De Venecia pushes for UN interfaith body in Madrid

MANILA, Philippines - Former House speaker Jose de Venecia Jr. brought to Spain Thursday his campaign for an interfaith dialogue council to be set up as a former United Nations body.

Online news site Arab News reported Friday that De Venecia made his push at the World Conference on Dialogue in Madrid.

During the event, De Venecia presented a draft resolution calling on the conference to petition King Abdullah, King Juan Carlos of Spain and Spanish Premier Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero to organize a joint Saudi-Spanish request to the UN.

The request will be for an Interfaith Council to promote and oversee "all global, regional and local interfaith dialogues among the great religions, civilizations, cultures, governments… to help resolve politico-religious, sectarian and ethnic conflicts and tensions in various parts of the world."

On the other hand, the council would have the same standing as UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) or the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization.

The report said the feeling at the conference was that his proposal would be endorsed, as there were calls from delegates for practical ways to take the vision of dialogue forward.

Redwan Naef Al-Sayyed, chairman of Lebanon's International Institute for Islamic Studies, was one of many who said that institutions were needed if dialogue were to move forward.

He called for a permanent secretariat and local ad-hoc working groups to be set up.

Safwat El-Baiady, head of the Egyptian Council of Protestant Churches, thanking King Abdullah for initiating the dialogue, said that he had been involved in inter-religious dialogue for over 20 years but that had not stopped conflicts in the wider region.

He said dialogue had to have a dynamic and a "road map" to make it work in any practical way.

De Venecia, in pushing for the interfaith movement, quoted Catholic theologian Hans Kung that there can be no peace among nations without peace among religions, no peace among religions without dialogue between religions, no dialogue without recognizing global ethical standards and no survival of the world without a global ethic.

Unfortunately, he said there had been an explosion of "religious"
conflicts in the 21st century.

The Philippines and Pakistan had called for an interfaith dialogue to promote peace but "for two years had been ignored by the UN." - GMANews.TV

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