Ara Pacis Inititiative
Rome, Protomoteca del Campidoglio, April 20th 2010
Task Force: Religion and Spirituality
Participants: Marc Gopin, Rev. Brian Cox, Joyce Dubensky, Barakat Fawzi Hasan, Rev. Andrew Wesley, Hassan Hanafi Hassanien, Imam Abd al-Wahid Pallavicini and Mrs. Pallavicini, Chris Iosso, David Addiss, Abd al-Ghafur Masotti and Mrs. Masotti
SUMMARY
The need to address religion in societal conflict.
One framework is to look at discrete issues to see that the issues manifest in different ways and require different responses (Middle East/ Italy/ Indigenous North American).
Principles:
- Forgiveness combined with a concrete change of reality = Integrating the personal, family, community, international aspects of peacemaking, conflict resolution and forgiveness.
- Reconciliation with equality.
- Goal of reconciliation is the “softening of hearts”; seeking reconciliation without surrendering the issues of rights and justice for sustainable peace.
- Religion and politics are a dangerous mix if misused and appropriated by politicians as a justification for militarism (however, it can be a powerful transformational tool if used properly).
- Recognition of the other is important; recognizing fellow human beings.
- Seeking reconciliation without surrendering the issues of rights and justice for sustainable peace.
Techniques:
- Peace “education” must be a PEACE AND JUSTICE process.
- Public Ceremony - Ritual is a useful tool, but the concept must be specified and go beyond traditional sense of rituals; can be locally applicable community rituals to facilitate reconciliation.
- Using zones of peace as areas for interaction and education.
- The power of the pulpit - use of religious sermons to facilitate concrete social change.
- The power of the story/personal narrative.
- Forgiveness and repentance; the sacrifice/offering of their personal trauma.
- Film.
- A way to enter a conflict and participate is with humility, focus on relationships, and trust in God; such a strategy will be productive.
(Equal recognition as a basis for dignity, forgiveness and reconciliation; not necessarily official recognition, but practical; theoretical (within the heart) versus legal definition).
a. The elicitive approach is one way to approach conflicts though a more prescriptive approach may also be valuable at times if a society is “stuck”.
- Check understanding and interpretation of concepts; words/concepts are often not similarly understood across cultural/linguistic lines; use deep listening to truly hear.
- Religious method: enter with focus on establishing relationships based on humility and trust in God that this will work.
Notes:Gregory Miller
Guidelines; Approaches; Methodologies: what has worked successfully?
To be applied around the world to various conflicts.
Hassan Hassanien:
Change the concept of religion; in the literature, religion has a narrow definition; must be beyond ritual and faith, beyond the dichotomy of secular versus religion. The realm of religion and secular society overlap (i.e. helping the poor).
Dignity is paramount. Forgiveness is conditioned by changing the reality of the victim/victimizer relationship. Reconciliation must be between equal parties; cannot be a superior/inferior relationship.
Ideas translating to practical issues; countless separate groups in civil society are driving toward the same goal of peace; their efforts must become visible and interact.
St James: don’t just say “Oh Lord”, put the principles into practice.
Joyce Dubensky:
Religions as motivation for working toward peace, even by putting themselves in physical peril.
Peace Education: work with teachers and students in a conflict area to develop RESPECT in the younger generation.
Using rituals that transcend sects/creeds.
Finding commonality amongst religion.
Zones of peace in conflict zones.
Liberation Theology: El Salvadorian priest used his pulpit to mobilize the peasants.
Role of religion: religious leaders are and can be a valuable resource for peace building, which is not the exclusive territory of secular society; must be either combined with secular efforts or at the very least recognized as an essential element.
Chris Iosso
The importance of forgiveness and the incorporation of repentance; Forgiveness is not a surrender.
Perhaps it doesn’t begin with equality, but through forgiveness the parties may become equals.
Rituals and sacrifice in religion; forgiveness is a “sacrifice” of individual wounds and painful memories.
Forgiveness must be transformed and must be holistic (filled out).
Brian Cox
Faith based conflict resolution; not necessarily interfaith.
The effort is practical problem solving; forgiveness is a softening of hearts. People must be reached individually.
Guideline: Unilateral action; does not depend on the offender and the two way relationship. May be undertaken by the victim individually. To be complete, however, and complete reconciliation, the perpetrator must repent and acknowledge their actions.
Marc Gopin
Different definitions of forgiveness across faiths; there have been historic ritual efforts to normalize “rules” of forgiveness.
A knowledge of traditions of forgiveness is essential to reach across cultures and religions.
Understanding and respecting various methods of forgiveness and specific rituals; no matter how archaic/barbaric some rituals may seem to an outsider.
Barakat Fawzi Hasan
Misconceptions of others; selfish aims of various groups; The CONFLICT IS NOT BETWEEN RELIGIONS; It is fueled by politics.
The principles of religion are not causing the conflict and delaying reconciliation. Dialogue between people and a true understanding of one another cuts through the policy of governments.
Separate the exploitation of religion for political goals from the religion itself; religion is not a problem.
Marc Gopin
Religion is often feared as being mixed with policy. Religion is often used by aggressors to achieve worldly goals.
Sheik Pallavicini + Italian Islamic Community CO.RE.IS
Deeper and holistic understanding of the various religions; cannot simply focus on violent elements
Stereotypes must be avoided; After 9/11 Muslim community was stereotyped in Italy.
In theory the Islamic community is permitted, but not officially recognized and receive no financial assistance from the state. The mainstream community needs assistance and recognition to combat stereotypes and need equal standing with the Christian sects and Jewish faith. Islam is the second most numerous religion in Italy.
Tax exemption is granted to citizens donating to an officially recognized religion; Islam needs the same.
Proposal was submitted, but difficult because no centralized structure
Marc Gopin
Echoes Bosnian Muslim religious leader about the need of recognition to combat radicalization of marginalized peoples.
Preservation of the status quo does not work; Islam and Christianity must be reconciled in Europe, the diametric juxtaposition does not function and is pursued unconsciously in the interest of traditional views/organization of society.
Joyce Dubensky
In the short-term it is necessary to ally with the recognized religious organizations to achieve the political goals through unity with the other religious groups.
CO.RE.IS
Pursuing this technique; has not functioned.
Request to the MAYOR:
ALL RELIGIONS MUST BE RECOGNIZED AND ACCORDED EQUAL STATUS TO PURSUE PEACE AND JUSTICE.
Sheik Pallavicini
Islam is framed as a foreign religion and considered a religion of immigrants; over a million Muslims, mostly immigrants, the small community of natural born Italian Muslims is thus marginalized, only 30,000 Jews.
All believe in the same GOD. All brothers and sisters recognizing the same GOD. Social reconciliation here demands that Islam is recognized.
Marc Gopin
Recognition/acknowledgment, respect and equality as a bridge toward continued peace.
Andrew Wesley
Aboriginal views: North America is the holy land; compared with relationship of Israel to their land and God.
Imposition of New Testament; the indigenous creation story is STILL fresh in indigenous society; the importance of their origin story/Creation Spirituality. Yet the religion of the indigenous people is not recognized, the faiths are compatible, but their particular origins must be recognized and respected alongside the imposed faith.
Marc Gopin
Shared story, creation stories; unity beneath the stars
Difficult to convey to secular policy makers; stories are difficult to centralize; film has been used to disseminate knowledge and recognition of various faiths.
Chris Iosso
Dignity is more important than specific rights; Recognition can include dignity and rights.
Symbolic importance of Israel; only protect Jewish religious sites; Christian and Muslim sites are ignored by Israeli law.
Hassan Hassanien
Theology versus policy; the methodology must combine.
Deep analysis of the middle ground; Concepts must transform. i.e. what is a ritual? The theological symbolism is not as important as the actions (see St. James quote above).
Change people’s reality. The process of peace-making, traditionally, stresses the subjective aspects over the objective and deeper aspects.
Religion is used for war but must be used for peace. Is also used for divisive means. Nation state system are archaic and divisive; putting up borders doesn’t help.
Bakarat Fawzi Hasan
Forgiveness and reconciliation must include restitution of property and tangible rights.
Marc Gopin
Peace education is caught up in semantics and pre-conceived notions; for instance, peace educatin can be considered as covering up crimes and surrendering justice.
Peace education is used as a first step toward justice and equal rights.
The route to rights; Ghandi used love. He didn’t surrender rights, merely sought to build trust and heal wounds to attain rights.
Shared language and practices that go beyond dialogue. Echoes Barakat’s point that tangible results are needed, talking alone will not suffice. The dialogue must be aimed toward concrete action.
Joyce Dubensky
Clarifies her point of shared rituals for peace as a method toward reconciliation.
The need to clarify the meaning of words between conflicting parties and within committees.
Hassan Hassanien
Contends that the tangible results and equality can come first before the forgiveness (i.e. South Africa).
Marc Gopin
Peace and forgiveness regarded as dirty words to some faiths; for instance, Judaism preaches to only forgive those that wrong an individual; cannot, therefore, forgive for mass murder.
The diction must sometimes change as an essential first step.
The respect SHOWN by their supposed enemies inspires forgiveness subconsciously, without using red flag words that are resisted.
Andrew Wesley
Wisdom, humility, bravery, trust, respect, love.
These similarities made Christianity’s tenants easily acceptable and familiar.
Marc Gopin
Personal experience; elicit method of training to suspend judgment and listen; facilitates the use of religion in peace-making.
A challenge to using principles as the basis for peacemaking; equates this strategy with western imperialist slant.
Forgiveness is “explosive and controversial”.
Public ceremony, “delicate art”; the danger is the emptiness if it is not backed up with tangible justice; the ceremony and public recognition offers false satisfaction that can impede real implementation of justice.
Each place is unique.
Forgiveness must be spontaneous, not planned; power relationship can be hidden and misinterpreted.
Build the relationship first, then seize opportunities as they arise.
People focus on the negative and must be coaxed out of this pattern; begin a dialogue and seize opportunities as they arise.
Andrew Wesley
Difficulty when religion acts as the victimizer; difficulty when the narrative is negative; applicability of the survivor’s experience and in some senses forgiving the survivor for their own abuses caused by their trauma.
Differing ideas of justice among cultures.
(Conference: The creator will only ask one question following death: “What did you do with the gift that I gave you?”)
Refining the document
Discussion
- Power of the narratives, both personal and communal
- Documentary/film making
- Method of listening/understanding
- Individual, family, community, international politics; holistic view of the individual peace efforts
- The frustration by many of the perceived arrogance of imposing plans and programs; relationships; humility
- Problem when peace is equated with imperialist tendencies/control
Brian Cox
The program isn’t necessarily imperialistic; sometimes an aggressive prescriptive strategy is necessary to free the parties in a conflict from being stuck repeating the same failed strategies.
Public conversation about reconciliation as a method.
Changing the paradigm.
Chris Iosso
Pressure and power to ensure justice; who has legitimacy to intervene.
Marc Gopin
The programs and outside imposition is fickle; the change must be holistic and come from the people.
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Melloni: My suggestion is, before stopping, to choose, the coordinator for the afternoon and beyond. A member of the board is good.
Schetro: We need guidelines, methodology.
Schetro: I look at 3 questions: why are we doing this: the education about history, reconciliation, forgiveness, dignity? It’s not the general study of history, this is for a particular purpose. To unfold historical truth that can create a platform for young people to understand out shared history. To acknowledge pain and history. For students to understand root conflicts. For young people to understand the roles. To help us move away from being controlled by history, and break the cycle of violence.
Zarina: religion also has a role to play. All religions talk about forgiveness and reconciliation so it should be taught to children.
Scherto: All of us offer ways to move this forward. Touching deeper aspects of history. Not just recent history, but the roots in early history. Offering the space for pain and suffering. Linking events throughout history. Teacher training to enrich their exposure to diversity. Multiple resources: arts, music, multimedia, games, experiential history, putting kids into debates, etc using historical context. People learn differently, work differently with kids, adults, etc. Including testimonies of forgiveness, to inspire people towards love and peace. It should also focus on helping students develop self-awareness, then you’ll be more open to understanding history. Projects we might do: test cases, narrative and forgiveness cross-culturally, repairing deficit knowledge, creating games, a conference of forgiveness.
Monica: I have another one. I work with universities, conflict about Israel and Palestine, to join the people in universities, in Rome or somewhere else, to talk about the process of peace, take the provost or some students, to try and develop a concrete proposal, to concrete the idea. I think it’s possible and could be a very concrete project and we can do that.
Scherto: you can bring students together, dynamics and so on, but what after?
Jamal: Awareness programs.
Svelanat: How do you bring this people together? They live close but they don’t interact. Morning shift is one ethnic group, afternoon is another. An alternative space, not school, not family. Groups to perform in mixed languages, families comment, it was ok up to one point, but then what next? You are limited, they experienced something positive, but then they go back to their communities, and there’s a wall. Maybe there are little holes in their wall, but they are still there. And their friends and families think they are traitors, because they sought out the enemy. A common place for understanding is good, but the next step is the most difficult thing. If we manage that, there will be no more conflicts. It doesn’t erase conflicts but creates a positive foundation for something else.
Zarina: One ethnic group doesn’t want a certain food because they say oh that’s what the other eats, if we eat that we are betraying. So its important to remove those. They are very strong prejudices. Clothes, the doti, if Pakistanis do that they say you are an enemy, Indians do that. These are prejudices that need to be taken out, children need to know this.
Kakar: It would be great to share the idea that every country needs peace reconciliation, good practices, we need globally working for peace.JP has a big story, we want to invite him to come to Afghanistan to explain, how you’re suffering, this is an example, Zarina has another example, it would be great to speak , have awareness groups.
Zarina: tens of thousands of refugees came from Afghanistan into Pakistan, but the people of Afghanistan are very difficult with Pakistanis, they prefer Indians, they are good at public relations, Pakistan isn’t, this is how ideas get developed, Afghans don’t like us, we feel they are not being true to us, this is how it develops.
Kakar: We need political peace, and social peace, justice is also.
Monica: history is a construction, this is very important. So history is fact and interpretations. If you agree with the fact, that is a very imp step. Then you can say, this fact is because, and then maybe because we are different, but we start with the fact. And if you accept the truth, sometimes you can’t do the justice process when you start if you can know the truth, you can invite, the whole society to be in the process, to construct this history, so everybody’s part of this, it’s a very dynamic history. For me this is very important.
Zarina: you can give the facts and say, this is what happened, the more details, the more difficult, you must be very concise.
Scherto: We can’t treat history that teaches hate, it should be about forgiveness, in ways that people don’t forget, but it is a communication. Monica said its imp for constructing. It’s not just a fact but active process.
Zarina: Be as factual as possible.
Monica; We see facts from different perspectives, so what happened with us with this fact? To contract the history of the country.
Zarina: The problems are the same in Palestine and Israel, the Israelis must give up the land.
Monica: The land was Palestinian, the Jews took it.
Scherto: But now we’re making interpretations.
JP: We can’t change the past but we can change how to approach it, or how we carry our feelings about it into the future, and forgiveness is the key.
Monica: We can change our ideas about the past. That’s very important.
Melloni: We discussed education but we need to talk also about the narratives, the narrative of forgiveness but also of the trauma, also the problem of the greater audience, the public in general, how can we teach and who can teach to a general audience, in a school audience everything is easy, one’s listening, one’s teaching, but in the wider audience it is different, these are the two points that must be discussed here and 5 in order to have a complete discussion.
Svetlana: These are the questions he posed at the beginning, we summarized what we presented and we have these 2 more questions. We have indirectly approached this. This experience is familiar to me, after the war we had war veterans come and talk to us about fighting from the different sides.
Scherto: We did say its important to give space for the victim to share their memory of pain and suffering, but we didn’t say how to do that in the context of teaching history.
Monica: I can tell you what happened in Chile, the Churches have a very important role, they organized groups of people who suffered, the mother who lost the child, family who lost a family member, they have a system of support, during this long process, 20 years, now we have another 20 years in democracy, but in dictatorship it was important to join these churches, though it was difficult, they have systems of psychology, medicine, who help them to deal with the suffering, to deal with the memory, all the different kind of pain, the psychology problem became a problem, treatment, organization: you are not alone, WE suffered, like a group, we are not alone because we are WE and we are with other people who are supporting us, a group of people who help, during this long process they have activity, it was a process, of talking about the diff issues, sometimes, people who were out of this, like me for ex, I was close but not in, we were invited to talk with them, in her first moment, it was a very slow level of trust, they were afraid, some ceremony, the church organized a big mass or procession, a group has to confront the possible repression it was a movement in action, all this has a lot of positive, healthy, open the situation to others who are afraid, one of the ways we used to work was with the people who suffered the repression and sometimes the artist was important to the people who suffered because they could express what happened.
Scherto: We have so many examples of successful history projects but that doesn’t mean as a group that that is what we want to do. As members of the council, what would we like to put forth? We have lots of examples of good projects but are they ours? Do we want to do a forgiveness gathering?
Monica: Others are indifferent, how do you involve people who are indifferent?
Scherto: So maybe people who come to a forgiveness gathering are already forgiving? How do we bring others in?
Svetlana: This is the 3rd question, how do we involve the wider public?
Monica: Each year in Chile its more difficult. It’s more far away. After 1990, I said I only want to teach human rights. Each semester we have more than 100 students, wonderful, we have this opportunity to talk, our approach to the issue. But lots of students are indifferent. They say your class has too much of a political view.
Zarina: Because they haven’t been through it. They feel they have nothing to do with it.
Kakar: We have two kinds of political party, Communist and Islamic, they are fighting with each other, they come together in Afghanistan, and then when they come to Afghanistan, the Government announced ok this is forgiveness, we will stick together we will find the solution, they started peace negotiations with each other, now they are sitting together, they have a political chair, one is communist, one is mujahedeen, justice, forgiving is another process, Afghan independent human right commission, for the next time they should be enemies, but they started a research, with human rights watch, the result is, people want justice, peace, people make another action plan, we establish a book, then they are writing, from this study, we make an action plan, and this is implemented by the government of Afghansitan, just say apologize or forgiveness, for justice, we want to just come to Afghanistan for forgiveness but first what do you want, do you want a museum, do you want forgiveness, do you want a holiday, memorial days, this is planned by Afghanistan government, the next state to implement this, how to implement this, this is the problem, but this is our example, they are not keeping their promise, how to keep the promise? We need an independent leader.
Svetlana: Concrete ideas? Realistic framework? What are our limits? If I say I can do that, does that mean I will have the resources? We all come from different countries with different resources.
