Parliament of Worlds Religion 1999 Capetown SA

Author(s): Parliament of the World’s Religions
Publisher: USA Parliament of the Worlds Religions

Page 162

1999
PARLIAMENT O F
DIALOGUE
3:00 PM-3:45 PM IN THEATER 5
Common Enemies Facing Faith Communities
H. E. Sayyed Musawi
Common dangers facing the human society at large are the real enemy of all religious groups. Some examples of these perils are immoral wars, drugs, crime, and the misuse of religion for political gains. The presentation will focus on the need for Faith communities to cooperate and join efforts to tackle such common dangers.
Sayyed Musawi is head of a worldwide Shiite Muslim organization covering 5 continents. He was head of the Interfaith Council of India. and he is now head of Interfaith International, which is an NGO at the United Nations. Mr. Musawi continually works with heads of state and leaders of various religious and international organizations to make the world a better place.
3:00 PM-3:45 PM IN COMMERCE 4.20 Compassionate Communication: How To Enjoy Painful Messages
Rev. Stephanie Clarke
During this workship. Rev. Clarke introduces skills for communicating compassionately across all lines: faith, race, gender, etc. We will first learn to recognize the forms of communicating which interfere with the meeting of needs. We will then develop and practice a new language of compassion which allows for everybody's needs to be met while promoting peace and harmony on an individual and global level.
Religious Science Minister, Stephanie Clarke, teaches classes, facilitates workshops and writes for International publications in the field of spiritual psychology and metaphysics. She has a large private clientele as a licensed practitioner, reaching out across cultural and color lines. Stephanie is returning to S. Africa (12/99) to establish an interracial nondenominational ministry.
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3:00 PM-3:45 PM IN COMMERCE 3.70
DISCOVERY
Prof. Kevin Sharpe
This a fascinating look at religious thinkers of the past, and how their theologies responded to the secular and scientific challenges of their day. Their experiences have a lesson for all who feel spiritually 'adrift' in the modern world.
Kevin Sharpe was born in 1950 in New Zealand, lived in the United States for sixteen years, and now resides in Oxford, England. He is a Professor in the Graduate College of the Union Institute, Cincinnati, a nontraditional distance learning program, where he supervises and advises doctoral studies. He is also a Visiting Fellow at the lan Ramsey Center, Oxford University. His academic background includes two doctorates, one in mathematics (from la Trobe University, Melbourne, Australia) and one in religious studies (from Boston University). Ecclesiastically, he is an Episcopal ( or Anglican) Priest.
3:00 PM-3:45 PM IN COMMERCE 2.54 Global Civil Society: A Framework for a Dialogue of Religions
Prof. Mervyn Frost
In this lecture, the specific features of global civil society will be outlined which are of particular significance for a dialogue between religions. In particular, attention will be drawn to the fact that civil society has no borders, that it has no centralized government, therefore, can have no partisan policies, that membership is open to all, and that it is not based on national, tribal, ethnic, or cultural loyalties. The existence and growing strength of global civil society provides a most promising framework for a dialogue between religions in the forthcoming millennium.
Mervyn Frost was educated at the Universities of Stellenbosch and Oxford. He is currently Professor of International Relations at the
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University of Kent, in Canterbury, England. Some of his major published contributions to the study of ethics in world affairs are: Ethics in International Relations, The Role of Normative Theory in IR, Constituting a New World Order, Migrants, Civil Society and Sovereign States: Investigating and Ethical Hierarchy, and A Turn Not Taken: Ethics in IR at the Millennium.
3:00 PM-3:45 PM IN COMMERCE 2.70 Relevance of Scientific Thought in Jainism
Dr. Mahavir Raj Gelra
Jain scriptures have provided a classical knowledge not only of life and mind but also of the external world, i.e. the description of the cosmos, dimensions of space, transition of soul during transmigration, existence of black holes, form, structure, and dynamics of Pudgala, etc. This scientific knowledge has placed Jain religion and Jain philosophy on firm footing to an extent that it has taken important suggestive leads for modern science in certain fields.
Dr. Mahavir Raj Gelra has presented papers on Jainism and modern science at various national and international conferences. He is a former and founder Vice Chancellor of Jain Vishva Bharati Institute Ladnun, India.
3:00 PM-3:45 PM IN COMMERCE 1.37
Responding to Philosophical Criticisms of Universal Truth Claims in the Second and Third Parliaments of the World's Religions
Mr. James Kraft
This paper rigorously presents philosophical criticisms of the kinds of universal and ethical truth claims both that the Second Parliament of the World's Religions embraced and that the Third Parliament will espouse. After carefully laying out such criticisms, the paper responds to them with a scientifically sophisticated version of the age old design (or purpose) argument-i.e., the Anthropic Principle- which can perhaps support the kind of universal ethical truth claims that the latest Parliaments deem necessary.
James Kraft is a Ph.D. student at the Graduate Theological Union (GTU) in Berkeley, California. He is working on a dissertation on universal truth claims in interreligious dialogue. He is interested in the relationship between faith and reason and the relationship betwen science and religion. He received an MA from GTU in 1991 with a thesis on Sartre's Understanding of God.
4:00 PM-5:30 PM IN COMMERCE 4.15 Discovering the Four Paths of Creation Spirituality Ms. Melissa Ellen Penn
The workshop is an introduction to the techniques of "Art as (extrovert) meditation" and to the teachings of creation spirituality. Participants will experience the four paths individually and collectively through lecture, story, music, meditation, and art. In essence, participants will discover and participate with the four paths of creation spirituality: Via Positiva, Via Negativa, Via Creativa, and Via Transformativa. Melissa Ellen Penn, MA has been teaching women and spirituality classes for 20 years. She is a graduate of The Institute of Culture and Creation Spirituality and The Institute for Spiritual Direction. Ms. Penn's mission is to reunite both halves of Western Spirituality (Pagan and Christian) through story, art, movement, and truth.
Dialogue
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