Spotlight on CLAL
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Religion, Violence And Peace: Muslim Initiative Brings Interfaith
Leaders Together To Promote World Peace
Brad Hirschfield, the Only North American Rabbinic
Participant, Will Address Moscow Symposium
By Judy Epstein, Director of Public Affairs
In the globalizing world, will religions be able to co-exist by showing mutual respect and understanding, or will they be used to fuel hatred and conflict rather than tolerance and love?
On June 7-8, 2005, interfaith leaders from across the globe will gather at the Kremlin for a symposium to address these issues. Organized by the Intercultural Dialogue Platform, a Muslim organization based in Istanbul that convenes inter-religious dialogue to foster greater harmony, and its Eurasian branch (DA) based in Moscow, it will explore how religious faiths are being exploited to support political conflicts and violence, and look at ways to promote peace and counter terrorism.
Providing a Jewish perspective on interfaith co-existence will be Rabbi Brad Hirschfield, the only North American rabbi invited and one of the few American participants. Rabbi Hirschfield, the Vice President of CLAL-The National Jewish Center for Learning and Leadership, will speak about the role and responsibility of a group’s members as the interpreters of its tradition, and the Jewish concept of justice and peace.
“At this moment in human history, members of all faith communities are faced with a critical choice,” said Rabbi Hirschfield. “We have unprecedented religious violence and remarkable spiritual engagement. What role does each of the world’s great religious traditions play in both beating the drums of war and in building bridges for peace?”
Representatives from Asia, Europe, the Americas and the Middle East will attend the Moscow program, which will consider the political, social, cultural, and economic sources of violence, and religion’s contribution to universal ethics. Moscow, long a city of atheism in the Soviet era, has seen a resurgence of faith in recent years.
The Intercultural Dialogue Platform, with its advisory board that includes Christian and Jewish members, is at the forefront of promoting Muslims as a force for tolerance. By bringing intellectuals and religious leaders from around the world together, it hopes to alleviate suspicions of each other, establish new networks, and begin conversations on religion as an instrument of global peace.
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