Spiritual
Practices
A
Message to World Religious Leaders
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(
Editor’s Note: The following letter made available to the
‘World’s Religious Leaders” by THE UNIVERSAL
HOUSE OF JUSTICE, Baha’i World Centre in April 2002)
The
enduring legacy of the twentieth century is that it compelled
the peoples of the world to begin seeing themselves as the members
of a single human race, and the earth as that race's common homeland.
Despite the continuing conflict and violence that darken the horizon,
prejudices that once seemed inherent in the nature of the human
species are everywhere giving way. Down with them come barriers
that long divided the family of man into a Babel of incoherent
identities of cultural, ethnic or national origin. That so fundamental
a change could occur in so brief a period-virtually overnight
in the perspective of historical time-suggests the magnitude of
the possibilities for the future.
Tragically,
organized religion, whose very reason for being entails service
to the cause of brotherhood and peace, behaves all too frequently
as one of the most formidable obstacles in the path; to cite a
particular painful fact, it has long lent its credibility to fanaticism.
We feel a responsibility, as the governing council of one of the
world religions, to urge earnest consideration of the challenge
this poses for religious leadership. Both the issue and the circumstances
to which it gives rise require that we speak frankly. We trust
that common service to the Divine will ensure that what we say
will be received in the same spirit of goodwill as it is put forward.
The
issue comes sharply into focus when one considers what has been
achieved elsewhere. In the past, apart from isolated exceptions,
women were regarded as an inferior breed, their nature hedged
about by superstitions, denied the opportunity to express the
potentialities of the human spirit and relegated to the role of
serving the needs of men. Clearly, there are many societies where
such conditions persist and are even fanatically defended. At
the level of global discourse, however, the concept of the equality
of the sexes has, for all practical purposes, now assumed the
force of universally accepted principle. It enjoys similar authority
in most of the academic community and information media. So basic
has been the revisioning that exponents of male supremacy must
look for support on the margins of responsible opinion.
The
beleaguered battalions of nationalism face a similar fate. With
each passing crisis in world affairs, it becomes easier for the
citizen to distinguish between a love of country that enriches
one's life, and submission to inflammatory rhetoric designed to
provoke hatred and fear of others. Even where it is expedient
to participate in the familiar nationalistic rites, public response
is as often marked by feelings of awkwardness as it is by the
strong convictions and ready enthusiasm of earlier times. The
effect has been reinforced by the restructuring steadily taking
place in the international order. Whatever the shortcomings of
the United Nations system in its present form, and however handicapped
its ability to take collective military action against aggression,
no one can mistake the fact that the fetish of absolute national
sovereignty is on its way to extinction.
Racial
and ethnic prejudices have been subjected to equally summary treatment
by historical processes that have little patience left for such
pretensions. Here, rejection of the past has been especially decisive.
Racism is now tainted by its association with the horrors of the
twentieth century to the degree that it has taken on something
of the character of a spiritual disease. While surviving as a
social attitude in many parts of the world-and as a blight on
the lives of a significant segment of humankind-racial prejudice
has becomes universally condemned in principle that no body of
people can any longer safely allow themselves to be identified
with it.
It
is not that a dark past has been erased and a new world of light
has suddenly been born. Vast numbers of people continue to endure
the effects of ingrained prejudices of ethnicity, gender, nation,
caste and class. All the evidence indicates that such injustices
will long persist as the institutions and standards that humanity
is devising only slowly become empowered to construct a new order
of relationships and to bring relief to the oppressed. The point,
rather, is that a threshold has been crossed from which there
is no credible possibility of return. Fundamental principles have
been identified, articulated, accorded broad publicity and are
becoming progressively incarnated in institutions capable of imposing
them on public behaviour. There is no doubt that, however protracted
and painful the struggle, the outcome will be to revolutionize
relationships among all peoples, at the grassroots level.
As
the twentieth century opened, the prejudice that seemed more likely
than any other to succumb to the forces of change was that of
religion. In the West, scientific advances had already dealt rudely
with some of the central pillars of sectarian exclusivity. In
the context of the transformation taking place in the human race's
conception of itself, the most promising new religious development
seemed to be the interfaith movement. In 1893, the World's Columbian
Exposition surprised even its ambitious organizers by giving birth
to the famed "Parliament of Religions", a vision of
spiritual and moral consensus that captured the popular imagination
on all continents and managed to eclipse even the scientific,
technological and commercial wonders that the Exposition celebrated.
Briefly,
it appeared that ancient walls had fallen. For influential thinkers
in the field o religion, the gathering stood unique, "unprecedented
in the history of the world". The Parliament had, its distinguished
principal organizer said, "emancipated the world from bigotry".
An imaginative leadership, it was confidently predicted, would
seize the opportunity and awaken in the earth's long-divided religious
communities a spirit of brotherhood that could provide the needed
moral underpinnings for the new world of prosperity and progress.
Thus
encouraged, interfaith movements of every kind took root and flourished.
A vast literature, available in many languages, introduced an
ever wider public, believers and nonbelievers alike, to the teachings
of all the major faiths, an interest picked up in due course by
radio, television, film and eventually the Internet. Institutions
of higher learning launched degree programmes in the study of
comparative religion. By the time the century ended, interfaith
worship services, unthinkable only a few decades earlier, were
becoming commonplace.
Alas,
it is clear that these initiatives lack both intellectual coherence
and spiritual commitment. In contrast to the processes of unification
that are transforming the rest of humanity's social relationships,
the suggestion that all of the world's great religions are equally
valid in nature and origin is stubbornly resisted by entrenched
patterns of sectarian thought. The progress of racial integration
is a development that is not merely an expression of sentimentality
or strategy but arises from the recognition that the earth's peoples
constitute a single species whose many variations do not themselves
confer any advantage or impose any handicap on individual members
of the race. The emancipation of women, likewise, has entailed
the willingness of both society's institutions and popular opinion
to acknowledge that there are no acceptable grounds-biological,
social or moral-to justify denying women full equality with men,
and girls equal educational opportunities with boys. Nor does
appreciation of the contributions that some nations are making
to the shaping of an evolving global civilization support the
inherited illusion that other nations have little or nothing to
bring to the effort.
So
fundamental a reorientation religious leadership appears, for
the most part, unable to undertake. Other segments of society
embrace the implications of the oneness of humankind, not only
as the inevitable next step in the advancement of civilization,
but as the fulfilment of lesser identities of every kind that
our race brings to this critical moment in our collective history.
Yet, the greater part of organized religion stands paralyzed at
the threshold of the future, gripped in those very dogmas and
claims of privileged access to truth that have been responsible
for creating some of the most bitter conflicts dividing the earth's
inhabitants.
The
consequences, in terms of human well-being, have been ruinous.
It is surely unnecessary to cite in detail the horrors being visited
upon hapless populations today by outbursts of fanaticism that
shame the name of religion. Nor is the phenomenon a recent one.
To take only one of many examples, Europe's sixteenth century
wars of religion cost that continent the lives of some thirty
percent of its entire population. One must wonder what has been
the longer term harvest of the seeds planted in popular consciousness
by the blind forces of sectarian dogmatism that inspired such
conflicts.
To
this accounting must be added a betrayal of the life of the mind
which, more than any other factor, has robbed religion of the
capacity it inherently possesses to play a decisive role in the
shaping of world affairs. Locked into preoccupation with agendas
that disperse and vitiate human energies, religious institutions
have too often been the chief agents in discouraging exploration
of reality and the exercise of those intellectual faculties that
distinguish humankind. Denunciations of materialism or terrorism
are of no real assistance in coping with the contemporary moral
crisis if they do not begin by addressing candidly the failure
of responsibility that has left believing masses exposed and vulnerable
to these influences.
Such
reflections, however painful, are less an indictment of organized
religion than a reminder of the unique power it represents. Religion,
as we are all aware, reaches to the roots of motivation. When
it has been faithful to the spirit and example of the transcendent
Figures who gave the world its great belief systems, it has awakened
in whole populations capacities to love, to forgive, to create,
to dare greatly, to overcome prejudice, to sacrifice for the common
good and to discipline the impulses of animal instinct. Unquestionably,
the seminal force in the civilizing of human nature has been the
influence of the succession of these Manifestations of the Divine
that extends back to the dawn of recorded history.
This
same force, that operated with such effect in ages past, remains
an inextinguishable feature of human consciousness. Against all
odds, and with little in the way of meaningful encouragement,
it continues to sustain the struggle for survival of uncounted
millions, and to raise up in all lands heroes and saints whose
lives are the most persuasive vindication of the principles contained
in the scriptures of their respective faiths. As the course of
civilization demonstrates, religion is also capable of profoundly
influencing the structure of social relationships. Indeed, it
would be difficult to think of any fundamental advance in civilization
that did not derive its moral thrust from this perennial source.
Is it conceivable, then, that passage to the culminating stage
in the millennia-long process of the organization of the planet
can be accomplished in a spiritual vacuum? If the perverse ideologies
let loose on our world during the century just past contributed
nothing else, they demonstrated conclusively that the need cannot
be met by alternatives that lie within the power of human invention.
The
implications for today are summed up by Bahd'u'lldh in words written
over a century ago and widely disseminated in the intervening
decades:
There
can be no doubt whatever that the peoples of the world, of whatever
race or religion, derive their inspiration from one heavenly Source,
and are the subjects of one God. The difference between the ordinances
under which they abide should be attributed to the varying requirements
and exigencies of the age in which they were revealed. All of
them, except a few which are the outcome of human perversity,
were ordained of God, and are a reflection of His Will and Purpose.
Arise and, armed with the power of faith, shatter to pieces the
gods of your vain imaginings, the sowers of dissension amongst
you. Cleave unto that which draweth you together and uniteth you.
Such
an appeal does not call for abandonment of faith in the fundamental
verities of any of the world's great belief systems. Far otherwise.
Faith has its own imperative and is its own justification. What
others believe -or do not believe-cannot be the authority in any
individual conscience worthy of the name. What the above words
do unequivocally urge is renunciation of all those claims to exclusivity
or finality that, in winding their roots around the life of the
spirit, have been the greatest single factor in suffocating impulses
to unity and in promoting hatred and violence.
It
is to this historic challenge that we believe leaders of religion
must respond if religious leadership is to have meaning in the
global society emerging from the transformative experiences of
the twentieth century. It is evident that growing numbers of people
are coming to realize that the truth underlying all religions
is in its essence one. This recognition arises not through a resolution
of theological disputes, but as an intuitive awareness born from
the ever widening experience of others and from a dawning acceptance
of the oneness of the human family itself. Out of the welter of
religious doctrines, rituals and legal codes inherited from vanished
worlds, there is emerging a sense that spiritual life, like the
oneness manifest in diverse nationalities, races and cultures,
constitutes one unbounded reality equally accessible to everyone.
In order for this diffuse and still tentative perception to consolidate
itself and contribute effectively to the building of a peaceful
world, it must have the wholehearted confirmation of those to
whom, even at this late hour, masses of the earth's population
look for guidance.
There
are certainly wide differences among the world's major religious
traditions with respect to social ordinances and forms of worship.
Given the thousands of years during which successive revelations
of the Divine have addressed the changing needs of a constantly
evolving civilization, it could hardly be otherwise. Indeed, an
inherent feature of the scriptures of most of the major faiths
would appear to be the expression, in some form or other, of the
principle of religion's evolutionary nature. What cannot be morally
justified is the manipulation of cultural legacies that were intended
to enrich spiritual experience, as a means to arouse prejudice
and alienation. The primary task of the soul will always be to
investigate reality, to live in accordance with the truths of
which it becomes persuaded and to accord full respect to the efforts
of others to do the same.
It
may be objected that, if all the great religions are to be recognized
as equally Divine in origin, the effect will be to encourage,
or at least to facilitate, the conversion of numbers of people
from one religion to another. Whether or not this is true, it
is surely of peripheral importance when set against the opportunity
that history has at last opened to those who are conscious of
a world that transcends this terrestrial one-and against the responsibility
that this awareness imposes. Each of the great faiths can adduce
impressive and credible testimony to its efficacy in nurturing
moral character. Similarly, no one could convincingly argue that
doctrines attached to one particular belief system have been either
more or less prolific in generating bigotry and superstition than
those attached to any other. In an integrating world, it is natural
that patterns of response and association will undergo a continuous
process of shifting, and the role of institutions, of whatever
kind, is surely to consider how these developments can be managed
in a way that promotes unity. The guarantee that the outcome will
ultimately be so und-spi ritually, morally and socially-lies in
the abiding faith of the unconsulted masses of the earth's inhabitants
that the universe is ruled not by human caprice, but by a loving
and unfailing Providence.
Together
with the crumbling of barriers separating peoples, our age is
witnessing the dissolution of the once insuperable wall that the
past assumed would forever separate the life of Heaven from the
life of Earth. The scriptures of all religions have always taught
the believer to see in service to others not only a moral duty,
but an avenue for the soul's own approach to God. Today, the progressive
restructuring of society gives this familiar teaching new dimensions
of meaning. As the age-old promise of a world animated by principles
of justice slowly takes on the character of a realistic goal,
meeting the needs of the soul and those of society will increasingly
be seen as reciprocal aspects of a mature spiritual life.
If
religious leadership is to rise to the challenge that this latter
perception represents, such response must begin by acknowledging
that religion and science are the two indispensable knowledge
systems through which the potentialities of consciousness develop.
Far from being in conflict with one another, these fundamental
modes of the mind's exploration of reality are mutually dependent
and have been most productive in those rare but happy periods
of history when their complementary nature has been recognized
and they have been able to work together. The insights and skills
generated by scientific advance will have always to look to the
guidance of spiritual and moral commitment to ensure their appropriate
application; religious convictions, no matter how cherished they
may be, must submit, willingly and gratefully, to impartial testing
by scientific methods.
We
come finally to an issue that we approach with some diffidence
as it touches most directly on conscience. Among the many temptations
the world offers, the test that has, not surprisingly, preoccupied
religious leaders is that of exercising power in matters of belief.
No one who has dedicated long years to earnest meditation and
study of the scriptures of one or another of the great religions
requires any further reminder of the oft-repeated axiom regarding
the potentiality of power to corrupt and to do so increasingly
as such power grows. The unheralded inner victories won in this
respect by unnumbered clerics all down the ages have no doubt
been one of the chief sources of organized religion's creative
strength and must rank as one of its highest distinctions. To
the same degree, surrender to the lure of worldly power and advantage,
on the part of other religious leaders, has cultivated a fertile
breeding ground for cynicism, corruption and despair among all
who observe it. The implications for the ability of religious
leadership to fulfil its social responsibility at this point in
history need no elaboration.
Because
it is concerned with the ennobling of character and the harmonizing
of relationships, religion has served throughout history as the
ultimate authority in giving meaning to life. In every age, it
has cultivated the good, reproved the wrong and held up, to the
gaze of all those willing to see, a vision of potentialities as
yet unrealized. From its counsels the rational soul has derived
encouragement in overcoming limits imposed by the world and in
fulfilling itself. As the name implies, religion has simultaneously
been the chief force binding diverse peoples together in ever
larger and more complex societies through which the individual
capacities thus released can find expression. The great advantage
of the present age is the perspective that makes it possible for
the entire human race to see this civilizing process as a single
phenomenon, the ever-recurring encounters of our world with the
world of God.
Inspired
by this perspective, the Baha'i community has been a vigorous
promoter of interfaith activities from the time of their inception.
Apart from cherished associations that these activities create,
Baha’i see in the struggle of diverse religions to draw
closer together a response to the Divine Will for a human race
that is entering on its collective maturity. The members of our
community will continue to assist in every way we can. We owe
it to our partners in this common effort, however, to state clearly
our conviction that interfaith discourse, if it is to contribute
meaningfully to healing the ills that afflict a desperate humanity,
must now address honestly and without further evasion the implications
of the over-arching truth that called the movement into being:
that God is one and that, beyond all diversity of cultural expression
and human interpretation, religion is likewise one.
With
every day that passes, danger grows that the rising fires of religious
prejudice will ignite a worldwide conflagration the consequences
of which are unthinkable. Such a danger civil government, unaided,
cannot overcome. Nor should we delude ourselves that appeals for
mutual tolerance can alone hope to extinguish animosities that
claim to possess Divine sanction. The crisis calls on religious
leadership for a break with the past as decisive as those that
opened the way for society to address equally corrosive prejudices
of race, gender and nation. \Whatever justification exists for
exercising influence in matters of conscience lies in serving
the well-being of humankind. At this greatest turning point in
the history of civilization, the demands of such service could
not be more clear. "The well-being of mankind, its peace
and security, are unattainable", Bahd'u'lldh urges, "unless
and until its unity is firmly established."
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