WCC Conference: Inter-Faith Should Move Beyond Liberals

Interreligious dialogue must move beyond the hands of the liberal few and reach the “ordinary people” in local communities, some speakers expressed at an interfaith gathering in Geneva today.

"We should move from a dialogue of strangers to a dialogue of neighbours," suggested Rev. Valson Thampu, (Church of North India) a leader in the social justice movement. "In a globalized world, more and more religions are crowding into my neighborhood. But when you seek your neighbors and their needs, you will find God accidentally in the other."

According to the World Council of Churches, sponsor of the Critical Moment in Interreligious Dialogue conference in Geneva, the main criticism made against interreligious dialogue is that it “does not really reach the ordinary people in religious communities, being mostly restricted to the religious leadership and involving mainly liberal-minded activists.”

Therefore, speakers at the event emphasized the need to gather around a table of common values and common justice.

“Tthe world is now poised for a shift to social spirituality which upholds the core spiritual values common to all faiths: love, compassion, and justice. That is real spirituality,” said Swami Agnivesh, an Indian spiritual leader and social activist.

The WCC-sponsored conference, which ends tomorrow, gathered some 130 participants from ten world religions.