After repeated discussion in the fifth, sixth and seventh presidium conference, OPGC has decided that the 3rd World Congress of Global Civilization will be held between October 6th and 8th in 2009, in Jerusalem’s Kings Hotel. The theme of this congress is “Promoting the unity of spirituality to achieve interreligious harmony in a global world”. The key task is to discuss and pass The Proposal to Global Religions put forward by the Third World Congress of Global Civilization.
The first decade of the 21st century is about to end and, taking our world into deep consideration from the perspective of our present understanding, we realize that humankind is facing with two “century conundrums”.
Religion, in all its manifestations, has been a central feature in the development of every civilization in human history. Human spirituality, metaphysical speculation, expressions of the mythological imagination, the philosophy of ethics, and ritual practice have all taken innumerable forms in human history. But these are the products of human consciousness that have shaped the forms and created the content of human civilization. One could say that religion, in its role as elaborator of myth of and foundation of ethical and social norms, is the bedrock upon which all human civilizations are built.
The first one is: “How to promote humanity’s spiritual stature?”
As human beings, all issues concerning politics, economy, society, culture, family come down to the issue of the “human”. All the issues of the human boil down to the issue of “spiritual stature”, and all the issues of spiritual stature are reduced to the issues of faith or religious belief. Buddha, Jesus, Mahomet are recognized as great prophets and saints not because of their resources, wealth, power, and knowledge but because of their lofty spiritual stature and their correct and firm faith. In this sense, in all ages religious belief contributes to all human happiness while the incorrect religious belief results in all its sufferings. The distance between human and Buddha, God ,Allah, namely “Divinity”, is the distance between the human and happiness, the distance between the human and personality, and the distance between the human and himself.
It is clear that the question of “How to promote the spiritual stature?” includes three inter-related subjects. Firstly, the deep-dyed problem of the current world is not concerned with the improvement of environment, the economic disparity between south and north, the cultural conflicts between east and west, the shortage of energy and the nuclear investigation; rather, it is the promotion of spiritual stature. Secondly, the key point of promoting spiritual stature is not the acceptance of different cultures, is not the acquisition of scientific knowledge, is not the self-discipline of morality, is not the compliance to law, rather it is the way of improving religious belief and promoting the concepts of religious belief. Thirdly, how to improve the way of religious belief? How to promote the concepts of religious belief? The historical realities from thousands of years have proved that we can only seek wisdom and escape through the assistance of religious prophets?
The second one is: “How to deal with today’s global age?”
In the 21st century, the subject we face is different from that of our prophets. That is, we are living in a”Global Age” while our prophets were living in a “Regional Age”. There are different problems in different ages. Diachronically we look around the problems of global age such as military confrontation, the competition of economic strength, the struggles of political system, and the scramble of natural resources and so on. However, upon carful retrospection these are the branches of the problems. The sticking point of global age is our “way of civilization”, is how to deal with the relationships between local civilizations, and how to deal with the relationship between local civilization and global age. On second thoughts, the essence of the so-called civilization is the religion that hides inside the civilization, is the mode of civilization that is produced and formulated by a certain type of religious belief, which calls for our seeking advice from the prophets of all religions. More than two thousands years ago, they complied with the historical trends shaped by regional civilization, brave enough to sand out to create a harmonious unification from the miscellaneous nations, which were full of warfare, with their morals, intelligence and action. We really have sufficient reason to imagine: If these prophets were living in today’s global age, what would they think? What would they say? How would they act? Furthermore, as prophets recognized by the whole of humanity, there any answer we need today in the “sutra” which is mainly recorded their behavior and speech?
Therefore, the question”How to deal with the global age?” also consists of three inter-related subjects. Firstly, the actual key point of the global age is “civilization” instead of the relationships among the different civilizations. Secondly, the actual main problem of civilization is “religion” rather than the harmony of different religions. Thirdly, the solutions to the various religious problems are subject to the new recognition of their prophets and the new understanding of their sutra. Only our worshipped prophets and the good command of sutra can lead us to enter into the global age integration into world.
We hold this world congress in order to give clear answers to these questions and identify a better developmental road for our religions and today’s human beings.
My honored friends, knowing that you have long been engaging in such kind of researches with profound attainments I hereby as the chairman of this congress sincerely invite you to attend this congress.
Zhang Shaohua
The Permanent Chairman of OPGC
The Chairman of the Third World Congress Global Civilization
Chairman, Vice Chairman, Secretary-General:
Chairman:
Zhang Shaohua (China)
Vice Chairman:
Yury Yakavets (Russia)
David McLellan (U.K)
Norman Levine (U.S.)
Octavian Gakuru (Kenya)
Ellen Oppenheim (U.S.)
Alexander Ageev (Russia)
Michael Murphy (New Zealand)
Barnard Rangel (Brazil)
Mohsen Mohebi (Iran)
Tan khoon Yong (Singapore)
Secretary-General:
Vincent Law (Australia)
Theme:
Promoting the unity of spirituality to achieve interreligious harmony in a global world
Task:
Promoting the unity of spirituality to achieve interreligious harmony in a global world”Discuss and pass the Proposal to Global Religions put forward by the Third World Congress of Global Civilization”
Register location:
Hall of Kings Hotel•Jerusalem•Israel
Register time:
3rd-5th October, 2009
Working Languages:
English, Arabic
Speech:
Key speech: less than 30 minutes; general speech: less than 10 minutes.
Please hand in the speech (English, Arabic) to secretariat of the conference not later than July 6th, 2009.
Guests of the congress:
This gongress will specially arrange “guest seats” for informal representatives, including personnels from embassies of every country and every religious organization in Jerusalem, Israel, religious representatives and friends who have been supporting OPGC for long.
Accommodation and Air Ticket:
Representatives shall pay 100 US Dollars for the meeting. Charges for air ticket and accommodation shall be covered by yourself.
For the person with finance difficulties, he/she can ask the Preparatory Committee of the Third World Congress of Global Civilization for support.
Special hint:
For the formal representatives that have participated in the First World Congress of Global Civilization (Sydney, July 2001) and the Second World Congress of Global Civilization (New York, November 2005), the charges for their air tickets, accommodation and meeting will be covered by this conference.
Contact:
Contact person: Emma Wang Add: 246 West 38th Street, Ground Floor, New York, NY10018, USA Fax: ＋1－212－575－8828 Web: http://www.opgc.net E-mail: info@opgc.net
You can download this form，and after the completion of the fill-mail sent to info@opgc.net, Thank you!
