Interreligious Intercultural Dialogue Institutionalized - Deja Vu All Over Again

A faculty member from George Mason University’s World Religions, Diplomacy and Conflict Resolution program intimated the sentiment most closely, as we boarded the bus after the inaugural ceremony at the Hofburg Palace to return to the Stadtpark Hilton Hotel in Vienna last night. It was, for many of us who have worked in interfaith dialogue for decades, as though we had passed into the next life and found everyone whose path we had crossed on the journey with us there. Who knew? Or at least how did the king of Saudi Arabia know?

We have to trust that at some level there was no mystery, but many of those I asked had no better idea than I about how we had been selected to receive an invitation, all expenses paid, from the four corners of the earth, to the opening of the King Abdullah International Centre for Interreligious Intercultural Dialogue (KAICIID). All the major faith traditions were represented, and most of the world’s institutional manifestations of interfaith, intercultural dialogue: the Vatican, the Church of England, Greek Orthodoxy; the World Council of Churches; Orthodox, Conservative, and Reform Judaism; Sunni and Shiite Islam as well as Sufism; Hindu, Buddhist, and Shinto figures; the United Nations; Religions for Peace; the Arab League; the co-founding governments of Spain, Austria, and Saudi Arabia; among others. As Dr. William F. Vendley, secretary general of Religions for Peace, said this morning, it was nothing if not highly symbolic. There were a few ironies as well which I will return to in a below.

The vision of KAICIID was set out in beautifully produced materials and rehearsed on a number of occasions in tracing the path leading to this event. It describes its vision as “Religion as enabler of respect and reconciliation” and its mission as “Acting as a hub, facilitating interreligious and intercultural dialogue an understanding, to enhance cooperation, respect for diversity, justice and peace.”

What value might be added to the investment of time that participants made to travel to the event? Best a self-exemplifying demonstration of the purpose of the Center, not so much to create yet another free standing program but rather an intersection of those doing interfaith dialogue work around the world, some for decades. So four workshops were offered to share best practices across four fields: conflict management, cultural progams, work with youth, and religious education as enabler. Simultaneously a series of films were screened. We had to choose two workshops or the film series.

The workshops were the first opportunity to sense the comprehensive reach of the event. In the conflict management workshop, colleagues or organizations I have worked with for 15 to 20 years in Israel and Palestine presented. Sharon Rosen of Search for Common Ground set out the new Universal Code for Holy Sites and Abraham’s Vision co-founders Tamar Miller and Huda Abu Arqoub shared its dialogue work with youth. George Mason University’s Center for World Religion, Diplomacy and Conflict Resolution was represented by both its co-directors, Marc Gopin and Aziz Abu Sarah.

While exemplifying proven and critical work in conflict resolution and transformation, it was not necessarily an audience of true believers. A number of people challenged the effectiveness of dialogue as a path to positive change and peace, and the presenters were sanguine about their own successes as well, though each had ready anecdotal stories of meaningful outcomes.

In the youth workshop some interesting emerging work in England (3FF – Three Faiths Forum, The Feast), global work by the World Scouting Foundation (Messengers of Peace), and the Interfaith Youth Core were among the programs featured.

The conferencing best practice of networking meal breaks, and the interesting mixing of attendees at the inaugural banquet, took advantage of the diversity as well. I had lunch with Safaa Zarzour, secretary general of the Islamic Society of North America, and sat between the British ambassador to Austria and the president of Qatar University at dinner (and that table included a correspondent from Vatican Radio, a bishop of the Roman Catholic Church from Malaysia, the founder of a program for training teacher of Islam in Austrian schools, and a faculty member for the Islamic Studies program at the University of Vienna. (Incidentally, and surely not known by those creating the seating charts, the British ambassador had previously served in Colombia, had visited San Jose de Apartado, and knew the work of the Fellowship of Reconciliation and Peace Brigades International there.)  

The evening inauguration ceremony was one of high protocol. Speeches were given by an arc of dignitaries spread across a dramatic stage. In addition to greetings and remarks by the president of Austria, the king of Spain, a Saudi prince on behalf of the king (whose video welcome opened the evening), and a representative of the Holy See, there were longer remarks by Secretary General Ban Ki Moon of the United Nations, and Patriarch Bartholomew of the Greek Orthodox Church. An orchestra accompanied the main meal and the program closed with a formal signing of a documental covenant by the members of the board of directors.

The ironies of the gathering have to do with the legitimately suspect commitment of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to the very work of interfaith dialogue. Since the creation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, which resolved the contest of evangelism between Christians and Muslims by preserving the right of all faiths to practice their religions in peace, including the right to evangelize, the question of the degree of compliance with that covenant has been an issue. According to some conjectures, the location of the center in Vienna is an implicit acknowledgment that the kind of global commitment to interfaith work could not be productively housed in Saudi Arabia, though some wished it were possible. Simply creating a safe and constructive dialogue between Sunni and Shiite is enough of a challenge at the moment, according to some.

Within Austria, as an expression of broader European skepticism and anxiety about the continued growth of Muslim communities, local and national press challenged the siting of the Center in Austria as an effort to plant an institutionalized evangelical foothold for Islam in Europe. (One source for this insight was Irmgard Ehrenberger and Pete Hammerle, who staff the Austrian Fellowship of Reconciliation — Irmgard was a generous hostess when I arrived on Saturday, providing a walking tour of downtown Vienna, and, with Pete, showing me through their offices in Vienna this morning before I left for the United States and Nyack.) Given the particular character of Vienna as the home to many international institutions and agenda (e.g., IAEA and OPEC, to name only two), one can fairly safely dismiss this critique I think. But the more fundamental question of contradictions between Saudi sponsorship and freedom of religion and other human rights issues in Saudi Arabia were captured in a small demonstration outside the Palace as we arrived, and is harder to dismiss.

It was hard to tell if it was a precaution of privacy, or a cultural nuance, but only the presenters of workshops had name tags and so it was a somewhat random process of finding one another side-by-side at tables or on a bus transfer between the hotel and Palace. One of my final conversations of the evening was with a official of UNICEF, who lives in Tappan, Rockland County, and attends programs at Shadowcliff with some frequency. UNICEF and Religions for Peace were lifted up with the promise of programmatic support in addressing global health and well-being of children with support from the new Center as an illustration of a commitment to action as a part of its remit.

There is no question, however, that the quintessential virtue of Arab hospitality was embodied to the “Nth degree” in the gathering, no expense was spared, and while it is no surprise that Saudi Arabia has the wherewithal for the kind of generosity it demonstrated in bringing us together, it was generous to a fault and produced a very interesting event. And therein lies the promise of the gathering and the Center, it could indeed become “…a hub, facilitating interreligious and intercultural dialogue and understanding, to enhance cooperation, respect for diversity, justice and peace.”