An Inter-faith Perspective on

Globalisation for the Common Good

The Annual International Conference Series,

Inaugural Conference, Oxford, 2002

To download the programme brochure as Adobe file (1MB) with photos click here

About the Conference Venue:

Why Kericho?

For many centuries, Africa remained labelled, in a rather casual and inconsiderate way, the ‘Dark Continent’. It suffered under the yoke of colonial subjugation and repeated economic exploitation. Its wealth of raw material, including gold and diamonds, was plundered and its people endured the untold sufferings of the slave trade. Africa was hastily carved up by the colonial nations in their scramble for a portion of the continent, and those regions that offered the most attractive climate and conditions were routinely granted to the aristocrats and those with wealth and power. After gaining independence, Africa became steeped in terrible debt for which, despite ‘debt relief’ programmes from the West, it is still suffering the consequences.

The conference venue in Kericho therefore throws into stark relief many of the challenging issues we face concerning ‘Globalisation for the Common Good’. It is surely time that humanity woke up to Africa’s enduring plight and found constructive ways to make amends and create real opportunities for regeneration and sustainable development.

The small town of Kericho owes its name to a renowned African healer and medicine man known as ‘Kerich’. People from far and wide would flock to see him in this green and fertile region of East Africa, so much so that the town was named Kericho in tribute to his remarkable healing gifts. Around the early 1900s, Kericho became home to settlers from the Indian Subcontinent, including a number of Sikh families. Today, the town is associated with one of the most eminent and influential Sikh saints of the twentieth century outside India. Remembered fondly as ‘Baba Puran Singh Ji of Kericho’, he was born in 1898 to a devout Sikh family in the Panjabi village of Gura. Married at a young age, he emphasised the Sikh principle of ‘Grihsthi Jeevan’, to live the life of a householder, carrying out all one’s responsibilities to family and society whilst kindling spirituality within, rather than choosing a reclusive life of meditation – in other words, this was to live like the lotus flower, with its roots in the muddy waters of earthly life, with spirituality blossoming like petals above.

Baba Puran Singh emigrated to Kenya in 1916 and spent a total of forty-seven years in Kericho itself, where he set up ‘Kericho Wagon Works’. There he focussed on earning a livelihood, being a father to his family and helping others in the town, notably through municipal improvement schemes, such as the renovation of hospitals, schools and churches. In recognition of his civic contributions, the town square was named Sant Puran Singh Square. He also devoted himself to a private life of meditation, a love for Kericho’s natural surroundings, and the practice and propagation of the Sikh faith, demonstrating that modernity and spiritual growth need not be contradictory. It was in 1952 that Baba Puran Singh’s spirituality was given open recognition by a visiting saint from India and, thereafter, Kericho became immortalised through his immense humility and compassion, resilience and conviction which drew thousands to the town. In the 1970s Baba Puran Singh came to England and became a catalyst for the spiritual regeneration of Sikhs in Britain and around the world and a driving force for interfaith understanding. He founded the international charitable organisation, Guru Nanak Nishkam Sewak Jatha whose headquarters are in Birmingham, UK, which promotes the spirit and practice of selfless service (‘nishkam sewa’) in the name of Guru Nanak Dev Ji, the founder of the Sikh faith.

Today, Kericho is home to Africa’s largest Gurudwara or Sikh place of worship, which in recent years has been extended and refurbished as a ‘living’ monument to this great saint. For Sikhs who are endeared to the town and to the memory of Baba Puran Singh, the name Kericho is associated with the healing and rejuvenation of mind, body and soul, echoing the original legacy of the African healer ‘Kerich’ many year before. The spaciousand monumental Gurudwara, which has become a stunning architectural landmark in the region, envelopes Baba Puran Singh Ji’s modest family residence as well as workshop – the ‘Kericho Wagon Works’ – which is still operating 79 years on since it was founded in 1925. The site has been gazetted by the Government of Kenya as a place of spiritual significance. Another renowned Gurudwara in Kenya, which was the first to be built in the African continent, is in the small town of Makindu en route from Nairobi to the coastal resort of Mombasa, home to a long-established Sikh community. Still today, Makindu is a popular stop-over for pilgrims and travellers and is noted for its spiritually vibrant and refreshing atmosphere. Adjoining the Gurudwara an infrastructure has been built for ‘The Nishkam Puran Technical Institute’ envisaged to impart technical skills, with a faith dimension, to indigenous local youth. The visionary initiative, which in time should become a model to be emulated, is a combination of benevolence and charity exercised by followers of one faith into doing positive good for people of different faiths who are marginalised and less privileged. The unique enterprise thus strives to build bridges between different faith communities across physical and hierarchical borders, across nations and nationalities and, with the respective government’s blessings, to serve at the grass roots level. This development initiative can be seen as a practical example of the human spirit at work for Globalisation for the Common Good. The forthcoming April 2005 conference will be the second international programme to be hosted by GNNSJ in Kericho. In March 2004 it was the venue for a conference organised jointly by GNNSJ and Chicago-based CPWR (Council for a Parliament of the World’s Religions) entitled ‘The power of commitment in improving the plight of refugees and addressing international debt cancellation for developing countries.’ This event brought together over eighty leaders and activists from around the world, including figures such as Rev. Professor Micheal Taylor, Director of World Faiths Development Dialogue; the Rev. Dirk Ficca, Executive Director of CPWR; and Hon. Dr. A. A. Moody Awori, the Republic of Kenya’s Vice President and Minister for Home Affairs. Faith is expected to be the ‘global prime mover’ of the 21st century in the third millennium. Globalisation without the faith element’s humane traits is bound to result in exploitation. To establish world peace and harmony, it is paramount that humanity eradicates poverty, through charitable acts and education, through exercising love for human beings, through actually practicing not theorising faith’s universal qualities of compassion, forgiveness, truthfulness, selflessness, humility and love. In turn, faith organisations should have an open door policy for social uplift, community development, conservation and environment issues as well as education and technical training. The Babylonian proverb ‘work is worship’ cannot be true without work having a faith dimension for its upkeep. The human spirit, being indestructible, is the only everlasting human ‘constituent’ that can, in absolute terms, guarantee sustainability. Finally, Kericho and the surrounding region can be considered as the emerald of Kenya; scenic and serene, it is a truly breathtaking, naturally carpeted ‘tea-country’ of tranquillity. The appreciation and protection of nature and the environment is mandatory for humanity within the globalisation context. Kericho is only an hour’s drive from the world’s largest fresh water lake – Lake Victoria Nyanza, and only some two hours drive from Masai Mara National Park, offering a chance to view Kenya’s extraordinary wildlife first hand. Conference participants will therefore have the opportunity to experience the region’s spectacular natural beauty during their stay. Nature according to the Sikh scripture is second to Godliness.

An Introduction and Mission Statement

The Children of Adam

Are limbs of one another,

In terms of Creation,

They’re of the self-same Essence.

Sa’adi.

What is to be done, O Moslems? For I do not recognise myself.

I am neither Christian, nor Jew, nor Gabr, nor Moslem.

I am not of the East, nor of the West, nor of the land, nor of the sea;

I am not of Nature’s mint, nor of the circling heaven.

I am not of earth, nor of water, nor of air, nor of fire;

I am not of the empyrean, nor of the dust, nor of existence, nor of entity.

I am not of India, nor of China, nor of Bulgaria, nor of Saqsin;

I am not of the kingdom of ’Iraqian, nor of the country of Khorasan.

I am not of this world, nor of the next, nor of Paradise, nor of Hell.

I am not of Adam, nor of Eve, nor of Eden and Rizwan.

My place is the Placeless; my trace is the Traceless;

’Tis neither body nor soul, for I belong to the soul of the Beloved.

I have put duality away; I have seen that the two worlds are one;

One I seek, One I know, One I see, One I call.

He is the first, He is the last, He is the outward, He is the inward;

I am intoxicated with Love’s cup, the two worlds have passed out of my ken;

If once in my life I spent a moment without thee,

From that time and from that hour I repent of my life.

If once in this world I win a moment with thee,

I will trample on both worlds; I will dance in triumph for ever.

Rumi.

With what shall I come before the Lord, and bow myself before God on high?

Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old? Will the Lord

be pleased with thousands of rams, with ten thousands of rivers of oil? Shall I give

my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?’ He

has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to

do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?

Prophet Micah

Now is the time to know
That all that you do is sacred.

Now, why not consider
A lasting truce with yourself and God.

Now is the time for the world to know
That every thought and action is sacred.

This is the time for you to compute the impossibility
That there is anything
But Grace.

Now is the season to know
That everything you do
Is sacred.

Hafez

Sooner or later, all the peoples of the world will have to discover a way to live together in peace, and thereby transform this pending cosmic elegy into a creative psalm of brotherhood. If this is to be achieved, man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression, and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.

Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

To address this need, in 2002, in Oxford, a small and humble movement for Globalisation for the Common Good came into being. This movement was for “Rekindling the Human Spirit and Compassion in Globalisation”. We wanted to have an alternative to the current dominant economic/free trade globalisation and to make globalisation good for all. Our movement found many dedicated and committed friends around the world. From Oxford we went to St. Petersburg, Russia, then to Dubai. This year we are in Kenya. 2006 will take us to Chaminade University, Honolulu, Hawaii, while in 2007 we will be in India.

Globalisation for the Common Good Mission is to promote ethical, moral and spiritual values into the areas of economics, commerce, trade and international relations amongst others, as well as personal virtues, to advance understanding and action on major global issues by civil society, the private enterprise, the public sector, governments, and national and international institutions, leading to the promotion of collaborative policy solutions to the challenges posed by globalisation. We are committed to the idea that the marketplace is not just an economic sphere, ‘it is a region of the human spirit’. Whilst considering the many economic questions and issues we should also reflect on the Divine dimension of life, and should, in contrast to what is practised today, be concerned with the world of heart and spirit. We view the problem and challenge of globalisation not only from an economic point of view, but also from ethical, spiritual and theological perspectives.

We affirm our conviction that a genuine inter-faith dialogue and co-operation is a significant way of bringing the world together; leading to the creation of a harmonious environment needed to build a world of peace, justice and prosperity for all. The call for Globalisation for the Common Good is an appeal to our essential humanity to deal with some of the most pressing concerns of peoples the world over.

Religion has always been a major factor in the growth of human civilisation. Business and wealth creation when they are for a noble reason are blessed and vital for human survival.

Bringing religions and business together for the common good will empower us with humanity, spirituality and love. It will raise us above pessimism to an ultimate optimism; turning from darkness to light; from night to day; from winter to spring. This spiritual ground for hope at this time of wanton destruction of our world, can help us recognise the ultimate purpose of life and of our journey in this world.

In the beautiful and ever-lasting words of Eleanor Roosevelt; “The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams”. At Globalisation for the Common Good, we do believe in the beauty of our dream. We do know that you share this dream with us. Please accept my heart- felt thanks for who you are and what you do in serving the common good and thank you also for all your love, support and prayers.

Dear Colleagues and Friends,

It is our pleasure and honour to welcome you to the conference. In these global and too often troubled times, we need new perspectives and models so that we can find humane answers to the challenge of globalisation, based on a profound respect for the diversity of cultures and religions in our world community. As global events demonstrate, there is a desperate need to reintroduce spirituality, ethics, morality and faith into the debate on globalisation.

Looking at the conference programme, without doubt and hesitation, we can see that our accomplished speakers have risen well to this challenge. The conference is truly privileged to have speakers of this calibre, sharing their views with us. Without them there would have been no conference, and with them, we hope we can travel together to heal the troubled and torn cultures of our time and pave the way to global justice, peace and harmony. We wish to express the conference’s respect and sincere gratitude to each of our presenters for their extraordinary commitment in being a part of this vital effort by giving their time and expertise freely. Each one of our speakers brings a missing and essential piece that completes the process, leading to a better understanding of what globalisation is all about. Hopefully, together, we can clearly argue for and insist on social and economic alternatives that address the roots of global injustice and inhumanity, leading to Globalisation for the Common Good.

We are also grateful to and thank all the conference delegates who have come from near and far to be with us. It is wonderful for academics and non-academics to get involved and engaged with one another, so that we can all share each other’s varied experiences. All of us must be given a voice to be heard.

We are most grateful to Hon. Dr. Moody Awori, The Vice President and Minister for Home Affairs, for his kind acceptance to be the Patron of the Conference. We also give our grateful thanks to the Government of Kenya, its Ministers and Officials who have provided much assistance to us. We are honoured to be in Africa-The Cradle of Civilisation- and Kenya-The Cradle of Humanity.

We are grateful to and thank our Local Organising Committee (LOC) in Kenya. Space alone has kept us from naming all of them. They have given their time, expertise and know-how as volunteers to Globalisation for the Common Good. We thank them all. We are however, particularly grateful to Sutinder Singh Jabbal, the Chair of (LOC), for all his support and hard work. Faith Muniu, our Conference Secretary, deserves a special thank. She has worked tirelessly, with great dedication and sense of humour. We would also like to thank Hayer Bishan Singh, Indish Hayer, Pal Singh Bhachu and Davinder S. Devgun for all their support. We thank the Audio Visual Department at Guru Nanak Nishkam Sewak Jatha, especially Nirmal and Sukhwinder, in preparing and the printing of the Programme. Finally, we thank our mutual good friend, Dr. Josef Boehle for his continuous hard work in maintaining the commongood website and help in developing the conference programme.

This week, all of us, experienced and newcomers, young and old, students and teachers together will form a community, committed to exploring and debating visions and ideas for celebrating diversity, appreciating uniqueness, enabling us to transform disagreements into understanding and mutual respect.

In addition to plenary sessions and workshops, there will be opportunities for informal spontaneous meetings and dialogue between participants all through the week. This, we sincerely hope will result in invaluable collaborative learning experiences and networking as well as rich personal interactions. Please try to participate also in the cultural and social activities to cement further the newly formed friendships. I hope you will take full advantage of all these activities.

In conclusion, we invite you to share a common belief in the potential of each one of us to become self-directed, empowered, and active in defining this time in the world as opportunity for positive change and healing and for the true formation of a culture of peace by giving thanks, spreading joy, sharing love, seeing miracles, discovering goodness, embracing kindness, practicing patience, teaching tolerance, encouraging laughter, celebrating diversity, showing compassion, turning from hatred, practicing forgiveness, peacefully resolving conflicts, communicating non-violently, choosing happiness and enjoying life.

Bhai Sahib Mohinder Singh and Kamran Mofid

List of Speakers

Hon. Dr. A. A. Moody Awori, EBS, M.P.	The Vice President and Minister for Home Affairs, The Republic of Kenya
Dekha Ibrahim Abdi	Director, Wajir Peace&Development Initiative, Kenya
Rev. Prof. J. Baitu	Director, Centre for Social Justice and Ethics, Catholic University of Eastern Africa, Kenya
Teresa Baldwinson	Justice and Peace Campaigner, UK
Rev. Michael Bos	Director, Al Amana Centre, Sultanate of Oman
Rev. Dr. Marcus Braybrooke	President, World Congress of Faiths, Oxford, UK
Shaheen Chandbhai,	Student, Centre for Women Studies and Gender Analysis, Egerton University, Kenya
Prof. Dr. Michael Chege	Advisor to the Minister for Planning and National Development, Nairobi, Kenya
Bagher Talebi Darabi	Centre for Religious Studies, Qom and Advisor, Institute for Interreligious Dialogue (IID), Tehran, Iran.
Cliff Edwards	Realign Consulting, UK
Prof. William F. Fore	Adjunct Prof. Divinity School, Yale University and Founder/Moderator Religion Online, USA
Moraa M. Gesicho	Department of Business Administration, Kenyatta University, Kenya
Wayne Green	Global Affairs Consultancy, UK
Prof. Wendy C. Hamblet	Department of Philosophy, Adelphi University, USA
H.E. Dr. Ahmad Jalali	President of 31st UNESCO General Assembly (2001-2003) and President of the World Heritage General Assembly of UNESCO (2003-2004)
Dr. Judith Rahima Jensen	Director, Educational Solutions, USA
Prof. Yahya R. Kamalipour	Head, Department of Communication and Creative Arts, Purdue University Calumet, and Managing Editor, Global Media Journal, USA
Jim Kenney	Executive Director, Interreligious Engagement Project, USA
Prof. Mumtaz Ali Khan	University of Agricultural Sciences, Bangalore, India
Daniel Lewis	Chief, Disaster, Post Conflict and Safety Section, Un-Habitat, Nairobi, Kenya
Todd Lorentz	Centre for Global Negotiations, Brandt 21 Forum, USA
Sr. Beatrice Mariotti	Headmistress, St. Mary’s Catholic High School, Dubai, UAE
Rev. Prof. John Maviiri	Rector and Vice Chancellor, Catholic University of Eastern Africa, Kenya
Prof. Ali Mazrui	Director, Institute of Global Cultural Studies, Binghamton University, USA and Chancellor, Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology, Kenya
Paul McCarthy FRSA	Principal Teaching Fellow, Warwick Manufacturing Group, University of Warwick, UK
Dr. Kamran Mofid	Founder-Convenor, An Inter-faith Perspective on Globalisation for the Common Good, UK
Roger Montgomery	Bishop, Spirit of Peace Monastic Community, USA
Dr. Mansoob Murshed	Institute of Social Studies (ISS), The Hague, Netherlands
Rebecca Napier	Research Intern, Centre for Survivors of Torture, Dallas, USA
Hon. Prof. Peter Anyang' Nyongo, M.P.	Minister for Planning and National Development, Kenya
Emmanuel Franklyne Ogbunwezeh	Candidate, Faculty of Social Ethics, Johann Wolfgang Goethe Universitat, Germany and Nigeria
Prof. Mar Peter-Raoul	Marist College, Marist Praxis Project, Founding Resident: Beloved Community House (Casa de Beloved Communidad), USA
Dr. Andreas Philippopoulos-Mihalopoulos	Reader in Law, University of Westminster, London, UK
Dr. James Bernard Quilligan	Director, Centre for Global Negotiations, Brandt 21 Forum, USA
Rev. Alan Race	Editor-in-Chief, Interreligious Insight, UK
Prof. Ahmad Sadri	Chair of the Sociology and Anthropology Department, Lake Forest College, USA
Prof. Mahmoud Sadri	Department of Sociology, Texas Woman's University, USA
Jane Samuels	Director of the Removing Unfreedoms Project, UK
Bhai Sahib Mohinder Singh	Chairman, Guru Nanak Nishkam Sewak Jatha
Dr. Keyvan Tabari	Attorney-at-Law, USA
Dr. jur.Thilo Tetzlaff	Institute of Global Law, University College London (UCL), UK
Cemal Usak	Secretary General, The Intercultural Dialogue Platform, Istanbul, Turkey
Sr. B. K. Vedanti	Director, Brahma Kumaris, World Spiritual University (Africa)
Dada Vratadhiirananda	Principal, Ananda Marga Academy, Nairobi, Kenya
L. Muthoni Wanyeki	Executive Director, African Women's Development and Communications Network (FEMENT), Kenya
Prof. Lawrence Woods	Department of International Studies, American University of Sharjah, UAE

Monday 18^th April

	Arrival at Nairobi Airport

Inaugural Conference, Oxford, 2002

An Introduction and Mission Statement

Cemal Usak