UN Interfaith Conference and United Religions Initiative

The
need that has arisen from the UN's Conference to have more interfaith
cooperation is a great story that speaks to the ubiquity of the General
Assembly meeting of URI groups in Mayapur, India next week.  This story
is important for your readers because The URI General Assembly and the
ideas of the UN Conference are to form a greater understanding of the
Middle East and its cultural biases in modern times.

 

 

MEDIA ALERT
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Pilgrimage of Global Interfaith Leaders & Youth
Unite in Mayapur, India

November 30 – December 05, 2008

San Francisco, November 2008 –This November 29th –
December 5th, 2008, in Mayapur, India, United Religions Initiative
(URI) will hold its second global gathering of members and partners, in
a small temple town on the banks of the Ganges where daily up to 10,000
pilgrims visit. Bringing together nearly 300 global interfaith leaders,
from 44 countries, as well as the first interfaith youth delegation,
the 2008 Global Assembly
will serve as an opportunity for members, all of whom are working on
interfaith projects worldwide, to speak face to face, learn from one
another’s successes and to build further alliances within the URI
network.

The Young Leaders Program,
as part of URI’s 2008 Global Assembly, will bring together 100 youth
leaders ranging from ages 18-35, from 35 countries, for a five-day
workshop in Mayapur. During their stay in India, they will lead
sessions on leadership, visit a local village to engage in a hands-on
service project to paint a peace mural, and participate in a
tree-planting initiative with the village schoolchildren for the UN’s Billion Tree Planting program.

The five-day gathering in Mayapur, one of the spiritual capitals of the
world, is based on the premise of being a pilgrim in one’s host
country, rather than being a tourist. The Assembly’s theme this year ‘Pilgrims of Peace: Many Paths, One Purpose’
is a powerful notion, representative of the diversity of projects and
faiths, as well as the dedication of URI members and delegates, all of
whom, and some at great financial expense, are coming together to
participate in an unprecedented grassroots global gathering for the
sole purpose of furthering worldwide interfaith cooperation.

While participants in URI’s projects have included leaders such as
the Dalai Lama, URI’s primary constituents are common citizens working
on a grassroots level in their own communities. These individual
community and spiritual leaders connect to the URI network though one
or more of URI’s nearly 400 local groups based in 70 countries
worldwide, called Cooperation Circles.
Developed to directly assist and further the work of these interfaith
Cooperation Circles, the 2008 Global Assembly in Mayapur will address
questions and share experiences of respected and recognized leaders in
grassroots organizing, in order to further the work of world wide
interfaith peacebuilding.

–end–

United Religions Initiative
(URI) is a non-profit organization dedicated to the promotion of
enduring and daily interfaith cooperation in order to end religiously
motivated violence, and to the creation of a culture of peace, justice
and healing for the Earth and all living beings. Founded in 2000, with
a central hub in San Francisco, California, URI has nearly 400
Cooperation Circles representing over 100 faiths working on
community-based projects, which serve over one million people, in more
than 70 countries worldwide.  Having attained special consultative
status with the Social and Economic Council of the United Nations in
2007, URI’s network continues to grow and expand in areas of interfaith
peace building, conflict resolution, economic development, heath,
ecology and education.
The work of URI and its Cooperation Circles is as varied as their members and consists of a wide range of programs including:

• Protecting street kids in Kenya
• Preventing gang violence in California
• Providing burial cloths for needy Muslims in local Malawian communities
• Creating schools for women in Mozambique
• Encouraging women in Israel to take on roles of leadership
• Engaging in hunger-strikes via Facebook in protest of Saudi Arabia’s human rights violations
• Promoting peace education for youth and children in Pakistan
• Inspiring imam and priest dialogues in the Philippines

For more information about URI visit: www.uri.org

Visit www.uri.org for Further Information on URI’s Projects in:

Africa

Asia

Europe

Latin America & the Caribbean

Middle East & North Africa

Southeast Asia and the Pacific
North America

 

For Media Information or Images Please Contact:

Wendy Norris, Principal

Norris Communications
(415) 307-3853
wendy@norriscommunications.biz

or

Sam Ruben, Communications                         

United Religions Initiative                         
(415) 561-2300                                             

sruben@uri.org