In 1993, the Council for a Parliament of the World’s Religions staged the first and biggest inter-religious gathering in 100 years. Commemorating this landmark anniversary year of 2013 we are:

LOOKING BACK…

120 Years Ago - The World’s Parliament of Religions was held in Chicago during the 1893 World’s Fair, hailing representatives of faith groups never previous known to the western world and giving world-wide recognition to the peace and harmony cultivated by inter-religious fellowship and cooperation. It is the site where Swami Vivekananda changed the world of religious thought with his now famous speech.

25 Years Ago - The planning for 1993 began in the basement of a Hyde Park Chicago church where religious leaders recognized the opportunity to again invest the world in interfaith dialogue.

20 Years Ago - The Parliament of World Religions in the Palmer House Hotel of Chicago convened more than 8000 people joining together for the first and largest global interfaith gathering in a century. There a breakthrough document, Towards A Global Ethic: An Initial Declaration drafted by Hans Kuns was signed by numerous faith leaders, officially establishing the ongoing work of the CPWR.

…TO MOVE FORWARD

…by canvassing scrapbooks, white papers, phone lists, and the Parliament’s internet community comprising the last two and a half decades.

We invite the attendees, organizers, and friends of the 1993 Chicago, 1999 Capetown, 2004 Barcelona, and 2009 Melbourne Parliaments of the World’s Religions to reunite with us through our “Looking Back to Move Forward” series of 2013 programs.

Here’s what we’ll be doing: 

Highlighting the stories of the Council’s friends, many who planned 1993 and continued to serve the organization by joining the board, volunteering, and attending subsequent Parliaments.

Featuring you! Did you attend 1993 in Chicago?  What about 1999 in Capetown, or Barcelona in 2004? Did you feel connected to a movement because of those experiences? Please share these memories with us. Maybe you’ve been to all of the Parliaments, and your time in one of them inspired the life you’ve been living differently the past few years. How were you changed?

Exploring how “interfaith” has evolved over the last twenty years through Parliament events. It is time to mark  20 years of the Parliament movement by documenting surprise lessons, unexpected answers, and new questions to pursue.

Updating our community on the changing face of this movement and staying current. Momentum in interfaith today has sprouted major growth in youth inter-religious organizing, initiated history-making interfaith discussions, connected groups across polar spiritual, geographic, and digital lines, and defined new relationships between the religious and secular communities.  Guiding institutions and and faith-based organizations are constantly discovering new pathways to becoming cooperative entities.  The study of religions now considers the cooperative nature of diverse faith groups, going beyond the traditional comparative religions study. We will be present in these conversations as we plan our next steps, and share our findings through our Global Listening Campaign, Faiths Against Hate Campaign, and Parliament newsletters.

Celebrating our successes. Chicago is still the Council’s base, and as we look back on all the connections we’ve made all across the globe from our offices here, we want to reconnect. Later this year we will be announcing exciting plans to invite our Parliaments friends to a can’t-miss anniversary event here in Chicago.

Please connect with us at stories@parliamentofreligions.org and share your best memories, experiences, and lessons learned from the relationship you’ve built with the Parliament.  Kindly include your name, location, Parliament(s) attended and years, as well as any contact information you are comfortable sharing.   If you have recommendations or wishes for future Parliaments, we would be delighted to read about this, too.

Ma Jaya Sati Bhagavati

Ma Jaya Sati Bhagavati, a former Brooklyn Jewish housewife turned Guru, lost her battle with pancreatic cancer last week at her home, Kashi Ashram, an interfaith spiritual community, which she founded 35 years ago in the central Florida town of Sebastian. A memorial service will be held at Kashi Ashram on Ma’s birthday, May 26, and will be open to the public.

Thousands followed Ma’s teachings and way of life through a network of affiliated communities and charities throughout the globe. As actress Julia Roberts said, “There are a few people in one’s life that create only the warmest and most powerfully positive impact imaginable. Ma Jaya Sati Bhagavati was one of those people to me and my family. She was a beautiful person who shined with love and understanding in all ways. Kashi Ashram was created out of her devotion to all who sought her wisdom and ideas. Her transition was deeply sad news and yet, as with all she did, it has brought me even closer to her words and her teachings. May we all look upon one another with loving kindness in her name and in the memory of all Mothers who love and teach us all.”

Founded by Ma in 1976, Kashi Ashram blends Eastern and Western philosophies. The Ashram sits on 80 acres at the banks of the St. Sebastian River and has dozens of temples and shrines to many diverse religions and spiritual paths. People from all walks of life are welcome and embraced at Kashi and encouraged to worship and coexist in harmony. Kashi Ashram affiliates have been opened in New York, Los Angeles, Atlanta, Chicago, and Santa Fe.

Ma was the founder of Kashi Church Foundation, The River School, The River Fund, Kashi School of Yoga, the Village of Kashi, and By the River affordable senior housing. Her present and past affiliations include Trustee Emeritus of the Council for the Parliament of the World’s Religions, Advisory Board Member of Equal Partners in Faith, Advisory Board Member of the Institute on Religion and Public Policy, Advisory Board Member of the Gardner’s Syndrome Association, Delegate to the United Religions Initiative, Member of the Board of Directors of the AIDS care organization Project Response, and member of the Parliament’s General Assembly. Ma also founded orphan centers in Uganda and India.

Click here to read article featuring remembrances of Arlo Guthrie

Click here to read the full obituary

by Helen Spector, CPWR Trustee

When Rev. Dr. David Ramage recruited me in 1990 to serve on the Board of Trustees leading up to the 1993 Parliament, I was not engaged in or much aware of the inter-religious movement.

My commitment to the Council’s work caught fire when I joined a group of Trustees to travel to Cape Town in 1998, to meet with our organizing counterparts and talk with leaders from all the faith communities who would support the Parliament in 1999 in Cape Town.  From that visit and my work since, I have come to see clearly the power of the interfaith experience and the positive impact of Council’s community organizing approach.

During our visit, we each were asked to meet individually with leaders from different faith traditions. Although I am Jewish, I had done considerable consulting with the Episcopal Church in the United States, so I visited with the Dean of St. George’s Cathedral.  He spoke with great energy about the glory days of interfaith in Cape Town during the struggle to overthrow apartheid, when every few weeks, leaders from all faith communities would meet to map the next steps in their powerful strategy of standing and marching forward together.

When he had finished his story, it seemed that a great sadness overwhelmed him, and he sat quietly for a few moments. I asked him what he hoped would come from organizing and holding the Cape Town Parliament, and he said in a very quiet voice, “Since our victory in overcoming apartheid, we have not met again. I hope that we will find a way to come together again as leaders of faith and share our hopes for rebuilding our country.”

In the years since that meeting, I have had the opportunity to witness the formation of the Cape Town Interfaith Initiative, which just observed its 10th anniversary on May 10, 2010.  Gordon Oliver, CTII Chairman, credits the Parliament event as the organizing impetus for this vibrant and growing local inter-religious movement.

More recently, Dr. Gary Bouma, Chair of the Board of Management in Melbourne, has shared with us that “before PWR 2009, 3 or 4 cities in Melbourne (which is itself divided into over 20 separate cities with their own mayors, councils and local responsibilities) had interfaith councils; now all but one do. This is a HUGE result!”

While these stories show what tangible results look like when local communities get inspired and connected, I learned something else in Cape Town, something perhaps even more important about our work of interfaith.

In the lead up to the 1999 Parliament event, The Cape Times daily newspaper sponsored a 13-week special section—“One City, Many Faiths.”   Monday through Friday, the paper carried four full pages of stories and information about five different faith traditions—Christian, Jewish, Hindu, Buddhist and African Independent traditions—which have significant populations in the city.  The publisher organized discussion groups, luncheon meetings of leaders, and interviews with people on the street to keep this initiative highly visible and energized.

After the Cape Town Parliament was over, I talked with the publisher, asking him what results he had seen from this massive initiative. “None,” he said. I was stunned. This was a huge investment of energy and resources! What did he mean he hadn’t seen any results?!

Then he told me the lesson that we all must remember: “We cannot tell you what the results are, because we have no way to count the number of hate crimes, attacks and killings that did not happen because someone walking on the street no longer saw a person who dresses differently or worships differently as someone to be feared.”

The world is full of stories like these that we will never hear. Yet we know that the inter-religious movement helps us to see each other as people with whom we share human experiences, even while we know we differ on how we worship and what we believe.

Mrs. Helen Spector joined the Board of CPWR in 1990 to help plan the 1993 Parliament Centenary Celebration. As a professional facilitator and Organizational Development consultant, Mrs. Spector has used her skills to further the values and goals of CPWR. She served as co—chair for the Site Selection task forces for the 2004, 2009 and 2014 Parliament events. She now lives in Portland, Oregon and continues as a Trustee of the Council.

From CNN

South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu announced Thursday he will retire from public life in October, when he turns 79 years old.

“Instead of growing old gracefully, at home with my family — reading and writing and praying and thinking — too much of my time has been spent at airports and in hotels,” the Nobel laureate said in a statement.

“The time has now come to slow down, to sip Rooibos tea with my beloved wife in the afternoons, to watch cricket, to travel to visit my children and grandchildren, rather than to conferences and conventions and university campuses,” he said.

Tutu, a Nobel Peace Prize winner, formally retired as Archbishop of Cape Town in 1996.

But by then he was already chairing South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, a public inquiry into the crimes of the country’s apartheid regime. He retired from that position in 1998.

Since then, Tutu has continued to travel the world, lecturing and advocating for various causes.

Click here to read the entire article.

The revival of the Parliament since 1993 is listed among the top five most important events that define the modern interreligious movement, according to Beth Katz.  The following is from her blog “The Accidental Theist“:

Recently, I gave a presentation to a group of clergy about the complexity of interfaith relations in which I traced the development of the modern interfaith movement. As I was sharing highlights of all that has and is unfolding in the U.S. and our world in terms of interfaith relations, I was struck by what an incredible time it is to be living in. Some of the most encouraging and challenging interfaith events to ever happen have occurred in the past fifty years alone (just a drop in the sea waters of time).

Here are five of what I think are some of the most formative events to have shaped interfaith relations in the U.S. and beyond in the past fifty years—let me know what other events you think belong on this list:

Click here to read the full article

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

ARCHBISHOP DESMOND TUTU TO ADDRESS
2014 PARLIAMENT BID TEAM

Chicago, Illinois (May 20, 2010) – Archbishop Desmond Tutu will deliver a special address on Thursday, May 20 at 1 PM CST to the bid/audit teams for the 2014 Parliament of the World’s Religions, welcoming them to the bid process and emphasizing the dramatic impact that hosting the Parliament can have on their cities. Reverend Tutu will appear from Cape Town, South Africa, via live-stream video, as that city marks its 10th anniversary of hosting the 1999 Parliament of the World Religions and celebrates the Parliament’s enduring legacy on the city, its institutions and its people.

Archbishop Tutu’s address takes place as part of the Cape Town Interfaith Initiative and the launch of the Charter for Compassion in South Africa. Karen Armstrong – renowned religious scholar and featured speaker at the 2009 Parliament in Melbourne, will also speak via a pre-recorded address from Cape Town.

Rev. Dirk Ficca, Executive Director of the Council for a Parliament of the World’s Religions, reflecting on Desmond Tutu’s long-standing support of the Parliament, observed, “Since his extraordinary leadership in the effort to dismantle Apartheid in South Africa, Archbishop Tutu has been an icon of the interreligious movement. With the election of Nelson Mandela in 1994, Desmond Tutu has been in the forefront of the ongoing task to create a more just and equitable society in South Africa. Like Archbishop Tutu, we are immensely proud of the role the 1999 Cape Town Parliament played in this historic process of national reconciliation.”

The Council is pleased to announce the three participating bid cities: Brussels, Belgium; Dallas, Texas, USA; and Guadalajara, Mexico. Edmonton, Alberta, Canada was present to audit the bidding process.

UPDATE: Archbishop Tutu’s address was recorded and will be available through PeaceNext.org. If you haven’t joined already, sign up to PeaceNext today to receive up-to-the-minute postings and updates on the 2014 Parliament and the work of the Council.

http://www.peacenext.org/

Contact: Alisa Roadcup, Communications Director
(312) 629-2990 x. 237
alisa@parliamentofreligions.org

Archbishop Desmond Tutu

UPDATE: Archbishop Tutu’s address was recorded and will be available through PeaceNext.org. If you haven’t joined already, sign up to PeaceNext today to receive up-to-the-minute postings and updates on the 2014 Parliament and the work of the Council.

Join the inter-religious movement online today at PeaceNext.org

From May 16 – 20, representatives from four international cities will gather in Chicago to learn more about hosting the 2014 Parliament. The meeting will take place at the Palmer House Hilton, site of the centennial 1993 Parliament and steps from the site of the inaugural Parliament of 1893 which launched the worldwide interreligious movement.

Much to our delight, Archbishop Desmond Tutu will personally address city representatives via live-stream video from the Cape Town Interfaith Initiative’s 10th Anniversary Celebration held in honor of the decade anniversary 1999 Parliament of Religions. Archbishop Tutu will share the meaningful legacy of the 1999 Cape Town Parliament as well as the critical importance of the Parliament of World Religions.

The Cape Town Interfaith Initiative will also celebrate the launch of the Charter for Compassion in South Africa. Karen Armstrong, a featured speaker at the 2009 Parliament, Melbourne, will deliver a special pre-recorded address to acknowledge the decade anniversary and to officially launch the Charter in Cape Town, South Africa.

Few aspects of religious experience are more universal than personal testimony. The stories that have emerged from past Parliaments speak to the importance of the transformative work that occurs at these historic events.  To read personal stories from attendees of past Parliaments, click here.

The centenary of the original Parliament of Religions was celebrated by a second Parliament in Chicago in 1993.  Since then, a Parliament has been held every five years in a major international city: Cape Town, South Africa in 1999; Barcelona, Spain in 2004 and Melbourne, Australia in 2009.  In addition, an Encounter of World Religions was held in Monterrey, Mexico in 2007. To find out more about these past Parliament events, click here.

To learn about the publications and reports that were composed for and at these events, click here.