Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, September 4, 1993 TAG: 9309040036
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: CHICAGO LENGTH: Medium
Dressed in red and gold robes with a smile never far away, the 1989 Nobel Peace Prize winner said Friday that religious leaders must work together to bring about a spiritual awakening in the world.
"Our beautiful world is facing many crises," the exiled Tibetan Buddhist leader said at a news conference. "It is not a time to pretend something's good."
The Dalai Lama is scheduled to give the keynote address at the closing session today of the historic eight-day parliament.
Participants also are expected to formally sign a declaration for a global ethic that seeks interreligious cooperation for peace and justice.
Friday, the Dalai Lama also expressed hope the parliament would give rise to another group that would continue its interfaith work.
Some 6,000 representatives from the world's major faiths and a variety of smaller traditions registered for the first parliament of religions since an 1893 conference in Chicago. The gathering was designed to promote peace among religions, but almost from the start there have been tensions.
On Sunday, a shouting match briefly delayed one session. It erupted when a Sikh from Punjab, India, spoke of the persecution of members of his faith.
On Monday, the Orthodox Christian Host Committee withdrew to protest the presence of neo-pagan groups, including witches.
On Thursday, four Jewish organizations withdrew as sponsors to protest the appearance of Nation of Islam Minister Louis Farrakhan.
David Ramage, parliament chairman, said Farrakhan was invited by the event's African American Host Committee.
"We have tried to follow the beacon of hope that persons who have so vigorously disagreed and have been hurt by each other in the past might come together and find some basis for new beginnings and hope and harmony for the future," he said in a statement.
Some parliament officials have tried to portray the tensions as an almost unavoidable result of such a diverse gathering. And some individuals from both the Orthodox and Jewish communities are still participating even though their agencies have withdrawn.
Roman Catholic theologian Hans Kung, the main drafter of The Global Ethic, said there have been "minor clashes," but the more significant development is how well the world's faiths have worked together.
But other scholars say the tensions show the difficulty of the parliament's task in a world where many conflicts are carried out in the name of religion.
"The contemporary reality is that religion and politics are so interconnected that it's not possible to have a public event where political tensions don't come to the surface," said Stewart Hoover of the University of Colorado at Boulder.
by CNB