From Atlanta Daily World

Members of the International College of Bishops will consecrate the Rev. Dr. Barbara Lewis King as the first bishop within the international New Thought Christian Movement of Churches.  This historic conseration service will take place on Sunday, Sept. 26, at 6 p.m. at the Hillside International Chapel and Truth Center located on Cascade Road in Atlanta.

“Dr. King has shown immense dedication, compassion and commitment to the work of the church for many years.  As an affirmation of her ministerial call and global impact, we — the members of the International College of Bishops — will consecrate her to the office of Bishop in God’s Universal Church,” said Bishop Carlton D. Pearson, Interim senior minister at Christ Universal Temple (Chicago), senior consecrator for the service.

The College of Bishops slated to consecrate Dr. King includes Bishop Yvette Flunder (San Francisco), Bishop Xavier (Ike) Eikerenkoetter (Malibu, Calif.), and Bishop Jim Swilley (Conyers, Ga.).  The Rev. Dr. Blaine Mays, president of the International New Thought Alliance, and the Rev. Dr. Della Reese-Lett, Understanding Principles for Better Living Church, will participate in the service along with Bishop Pearson. Spiritual leaders, stateswomen, and statesmen from around the world have been invited and are expected to attend the celebration, including Dr. Maya Angelou, Susan Taylor, Tavis Smiley, and Dr. Cornel West.

The living legacy of the Rev. Dr. Barbara Lewis King is a long-standing testimony of her qualifications for the position of bishop.

She is the founder minister/world spiritual leader and CEO of Hillside International Chapel and Truth Center Inc., one of the largest New Thought Christian churches in the world, and she has been enstooled as the first female chief at Assin Nsuta, Ghana, West Africa. Having had audiences with the Dalai Lama, South Africa’s former President Nelson Mandela, Archbishop Desmond Tutu; and having worked closely with His Holiness Sri Sri Ravi Shankar and Dr. and Master Zhi Gang Sha, she is known throughout the world.

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From ISKON

The next meeting of one of the biggest interfaith gatherings in the world, the Parliament of the World’s Religions, could be hosted in Brussels, Belgium in 2014—and an ISKCON devotee is front and center in the bidding process.

ISKCON’s European Communications Director Mahaprabhu Dasa goes back 117 years to explain how it came to this.

“The Parliament of the World’s Religions was first held in Chicago in 1893 as part of a large fair called the World Columbian Exposition,” he says. “An historic event, it was the first major meeting between leaders and thinkers of both western and eastern religious traditions, and is now seen as the birth of formal interreligious dialogue worldwide.”

But it wasn’t until 1993, when the City of Chicago decided to celebrate the Parliament’s 100th anniversary by having an academic conference, that it became a regular occurrence.

“As they planned it, it developed into a popular event that drew over 8,000 people from many religious communities,” Mahaprabhu explains. “The organizers decided not to wait another 100 years to hold the next one. So they held another in Cape Town, South Africa in 1999.”

After this, the Parliament was established as an event that was held every five years. The next two, held in Barcelona, Spain in 2004, and in Melbourne, Australia in 2009, were similar successes.

“Since the first four had been held in America, Africa, Europe, and Australasia respectively, I was sure the fifth would be held in Asia, the only remaining populated continent,” Mahaprabhu says. “So I began to campaign for Delhi as a candidate. But when I returned to ISKCON’s Radhadesh community in Belgium, several friends of mine who had attended previous Parliaments—including a Rabbi from the Jewish group Lubavitch-Chabad—contacted me and said, ‘Why not have it in Brussels?’ They expected that I might be able to get the ball rolling because of my connections in the interfaith world.”

…

Whatever his position, however, and whichever city wins the bid, Mahaprabhu is all set to help increase awareness and plan the involvement of devotees from all over the world.

“ISKCON Communications and other ISKCON representatives have attended all four Parliaments so far,” says Mahaprabhu. “We had an especially good presence in Barcelona—there was an ISKCON Communications stand handing out free brochures, and a “temple shop” selling devotional and cultural products. ISKCON guru Sivarama Swami did a presentation on Hungary’s eco-village project Krishna Valley, ISKCON Deity Worship Minister Krishna Ksetra Dasa participated in a panel conference, and one devotee did a cooking course. We also performed a fire sacrifice, or yajna, and held our traditional temple morning program.”

ISKCON’s participation in the Melbourne conference, however, was minimal, and Mahaprabhu hopes that its presence can be brought to a much higher level for the next Parliament in 2014.

“We really need to plan it well in advance, and to convince ISKCON leaders of its importance and receive their support,” he says. “It’s important for us to be present and to contribute in a positive way, because the Parliament—although still in its pioneer phase—is set to become a major interfaith event. For instance, last year it received heavy coverage by the media and a White House delegation even attended. So we would like to have ISKCON’s most talented leaders, thinkers and academics from around the world making proposals for workshops, conferences and presentations.”

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From The Wild Hunt

August 26th in Italy sees the beginning of the 13th annual World Congress of Ethnic Religions. Formed in 1998 at the first gathering in Lithuania, the congress works to promote tolerance of ethnic indigenous religions and create networks of support among adherents of ethnic traditions across the world. There are member organizations from across Europe, and the Congress also welcomes delegations from India, Russia, and the United States. The theme this year is “Ethics in the Contemporary World”, and is being organized by the Italian organization Gentilitas.

“The Congress theme will be to compare the different ethical views of individual members of the religious associations within WCER to find a lowest common denominator or, more simply, to discuss ethical and religious views during the development of rings.” – Federazione Pagana, Italy

WCER President Jonas Trinkunas (Romuva), who recently attended the Parliament of the World’s Religions in Australia, was inspired by his experiences there to propose a change of name and focus for the organization.

“In 2009 Romuva (Association of Lithuanian traditional religion) was invited to the Parliament of World Religions held in Melbourne, Australia. Romuva was invited to participate and was an active participant in the section of the Associations of indigenous religions. During the conference I presented not only the religious activities of Romuva, but the activities of the WCER as well. The invaluable experience of having taken part in the Parliament of World Religions after ten years of WCER encouraged me to see again and define the vision and the area of our activities. That’s why I want to reassess and redefine the term which we refer to ourselves. I refer to WCER – World Congress of Ethnic Religions (World Congress of Ethnic Religions). There is a word that I propose to discuss: the change of the term ‘world’ with ‘European’. Hence the change of name to ECER – European Congress of Ethnic Religions (European Congress of Ethnic Religions).”

In addition to the various European delegations, at least two Pagans of note from the United States will be in attendance. Andras Corban Arthen of EarthSpirit (also one of the Parliament’s Board of Trustees), and Prudence Priest, a COG Elder and co-founder of the American Vinland Association. At the AVA blog, Priest has a post running down the schedule of events at the WCER, and  talks about her role “promoting Heathenism” on her travels.

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FROM FIRE STORM TO ILLUMINATION:

Interreligious Reflections on the New York Center and Mosque Project

William Lesher, Chair Emeritus, Council for a Parliament of the World’s Religions

What some in the media have referred to as “a fire storm” over the mosque debate in lower Manhattan is turning out to be a catalyst to launch a much needed national discussion (and tutorial) on Muslims in America.

Since this discussion was intensified by the exaggerated rhetoric and distorted claims of Pamela Geller, a conservative blogger in her post on May 6, a consensus seems to be forming among constitutionally committed citizens across the political spectrum.  Fair-minded people are agreeing that the Imam and his wife in charge of the mosque project, Feisal Abdul Rauf, Daisy Khan and their supporters, have every right to expand their center and include a new worship space on the site.  They have worked from and worshipped in this place for many years, two blocks from the World Trade Center disaster.  Even though current polls claim that 7 out of 10 Americans oppose the project, opponents can hardly argue that the project planners do not have a constitutional right to carry out their vision.  As one letter to the NY Times editor put it, “As a legal matter, there is nothing to debate.  If a church or synagogue could be constructed on this site, so may a mosque.  Period. The first amendment means at least that.”

The location of the proposed Islamic Center touches the raw nerve that has elicited often shrill claims ranging from insensitivity to the families of the 9/11 victims and desecration of hallowed ground to an international Islamic conspiracy to subvert the nation.  Given the fact that the vast majority of Americans know little of Islam and know almost nothing of the history and intentions of the center planners in lower Manhattan, it is not surprising that the barrage of misinformation that initiated and continues to stoke the current national discussion has filled this vacuum and created the sharp negative and often heated responses.

But now, as the national discussion continues, one might cautiously hope, even anticipate, that the time is right for a nation-wide learning process to unfold.  This could become a time for Americans of fairness and goodwill to take the time to listen and to learn from people in the interreligious community and from Muslims themselves about the importance, the variety, and the beauty of this second largest religion in the world. And to hear as well, about the healing potential for having a thoroughly American expression of Islam close to the site of Ground Zero.

The Interreligious Movement in the US and around the world has been building bridges of understanding among religious communities, including Islam, for the last few decades.  Many religious people in the US are affiliated with local interreligious councils or with national and international organizations like United Religions Initiative (URI) or Religions for Peace (RFP) or have participated in one of the four modern Parliaments of the World’s Religions (PWR) with which I am affiliated. These people have led the way in this historic movement to develop knowledge, understanding, and respect for religious and spiritual communities of the world, many of whom have growing numbers of adherents in our towns and cities, states and nation.

People affiliated with the growing interreligious movement know about the great diversity that exists within Islam, not unlike the wide spectrum of beliefs, traditions and behaviors among different sectors in the Christian and Jewish communities. They know what William Dalrymple wrote about in an illuminating Op-Ed piece in the New York Times entitled, “The Muslims in the Middle,” that Islam is not a monolithic religion.  Rather it is as complex as Christianity and Judaism, with as many, perhaps more divisions, sects and traditions, some in opposition to others, as is true of every major religious group. Dalrymple helpfully teaches in his article how “Feisal Abdul Rauf…is one of America’s leading thinkers of Sufism, the mystical form of Islam which in terms of goals and outlook couldn’t be farther from the violent Wahabism of the jihadists.  His videos and sermons preach love, the remembrance of God and reconciliation…..But in the eyes of Osama bin Laden and the Taliban, he is an infidel-loving, grave-worshipping apostate…”

Members of the interfaith movement are also leading the resistance to the resisters and need to do so more and more.  In another New York Times article describing protests against mosques in several communities around the country, Laurie Goodstein focuses on Temecula, Ca.  There she writes: “In late June …members of a local Tea Party group took dogs and picket signs to Friday prayers at a mosque that is seeking to build a new worship center on a vacant lot nearby.”  She goes on to say that an estimated 20 – 30 people turned out to protest the mosque.  But then Ms. Goodstein states what many of us think is the real story in Temecula, “that the protesters were outnumbered by at least 75 supporters” who affirm the right of the Muslim congregation in Temecula to expand their mosque.  Something good is happening in Temecula when, less then a decade after 9/11, local citizens know and act on the difference between their mainstream Muslim neighbors and the terrorists whose actions violated the most basic tenants of Islam. It’s too bad that the NY Times headlined the Goodstein article, “Across Nation, Mosque Projects Meet Resistance” and missed the positive thrust of the Temecula story.

Speaking from the experience of the Parliament of the World’s Religions, the 2004 Parliament in Barcelona, Spain focused major attention on the issue of Religiously Motivated and Experienced Violence.  After several days of intense workshop discussions, participants from across the interreligious spectrum, agreed that the minimum responsibility of religious communities  is to come to the aid of any religious community whose house of worship is the target of an attack, vandalism, threat or destruction.

The recent Parliament in Melbourne, Australia in 2009 featured a strong focus on Islam.  Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf himself was a major presenter leading or participating in six interreligious programs with the following titles: “Applying Islamic Principles for a Just and Sustainable World”;  “Sacred Envy Panel: Exploring What We Love about Our Own Faith, What We Admire in Others and What Challenges Us in Both”;  “Purifying the Heart and Soul through Remembrance of Allah”; “Dhikr As An Islamic Devotional Act for Inner Peace”; “How Islam Deals with Social Justice, Gender Justice and Religious Diversity”; and “Islam and the West: Creating an Accord of Civilizations.”  How much could such a teacher of Islam help to bridge the gulf of misunderstanding about this great faith tradition by continuing his long and much admired ministry in lower Manhattan where he has built an international reputation for promulgating a modern version of Islam?

So, while some call it a “fire storm” and do their best to make it so, there are other voices that seem to be gaining strength.  Among the shouting and the uninformed outrage that sometimes seems ubiquitous, I sense that  responsible media outlets and people in the interreligious movement are grasping the significance of this moment and are helping to seed the discussion with historical facts, accurate information and a commitment to understanding and respect.  If this trend continues we will all learn important things about ourselves and about the most recent global religious tradition to enter the mainstream of American life.

From AnnArbor.com

Patheos.com, in its summer Future of Religion series, invited authors and scholars to write about the Future of Paganism this week.

According to Patheos.com’s overview, Paganism represents “a wide variety of traditions that emphasize reverence for nature and a revival of ancient polytheistic religious practices.” The article notes, “some Pagan traditions include ritual magic, but this practice is not universal.” This diverse grassroots movement includes Wicca, Goddess Spirituality, and the Pagan Reconstructionist religions (Norse, Druidic, Egyptian, and Greek).

According to Margot Adler, author, NPR journalist, and Wiccan priestess, the Contemporary Pagan Movement has “come of age” in the last 15 years, with estimates of 1 million practicing Pagans. Pagans are being recognized in military cemeteries, hospitals, seminaries, and the Parliament of the World’s Religions. “In short,” Adler says, “Paganism has become a mainstream movement, which has mostly been a good thing.” She asks, however, whether the movement’s critique of monotheistic and patriarchal religions will become “lost or watered down” as it gains more respect in the mainstream.

Sarah Pike, author and professor of religious studies at California State University, discusses the evolving news coverage of Paganism in recent years. Twenty-five years ago, a story about local Pagans gathering in an Indiana state forest was characterized as “devil-worshippers in Yellowwood Forest,” sparking national controversy. This year, the news coverage of Summer Solstice 2010 and other Solstice celebrations was “overwhelmingly positive.”

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From The Washington Post

By Katherine Marshall

When South Africa was emerging from the dark shadows of the apartheid era, Malaysia was one place it looked for successful examples of how to address the difficult legacy of racial inequality. Malaysia’s Malay citizens (about 60 percent of the total) lagged behind other groups and helping them to “catch up” was a deliberate government policy.

Malaysia is justly proud of its record in managing what at one time threatened to be a conflict-ridden transition. It also takes pride in its distinctive Muslim culture and in the way its religious and ethnic diversity works in a fast-changing society. But behind Malaysia’s new prosperity, seen in glittering skyscrapers and tangles of freeways, there are lively debates about what lies ahead.

Malaysia’s challenges involve above all its diverse ethnic, religious and economic identities, and today’s debates turn on how the three are intertwined. By constitution, Malaysia is a Muslim nation and its population is majority Muslim. Malays and Islam are tightly linked. That translates, among other things, into legal tussles over whether one can renounce being a Muslim. Malaysians are trying to identify how the country’s Islamic identity is distinct and how much latitude there is for different strands of Islamic thinking; how much can Malaysian Islam change as the country modernizes? The country’s minorities are largely Chinese and Indian, and they are mostly Buddhists and Christians. How do their rights balance with those of the Malay and Muslim majority, in law and in the society?

…

An example of the way Malaysian Islam is changing was the recent popular reality TV show that selected a young “cool” imam (Muhammad Asyraf Mohammad Ridzuan) from among 10 finalists; the others were voted off the program one by one, just like “American Idol.” The idea was to make Islam more appealing to young people and to make them associate religion with inspiration rather than caning and morality raids. The finalists were chosen from 1,000 candidates, faced written and practical tests on religion each week, and were quarantined in a mosque dormitory and banned from using phones, the Internet and television. They had to persuasively steer youngsters away from sex and drugs. Imam Muda had almost 94,000 Facebook fans when I last checked.

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From Earth Spirit Voices

by Andras Corban Arthen

One of the most important events of the Parliament of the World’s Religions – the Indigenous Assembly – was, quite likely, the least visible: attendance was by invitation only, and it was held in a former convent several miles away from the Exhibition Center, where most of the other programs took place.

In keeping with one of the Parliament’s seven main themes (and as mentioned in these pages prior to the event), the idea of convening an Indigenous Assembly in Melbourne was, from the beginning, a major focus of the Indigenous Task Force’s plans – we wanted to create a space wherein the international representatives of Indigenous traditions traveling to Melbourne would get a chance to meet with their counterparts from Australia and the South Pacific to discuss issues of mutual relevance, and perhaps even come up with a joint statement to be delivered during one of the Parliament’s plenary sessions. Our initial plans called for a three-day assembly which, for the first two days, would be limited exclusively to the Indigenous delegates, then opened on the third day to include representatives from other cultures and religions. Unfortunately, budgetary and time constraints forced us to scale back our plans and keep the assembly to one day.

Early in the morning of Monday, 7 December, about fifty Indigenous representatives, volunteers and translators traveled to the Abbotsford Convent near Victoria Park, some six miles away. Most of us had already had breakfast, but upon arrival we were offered juice, pastries and other refreshments as we waited for everyone to arrive.

The proceedings started with a brief introduction by Task Force chair Omie Baldwin, followed by a traditional welcome to country by Auntie Joy Murphy Wandin, senior elder of the Wurundjeri people who are the traditional “owners” of the land that includes Melbourne. Wominjeka Wurundjeri Balluk yearmen koondi bik (”welcome to the land of the Wurundjeri People”), she intoned, as she did probably a dozen more times during the course of the Parliament; but each time she spoke those words they were like music, as fresh and as heartfelt as if she were saying them for the very first time, and we felt, indeed, very welcome. Auntie Joy had some very kind words to say to those of us who served on the Task Force and organized the event, and gave each of us an Aboriginal flag as a gift.

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From The Wisdom of the Labyrinth

Acclaimed cultural historian, cosmologist, Passionist priest, and Earth scholar, Thomas Berry, was among the first of our world’s religious leaders to suggest that the earth ecological crisis is fundamentally a spiritual crisis. Thomas Berry dedicated his life to The Great Work of our time which he described simply as “moving the human community from its present situation as a destructive presence on the planet to a benign or mutually enhancing presence.” Dr. Mary Evelyn Tucker and Dr. John Grim, co-founders and co-directors of The Forum on Religion and Ecology at Yale and The Thomas Berry Foundation, join host Robin Bradley Hansel to share their stories and reflections on Thomas Berry’s life, his work, his writings, and his passionate dream for our Earth community.

Click here to hear the broadcast.

Katherine Marshall

Moral and Practical Challenges:
Fighting Poverty and Seeking Global Equity

By Katherine Marshall

My organization, the World Faiths Development Dialogue (WFDD), focused at the Parliament, from start to finish, on orchestrating a complex poverty and equity seminar that involved over twenty distinct events. We emerged with a hope that these many different encounters and exchanges did serve what we are convinced is an important purpose: to bring a far wider group of religious communities into the global debates about poverty and equity, and to enhance the commitments of leaders and communities to act.

WFDD’s work centers on why global development institutions should care about religious views, and what religious communities offer, actually and potentially, in meeting the challenges of global development. As we wrestled with these demanding and complex issues and views, we had six topics in our minds that present particular challenges and opportunities. Many themes that were broached during the Parliament touch, more or less directly, on these threads.

Challenge one: so what do we mean by development?
A first challenge is to appreciate what we mean today when we use the term “development”. A mounting uncertainty and ambiguity in how that term is used spills over into institutional missions, debates about what works and what does not, and into the shape and motivations of the development professions. My urging is that we appreciate this complexity in framing the challenges, but also discern more thoughtfully how we are making sense of the changing world around us. The purpose of what we call development could not be more demanding: to allow human potential to flourish in diverse societies that respect a hard core of human rights and just principles. But we are far from achieving that goal. We readily recognize the bad habits and pitfalls as we listen to people describing the world and prescribing solutions in inherited and outmoded language and categories. In short, the Parliament discussions suggest that we can and need to do better.

Challenge two: focusing on the new “bottom billion” paradigm
One idea that has emerged in part from those contending with the inadequacies of overly simplistic pictures of the world is a new and increasingly influential paradigm. It posits a need to focus far more attention and resources on a specific category of countries and societies that fall at the bottom of welfare indicators. The Parliament highlighted the particularly important role that religion plays in most, if not all, the societies and nations that fall into the “bottom billion” category, which have been far too little appreciated and explored. This is a priority area for attention.

Challenge three: charity, rights, and the MDGs
A major shift in thinking about development has special significance for religions because it is so deeply embedded in history and ethics. There is a move from a situation where international development and objectives for human development have been driven, above all, by a motivation for charity to a paradigm that is motivated by notions of human rights. In this newer frame, the driving force is justice more than compassion.

Challenge four: getting a grip on uncoordinated aid
A theme that preoccupies many people in the developing world is poor coordination; a problem that can be termed the challenge of “getting a grip” on development assistance. The current reality of countless groups working without respect for local situations, without a common strategy, and too often at cross-purposes is daunting. This has special relevance for religious communities because they tend to fall in the minority group that sees virtue in diversity and decentralized initiatives. There is an obvious need to get at least some grip on the situation.

Challenge five: accountability, results, and good governance
With a general pattern of decentralized intervention, which focuses more on human engagement than efficiency in resource management, religious organizations are often coming rather late to global governance debates. They have immense experience and moral authority to offer, so it is high time they become more actively engaged.

Challenge six: how far to press for interfaith action
Appreciating that faith and religious bodies are major development actors that provide extensive services and shape attitudes that are important to change and to the lives of communities, a next question is how far we should aspire to an interfaith grounding for their work. Generally, many see promise in what some might term a “side by side” model. Different religious communities can be encouraged to work together to address a common problem that has little to nothing to do with religion (poor housing, gangs disruption, urban life). Once the groups have experienced working together, they come to know each other, and that builds strength in the community. The question is how far such initiatives should extend beyond spiritual and religious matters.

Conclusions
A central conclusion is that this work has barely begun; much lies ahead. We urgently need more conversations that bring the different views together, so that we can try to find common ground and agreement on common action. We need to focus more sharply on the multifaceted insights and assets that different religions offer, thus building a new agenda for interfaith dialogue. We cannot achieve our hopes and dreams without such conversations and without a better understanding.

Katherine Marshall, a major speaker at the 2009 Parliament, is Executive Director of World Faiths Development Dialogue.

An Indigenous Peoples’ Statement to the World

Delivered at The Parliament of the World’s Religions

Convened at Melbourne, Australia

on the Traditional Lands

of the Wurundjeri  People of the Kulin Nation

December 9, 2009

PREAMBLE

In keeping with the theme of this year’s Parliament: “Make a World of Difference: Hearing each other, Healing the earth,” We, the Indigenous Peoples participating in this Parliament hereby issue this statement:

We are Indigenous Peoples and Nations who honor our ancestors and care for our future generations by preserving our lands and cultures. For thousands of years, Indigenous peoples have maintained a fundamental and sacred relationship with Mother Earth. As peoples of the land, we declare our inherent rights to our present and continuing survival within our sacred homelands and territories throughout the world;

We commend the Australian government’s recent support for the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. We call on all governments to support and implement the provisions of the UN Declaration.

Since time immemorial we have lived in keeping with our sacred laws, principles, and spiritual values, given by the Creator. Our ways of life are based on thousands of years of accumulated ecological knowledge, a great respect for our Mother Earth, a reverence and respect for all our Natural World relations and the survival of our languages, cultures, and traditions.

The Indigenous instructions of sharing and the responsibility of leadership to future generations are wise and enduring. As the traditional nations of our lands we affirm the right to educate our children in our earth-based education systems in order to maintain our indigenous knowledge systems and cultures. These have also contributed to our spiritual, physical and mental health;

Indigenous peoples concept of health and survival is holistic, collective and individual.

It encompasses the spiritual, the intellectual, the physical and the emotional. Expressions of culture relevant to health and survival of Indigenous Peoples includes relationships, families, and kinship, social institutions, traditional laws, music, dances, songs and songlines, ceremonies and dreamtime, our ritual performances and practices, games, sports, language, mythologies, names, land, sea, water, every life forms, and all documented forms and aspects of culture, including burial and sacred sites, human genetic materials, ancestral remains, so often stolen, and our artifacts;

Unfortunately, certain doctrines have been threatening to the survival of our cultures, our languages, and our peoples, and devastating to our ways of life. These are found in particular colonizing documents such as the Inter Caetera papal bull of 1493, which called for the subjugation of non-Christian nations and peoples and “the propagation of the Christian empire.” This is the root of the Doctrine of Christian Discovery that is still interwoven into laws and policies today that must be changed. The principles of subjugation contained in this and other such documents, and in the religious texts and documents of other religions, have been and continue to be destructive to our ways of life (religions), cultures, and the survival of our Indigenous nations and peoples. This oppressive tradition is what led to the boarding schools, the residential schools, and the Stolen Generation, resulting in the trauma of language death and loss of family integrity from the actions of churches and governments. We call on those churches and governments to put as much time, effort, energy and money into assisting with the revitalization of our languages and cultures as they put into attempting to destroy them.

The doctrines of colonization and dominion have laid the groundwork for contemporary problems of racism and dispossession. These problems include the industrial processes of resource exploitation and extraction by governments and corporations that has consistently meant the use of imposed laws to force the removal of Indigenous peoples from our traditional territories, and to desecrate and destroy our sacred sites and places. The result is a great depletion of biodiversity and the loss of our traditional ways of life, as well as the depletion and contamination of the waters of Mother Earth from mining and colonization.

Such policies and practices do not take into account that water is the first law of life and a gift from the Creator for all beings. Clean, healthy, safe, and free water is necessary for the continuity and well being of all living things. The commercialization and poisoning of water is a crime against life.

The negative ethics of contemporary society, discovery, conquest, dominion, exploitation, extraction, and industrialization, have brought us to today’s crisis of global warming. Climate change is now our most urgent issue and affecting the lives of indigenous peoples at an alarming rate. Many of our people’s lives are in crisis due to the rapid global warming. The ice melt in the north and rapid sea rise continue to accelerate, and the time for action is brief.

The Earth’s resources are finite and the present global consumption levels are unsustainable and continue to affect our peoples and all peoples. Therefore, we join the other members of the Parliament in calling for prompt, immediate, and effective action at Copenhagen to combat climate change;

On September 13, 2007, the United Nations General Assembly adopted the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. In support of this historic event, the Episcopalian Church in the United States adopted a resolution at its 76^th General Convention in July 2009, repudiating and disavowing the dehumanizing Doctrine of Christian Discovery. By doing so, the Church took particular note of the charter issued by King Henry VII of England to John Cabot and his sons, which authorized the colonizing of North America. It was by this ‘boss over’ tradition of Christian discovery that the British crown eventually laid claim to the traditional territories of the Aboriginal nations of the continent now called Australia, under terra nullius and terra nullus. This step by the Episcopalian Church was an act of conscience and moral leadership by one of the world’s major religions. Religious bodies of Quakers and Unitarians have taken similar supportive actions.

In Conclusion, we appeal to all people of conscience to join with us: We hereby call upon Pope Benedict XVI and the Vatican to publicly acknowledge and repudiate the papal decrees that legitimized the original activities that have evolved into the Doctrine of Christian Discovery and Dominion.

Click here to download this document.