religions for Peace.
We are grateful for 49 years of determined focus on building peace and
on speaking for those most in need. We are an alliance of care, of compassion,
of love. We represent a far greater, ever growing, and ever-radiating alliance
of “common action” that Religions for Peace gladly serves. In that light
we acknowledge with sorrow the ways – subtle and gross – that we and our
religious communities have fallen-short. Our hearts grieve over the misuse
of our faiths, especially the ways they have been twisted to fuel violence
and hate. Our alliance honors our religious differences, even as it serves
the peace for which the human heart hungers. We gather in hope, convinced
that the sacred calls all humanity into shared responsibility for our common
good, care for one another, the earth, and its entire web of life.
The burdens of the human family are well-known to us. We know too well
war, how it kills, maims, and destroys the lives of the innocent. We know
the crushing weight of extreme poverty, how it stunts, humiliates, and
plunders. Ten percent of our human family is desperately poor. We know
that more than 70 million of us no longer find shelter in the sanctuary
of their homes. They are refugees, internally displaced, and persons forced
to be on the move. We know we have entered a terrifying new arms race,
one that includes modernizing nuclear arms, weaponizing space and artificial
intelligence, and new energy weapons. These burdens are profoundly exacerbated
by the cataclysmic heating of the earth, decimation of the rainforests,
poisoning of the seas, and choking of the web of life.
We are also experiencing what we call a “meta-crisis” of our modern order,
which lies behind the United Nations and the agreements our states have
made on human rights, the rule of law, and international trade. Freedoms
of all kinds, the protections of minorities, and the fabric of our connection
have come under attack around the world. On the economic front, a meager
handful of the richest persons have more wealth than four billion persons.
Adding to the political and economic dimensions of this meta-crisis of
modern order, there is today a “meta-crisis” of truth, which challenges
the notion of “truth,” while “fake news” is tailored for political or commercial
gain. Today, we are buffeted between inconvenient truths and convenient
fabrications. The hour is late: we are called to urgent action.
Caring for our Common Future: Advancing Shared Well-Being
Our heart’s inner-most experiences of the sacred and our outer-most social
lives cry out to be connected in a state of positive peace that Religions
for Peace calls, “shared well-being.” Our different experiences of the
sacred make clear that we are, at root, relational: radically related to
the sacred and to all that is caused or embraced by the sacred. As fundamentally
relational, our well-being is intrinsically shared. Helping the other,
we are helped; injuring the other, we wound ourselves. We fully acknowledge
the invaluable roles of women and youth among us and will continually mainstream
their irreplaceable contributions. Our different traditions make clear
that the sacred establishes us as both responsible for and dependent upon
each other and the earth that sustains us. Shared well-being calls us to
commit to all the ways the modern order supports our human dignity. It
also calls us to offer in a constructive spirit any complementary contributions
from our religions. We affirm the modern order’s recognition of the foundational
importance of freedom. At the same time, we are called to show by example
the sacred grounding of freedom. It leads through the despair of nihilism,
rejects the narcissism of mindless consumerism, and expresses itself as
radical care for all.
To our commitment to the importance of human rights, we add our foundational
concern for the cultivation of virtues, those habitual orientations to
value that sculpt our human potentials. These include our potentials for
the most elevated states of mercy, compassion, and love. For us, the labor
to become virtuous is not a solitary act; rather, it is an act of “solidarity;”
one that can only be achieved by generosity and mutual love. The cultivation
of virtue tackles the ignorance, individual egoism, and group egoism that
mutilate authentic community.
Shared well-being also calls for a robust notion of the “common good” that
can serve all of us in our efforts to virtuously unfold our rights-protected
human dignity. The supreme good for us is the sacred, even as we understand
it differently. The common good includes the earth with its air, water,
soil, and web of life. The common good also includes just institutions
that help each to develop her or his human dignity. These call all of us
to a shared and grateful responsibility. Each person is to draw from the
common good; each is to help build it up.
Advancing shared well-being is concrete. We commit to advancing shared
well-being by preventing and transforming violent conflicts, promoting
just and harmonious societies, nurturing sustainable and integral human
development, and protecting the earth.
Preventing and Transforming Violent Conflicts
We commit to preventing violent conflicts by advancing peace education
– from early childhood to adults across our religious communities – focusing
on shared values, religious literacy, and narratives of peace. We will
build skills in conflict management that address the drivers of conflicts
non-violently. Our commitments to transforming violent conflicts are actualized
in our Assembly by the religious leaders from Myanmar, the Democratic Republic
of Congo, the Central African Republic, Nigeria, and South Sudan. Our commitment
is also expressed in the religious women represented by those from the
Middle East and North African Region in the Assembly plenary. Here, also,
religious persons from North and South Korea have worked to construct conditions
for peace on the Korean Peninsula. These religious leaders have convened
privately in the Assembly to strengthen one another as partners, peacemakers,
and healers. We commit to supporting their efforts in their respective
countries and regions. We adopt The Peace Charter for Forgiveness and Reconciliation,
convinced that transforming violent conflicts requires the healing of historical
wounds and painful memories, forgiveness, and reconciliation. We commit
to integrating efforts for healing into all our conflict resolution work.
To renew our commitment to nuclear disarmament, we pledge to be a full
partner of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons. We condemn
the existence of nuclear weapons, affirm our support for the Treaty on
the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, and will educate, mobilize, and engage
religious communities toward these ends. We also call for immediate steps
toward general disarmament including all weapons of destruction – conventional,
nuclear, chemical, biological, and those newly emerging.
Promoting Just and Harmonious Societies
We take heart that multi-religious actors and institutions are working
to build just and harmonious societies with a vibrant spirit of care and
commitment to justice. We commit to continued common action to tackle injustices,
including the large scale displacement of persons, and resulting challenges
from the migration crises – both for refugees and migrants and the societies
where they settle. We will make the global forced migration crisis a priority
for action. We will lead by example in “welcoming the other.” We commit
to instilling the respect, mutuality, and solidarity that are essential
to promote, build, and sustain just, harmonious, and diverse communities.
A cross-cutting commitment can be education, including religious literacy,
from early childhood to adults, that focuses on shared civic virtues and
appreciation for social diversity. We will develop an Alliance of Virtue
based on a declaration of virtues widely shared across religious traditions
and other virtue heritages.
We pledge to protect children, vulnerable individuals and communities and
advocate for their human rights and well-being in the face of grave suffering.
We will speak up forcefully and take action against corruption and for
good governance. We commit ourselves to caring and determined effort to
address the causes and reality of widespread abuses and violence, especially
against women and children. We also commit to common efforts within our
communities, with civil society partners and governments to ensure principled
freedom of religion worldwide. We, persons of faith, yearn to protect holy
sites and feel safe within them. We will preserve and protect holy sites
against violence and desecration, partnering with the United Nations Alliance
of Civilizations to form living rings for peace around them.
Sustainable and Integral Human Development and Protecting the Earth
We commit to human development as set forth in the Sustainable Development
Goals (SDGs). We will foster sustainable and integral human development
by promoting the justice, inclusive citizenship, and equal opportunities
interwoven through the SDGs. We will champion personal accountability for
sustainable consumption, the dignity of labor, and equitable distribution
of wealth. We will honor the insights of science and steward progress in
digital technology toward the good of all. We will advance universal access
to education. We will continue to promote the role of women and youth in
society and their leadership in institutions at the local, national, regional,
and global levels.
We commit to urgent action against the climate crisis. We will mobilize
religious communities to protect the earth – including the promotion of
“green congregations.” Leaders and partners in the fight against environmental
degradation, our Indigenous brothers and sisters remind us, “when Mother
Earth suffers, human beings suffer; when human beings suffer, Mother Earth
suffers.” We, guardians and caretakers of earth, endorse the Faiths for
Forests Declaration. We commit to raise awareness about tropical deforestation
and to educate our religious communities about the dire spiritual and sustainability
crisis. We will take action to live ecologically balanced and sustainable
lifestyles and advocate for government policies to protect rainforests,
defend the rights of Indigenous peoples, and fulfill their pledges to the
Paris Agreement on climate change.
Call-To-Common-Action
Guided by the principles of our own religious traditions, and respectful
of religious differences, we personally commit to fostering positive peace
as shared well-being. We will be partners with sincere believers of other
religions and all women and men of good will to:
-produce positive peace materials and workshops for multi-religious contexts
with the Institute for Economics and Peace;
-develop tools and training on the positive roles of women in preventing
and transforming conflicts, and on the issue of violence against them;
-acknowledge past hurts – including across religious traditions – and foster
public acts of forgiveness and reconciliation;
-work for the well-being of refugees and migrants and develop programs
of accompaniment and support;
-urge religious communities to invest their resources in alignment with
achieving the SDGs;
-raise public awareness about deforestation with the Interfaith Rainforest
Initiative and through the acceptance and promotion of the Faith for Forests
Declaration, take action against climate change in general, and advocate
for policies that protect the earth;
-advance reconciliation as a vital dimension of positive Peace within persons
and among communities and nations as per The Peace Charter for Forgiveness
and Reconciliation;
-commit to being a full-partner to support the International Campaign to
Abolish Nuclear Weapons;
-forge an Alliance of Virtue based on a declaration of virtues widely shared
across religious traditions and other virtue heritages.
We speak with humility, asking for support and blessings.
Lindau, Germany
23 August 2019