ENI – “Why is it that religious institutions and religious leadership seem to be an obstacle for peace-building rather than a solution?” asked Rabbi David Rosen, international director of inter-religious relations with the American Jewish Committee and the International Jewish Committee at the Assembly of the World Conference of Religions for Peace in Kyoto.
“Often, because religion relates to our identity so profoundly, when our identity is wounded, when we feel hurt, traumatized, vulnerable, disrespected, we would call upon our religious traditions to give us a sense of stability, meaning, and purpose,” he explained in his speech on advancing shared security through peace-building.
“And very often we do it out of a sense of wound, out of a sense of alienation, out of a sense of humiliation, then we would seek self-justification in a way that demonizes and disregards and stigmatizes the other,” Rosen said in his address to the August meeting of the inter-religious body holding its eighth world assembly.
“For this reason, politicians come to the conclusion that if they want to engage in peace-building, they need to keep away from religion,” said Rosen, citing the example of the Israel-Palestinian situation. “We must be honest and acknowledge that terrible things are done in the name of religion. An inter-religious structure is essential to provide psycho-spiritual glue, without which no process will hold together.”
