You make this announcement while the world is preparing to celebrate the anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights next week.
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), agreed to by the United Nations on December 10, 1948, was created in response to the “disregard and contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have outraged the conscience of mankind” begins with an opening article that applies to ALL of humanity. It states “All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.”
This includes you, me, and Warren Weinstein.
We all have the same responsibilities to human dignity and to act in a spirit of brotherhood and sisterhood to all of our fellow human beings.
Dr. Warren Weinstein, USAID contractor, allegedly kidnapped by Al-Qaeda in Pakistan
Your actions to kidnap USAID contractor Warren Weinstein are not only criminal actions, but they are also actions that defy the very universal rights and dignity that all human beings have.
Certainly most of the world rejects and condemns the actions of Al-Qaeda. Certainly most of the world rejects and condemns cowardly kidnapping and attacks on elderly individuals who seek to improve the lives of others, such as Mr. Weinstein.
But also the world must be consistent in extending our love and human dignity to all people. So, as with all others in the world, Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri, I urge you too to look within your heart. I urge you too, to free your heart from the burden of disrespect to others, the press of indignity towards others, and disease of hate towards others. I urge you too, to act as a decent human being and find the human decency and conscience to release Mr. Weinstein.
Responsible for Equality And Liberty (R.E.A.L.) stands united with practitioners of the Falun Gong, who seek our universal human rights and dignity. For over 12 years, there has been a continuing effort to deny human rights to practitioners of the Falun Gong in the People’s Republic of China (PRC).
However, we also seen many, many instances of human rights courage and solidarity, including protests throughout Washington D.C., which R.E.A.L. has been honored to join. Ten years ago in the PRC on November 20, 2011, human rights activists made an appeal to the conscience of human beings in the PRC and around the world to end the persecution of Falun Gong practitioners.
The persecution of the Falun Gong has continued. In addition, PRC representatives have sought the harassment of PRC representatives around the world.
In my experience with the Falun Gong, they have remained the spirit of non-violent peaceful protest that those of us in America look up to and respect. They protest with spirit, but with dignity. They express their defense of human rights, but remain compassionate.
The United States Congress has recognized their plight and called for action on this in House Resolution 605 in March 16, 2010, which recognizes that Falun Gong practitioners and their family members have “suffered persecution, intimidation, imprisonment, torture, and even death for the past decade solely because of adherence to their personal beliefs.”
But R.E.A.L.’s support does not end in our solidarity and shared anguish over the plight and the human rights injustices of the Falun Gong. Sympathy is not enough.
We also call for action. We call for real courage of the United States government to make this and other human rights abuses in the PRC a priority in discussions and meetings with the PRC. It has been nearly two years since the passing of H.R. 605.
Where does the United States government stand on its objectives to call “upon the Government of the People’s Republic of China to immediately cease and desist from its campaign to persecute, intimidate, imprison, and torture Falun Gong practitioners, to immediately abolish the 6- 10 office, an extrajudicial security apparatus given the mandate to ‘eradicate’ Falun Gong, and to immediately release Falun Gong practitioners, detained solely for their beliefs, from prisons and re-education through labor (RTL) camps, including those practitioners who are the relatives of United States citizens and permanent residents”? Respectfully, I ask if President Obama and our leaders can let us know where they stand on this in discussions with the PRC? There are many Americans whose hearts go out to the Falun Gong practitioners around the world and seek to support their human rights and human dignity.
All of us involved in human rights are grateful and appreciative our every effort to stand in solidarity and leadership on human rights issues. But we also know that good intentions and noble words need the sacrifice and seriousness to make changes. They are complex, difficult issues to be certain, given many international issues and the world economy.
But as Americans, we stand first and foremost on the truths that we hold self-evident on such inherent human rights and dignity. That is not just a promissory note to future Americans, but it is also a declaration of our identity as a nation; they may be large shoes to fill, but the American vision is based on such large goals and aspirations. Furthermore, as world citizens, we have an obligation to defend the Universal Declaration of Human Rights for all people around the world.
Two Falun Dafa practitioners hold a candle at the candle light vigil in Washington, DC on July 22nd -- marking 11 years of persecution in China. (Jeff Nenarella / The Epoch Times) Responsible for Equality And Liberty's Jeffrey Imm Joins Candlelight Vigil (Jeff Nenarella / The Epoch Times)
United4Equality invites the public to an event to raise awareness and funds in support of the Equal Rights Amendment (E.R.A. on November 12, Saturday night from 7 to 10 PM at theStrathmore Court Apartments Community Room at 5440 Marinelli Road in Rockville.
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Please join us for this special fundraising event that highlights the historic Equal Rights Amendment campaign and our revival effort going on now! Would you help us spread the word to your members and friends?
Carolyn Cook of United4Equality Speaks of the Need for Constitutional Equality for Women in America and Consistent Support for Women's Rights Around the World
In the many struggles for human rights, dignity, and social justice around the world, too many are ready to forget about America’s poor and struggling.
If we prioritize mercy in our lives, we must open our hearts, our lives, our wallets, and our arms to all of our brothers and sisters who struggle to achieve human rights, dignity, and social justice anywhere in the world, including in the United States. As our human rights are universal, so our compassion of mercy must also be universal to people of any identity group, any age, any gender, any race, any religion, any nationality. The members of the human race are our brothers and sisters – all of them.
There are many struggling, some that we know, and some that we do not know. All of them deserve our mercy, whatever help we can give, our encouragement, our prayers, and our respect as fellow human beings. Our cause, our mission, must be a mission of mercy for all. That is the heart of humanity that calls for universal human rights for all.
In the political world, there are those find the battle over helping those struggling to be more important than merciful respect and caring for those who are struggling. We must use political means in our government to pass laws and to take government action. But every solution for human rights, dignity, and social justice begins with a human rights mission of mercy to help our fellow human beings – not because it is the politically correct thing to do, but because it is the right thing to do as fellow human beings.
In September 2011, the U.S. Census Bureau released a report that states that 15 percent are living in poverty conditions in America today. The Associated Press goes on to report on people of all ages struggling to survive, one family in New Mexico after a husband lost his job at McDonalds, how they ended up living in homeless shelter. It reports of elderly struggling to survive in trailers in rural America.
— One in six of America’s elderly faces hunger and poverty. As women statistically live longer than men, I have no doubt that this also means a number of struggling elderly women.
— Significant racial minority poverty remains – Black Americans have a poverty rate of 27.4 percent, followed by people of Hispanic origin at 26.6 percent
It may surprise some to know that most in America (51.4 percent) will live in poverty at some point in their lives.
In my own experience over many years, I have seen first hand the struggles of the homeless and the poor in America. I thought I knew a great deal about poverty in America. But over the past year, I have had to travel to many poor and rural parts of this nation. I learned that I knew nothing about the degree of poverty in America. Things are much, much worse than I thought I knew.
Some have wondered where I have been in gathering the press for global human rights events, over the past year.
I have been traveling, and I have been with the poor in this nation, hearing their struggles, listening to their pain, visiting their homes, and seeing the conditions in which they are forced to live. I have been hearing the struggles of the elderly, I have been hearing the struggles of the young, and I have been hearing of the abuse of women of all ages in this nation. I have been hearing how their conditions of poverty impacts their human rights and dignity. In many areas of our nation today, the situation is dire, grim, and frightening.
I can understand how some can believe that these are not real human rights issues, they are not real women’s rights issues, they are not real children’s rights issues, they are not really an assault on human dignity and rights. This is not Darfur, the Congo, the struggles of religious minorities in Pakistan, Egypt, and elsewhere, the struggle for women’s rights in Saudi Arabia and other parts of the world, the struggles for rights and dignity in Communist China. Some may wonder why Americans are complaining about such financial issues, when by outward appearance of some of the most affluent parts of America, there appears to be no problems.
But they have not seen what I have seen in America today. They have not seen the frightening living conditions and inability of people to exercise their human rights, their freedom of speech, and the ability to get an education due to stark conditions of dire poverty in many parts of America today. They have not seen the rats running in inhuman living conditions. They have not seen the shacks in the woods that people are desperately clinging to so that they can survive. They have not heard the cries of the cold, the hungry, the frightened, the hopeless, and the oppressed in many parts of America.
They have not heard the tears and the voices of women forced into sexual service so that they can be permitted to live in such shacks and horrible conditions in parts of America. Like other parts of the world, here too in America we must also address the conditions of women whose human rights and human dignity are being systematically denied.
Like other parts of the world, these Americans too hope to get an education some day. Like other parts of the world, these Americans too hope to have the right to live without fear of oppression from those who would seek to deny them their freedom of speech. Like other parts of the world, these Americans too deserve our mercy, our compassion, and our respect.
We must address the poverty of human rights in America and around the world.
But we also must not ignore the poverty of existence that so many face daily in America and around the world, a poverty that makes it virtually impossible for many to exercise such human rights and a poverty that allows oppressors to deny them human rights.
In America, some would make light or political debates over such issues, but our brothers and sisters are genuinely suffering, and we must offer compassion, dignity, respect, and hope.
In America, however, some believe that this is a political issue, not a human rights or a human dignity issue.
It begins with a consistent commitment to MERCY.
On October 30, 2011, the widely-read and famous cartoonist Gary Trudeau published in his Doonesbury column in the Washington Post and other newspapers, a cartoon with a cartoon character which he states represents FOX News who states “America’s poor are like none before them. Our poor can afford cable. Over 25% have a dishwasher. Many are fat, so you know they get enough to eat. And they can get free health care at any emergency room! Fact is, this country has the most pampered poor on the Earth – the envy of the rest of the world!” Mr. Trudeau is known for his politically-oriented cartoons.
I am sure Mr. Trudeau had a reason for his cartoon, and was seeking to be ‘satirical” or “funny,” and to pointedly mock FOX News. I can see that perhaps Mr. Trudeau thought this would be shocking to some. However, in America today, there are too many who would believe such an attempt at satire as truth. Still the problem is not with FOX News, it is not with “Republicans” or the “right” as so many would have it. It is not with corporations. While America is suffering, the answers will not be found in pointing fingers, debating politics, and mocking others.
Addressing America’s poverty problem must being with our hearts first and our call for mercy, help, and support for all those suffering – from every group, from every political spectrum, and from any source. We must remind others that we are all brothers and sisters in humanity – and we share the responsibility for equality and liberty.
We may have different approaches to solving the problem of poverty for different groups, families, and individuals. But if we can address the truth of our shared respect and dignity for all human beings, we will begin to prioritize what really matters in our lives, in our groups, in our communities, in our laws, and in our government.
This is the challenge of viewing of fellow brothers and sisters in humanity through a political perspective versus a human rights perspective.
Americans, of all ages, the elderly, entire families, women, children, are suffering, struggling in America today. There is nothing to satirize about that struggle, and there is nothing political about that struggle.
We will lead the struggle to help our brothers and sisters with our hearts and hands first. With our commitment to show such respect for others, the political answers will follow. Our human rights answer must begin with Mercy. We must never forget those who continue to suffer in America, and our hearts need to go out to our brothers and sisters in America today.
Ladies and Gentlemen –
Good afternoon. My name is Mohamed Yahya, and I am a survivor of the genocide in Sudan and Darfur. I lead the Damanga Coalition for Freedom and Democracy. I would like to thank the UNHCR, the UN Office for Partnerships, and the Book Wish Foundation for the invitation to speak to you today. I am deeply moved and grateful that proceeds from the book “What You Wish For” will be used to develop libraries in Eastern Chad refugee camps where many of my fellow Sudanese refuges live. They need hope, they need dreams, and they need their culture and history. I too was a refugee from Sudan, before ultimately coming to this country, and so I can tell you it means a lot to me. This is a great initiative by the Book Wish Foundation, and we can’t thank you enough for this program to help provide libraries of books to help the lives of the surviving refugees in Chad. We express our great gratitude in your efforts to help Sudanese refugees in Chad who had lost hope in getting an education. With the ongoing genocidal war, they lost the lives of their loved ones, lands, farms, belongings, animals, and properties. We also extend our thanks to those you who visited Darfur and Chad several times, putting your lives in the front to save the lives of others, providing them with the necessary means for survival or education.
As human beings, we are inspired by our wishes, our ideas, and our dreams. Many of these we find in books. Books help us grow. Books help make us who we are. Books help give us freedom.
In the West, I have read books that speak of great ideas and philosophy, including writing by Nelson Mandela. I have read great poetry and I enjoy Edgar Allen Poe’s poetry. I have read great books of drama and struggle such as those by Leo Tolstoy. I have read great religious books from people of all faiths and different philosophers. I have read many inspirational and historical books from around the world and in different languages. These books tell great stories, provide great education, and inspire great ideas.
I ask you to imagine this. What if you were not allowed to read them? What if you were not allowed to read books, poems, history books about your culture and your heritage? Books help us grow. But what if someone refuses to let you read them? This is what has happened in Sudan and Darfur, under Sudanese President Omar Al-Bashir.
Imagine if someone tried to take your imagination, your history, your culture, and your books away from you? That has been the case in Sudan and Darfur.
Sudan’s Omar Al-Bashir has led a long genocide against people in Darfur and Sudan. But the genocide is not just killing my brothers and sisters there. The genocide is also trying to erase their culture, their heritage, their ideas, and their dreams.
Imagine if someone tried to prevent books on your culture, your history, and your dreams – to try to erase your identity. That is how genocide begins.
It is a crime against all of humanity, including all of you here. We need the genocide to stop, and we need to heal the Sudanese and Darfuri people who have suffered.
This is why the work you are doing with this initiative is so important not only just for the Sudanese refugees, but also for humanity. We thank you and humanity thanks you.
I wish to recognize all those involved who have sought to defend in some way, the struggle of the Sudanese and Darfuri people from the genocidal war. I wish to recognize all those even killed, raped, or kidnapped while performing their duties, from UN peace keepers to individuals, workers, staffers, teachers of the World Food Program, UNHCR, US AIDS, International Rescue Committee, Enough, Our Humanity In The Balance, Darfuri Associations, African Union, European Community, Physicians for Human Rights, I-ACT, Stop Genocide Now, Save Darfur, American Jews Service, Mia Farrow, human rights organizations, UNICEF, Save the Children, Red Cross, Doctors Without Borders, Darfur Interfaith Network, Eric Reeves, Humanity United, Responsible for Equality And Liberty, Change the World It Just takes Cents, American Jewish World Service, Jewish World Watch, Massachusetts Coalition to Save Darfur, Refugees International, Radio Dabenga, Amnesty International, US Holocaust Museum, Sudan Now,Africa Action, and more.
Someday, you too will be in the books of history. We need to finish the job to end the genocide and to bring freedom to Darfur and Sudan, so that those people will be allowed to read such books.
The Darfuri refugee camps have asked me to bring to your attention, including the UNSC and the US Mission through the UNHCR, the following actions that are urgently needed:
1- The Darfuri refugees are asking for a Non-Fly Zone over Darfur and all the affected areas to stop the Sudanese government’s bombings and protect their lives outside and inside camps and villages.
2- The Darfuri refugees are in need of help to build them more schools, libraries, and a refugees’ university near the Chad border with Darfur to absorb students, who might otherwise end up on the streets or become recruited as a child soldier after high school.
3- We appreciate your ongoing efforts for a peaceful settlement to the Darfur conflict. But the real lasting solution to Darfur conflict should start with justice. Therefore, we need you to support the ICC to bring Al-Bashir and all suspects to justice. Then peace will come and all refugees will peacefully returns back home.
4- We ask all to give full access to the humanitarian organizations and aid workers to reach all refugee camp with shelters, medicine, clean water and food supplies.
Once again we thank you all for your efforts and this wonderful initiative for libraries for the refugees. We share your commitment to ideas, learning, education, and hope for a future of peace, respect, dignity, and human rights for all people.
Mohamed Yahya
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Mohamed Yahya, Damanga Coalition Speaks on Human Rights, at National Press Club on Human Rights Day Event, December 9, 2010 (photo: Epoch Times)
My good friends in support of Chinese democracy, freedom, and dignity sent me this article below in Epoch Times about the Kennedy Center hosting of performances of the Chinese National Ballet organized by the Communist Chinese government. They protest the ballet’s history of glamorizing Communist violence and oppression. They have organized 25 human rights groups to join them in an Open Letter which will be published stating their protest on this.
We fully respect the rights of the Kennedy Center and all private businesses to chose what and who they will have at their establishments. We respect their freedom of expression, including that we disagree with. We support our universal freedoms and human rightsfor the Chinese people and all people around the world.
We reject the glorification of Communist violence, and we reject glorification of a message of oppression by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). We reject the messages of violence and oppression which have been part of this ballet’s performances.
The pain of the Chinese people who seek democracy and freedom is a voice the world cannot ignore.
So we stand with our brothers and sisters in support of Chinese democracy, freedom, dignity, and justice – because we are allResponsible for Equality And Liberty.
Chinese Ballet at Kennedy Center Extols Violent Revolution
By Matthew Robertson Epoch Times Staff
September 23, 2011
A scene from “The Red Detachment of Women,” where women wield rifles and knives in pursuit of the landlord villains. Hundreds of thousands of innocent people were violently killed in the Party’s land reform campaigns, which are glorified in the ballet. (Maopost.com)
WASHINGTON—Audiences at the prestigious Kennedy Center are being asked to applaud a ballet that celebrates a movement that went on to murder hundreds of thousands. The Chinese National Ballet is performing on Sept. 22-24 “The Red Detachment of Women,” which glorifies the history of the communist land reform campaign in China, while concealing the reality of the violence that suffused it. In 1931 Mao Zedong, head of the communist-controlled regions, signed off on a policy of land reform that would “Rely on the poor peasants and hired laborers, make allies of the middle-peasants, exploit the kulaks and exterminate the landlords.” What followed in the 1930s, 40s, and into the 50s, was mass violence directed at “class enemies”: torture, arson, live burials, smashing and theft—a reign of terror designed to impose the political will of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) on villages across the country. Hundreds of thousands were killed. Acts I and II from “Red Detachment” performed at Kennedy precede a scene from “Swan Lake” and the Chinese nationalist favorite “Yellow River.”
“They used this play to trick the Chinese people, and now they’re tricking Americans,” says Wu Fan, editor of China Affairs and co-author of an open letter that opposes the performance.
“They’re bandits and arsonists attacking wealthy people, taking their property and splitting the profits, and they’re portrayed as heroes,” he said in a telephone conversation. “Americans would not stand for a ballet that made Hitler seem glorious. Why should they accept one that makes Mao heroic? Both are mass murderers.”
The “Red Detachment” is a flagship of the CCP’s revolutionary operas, infamous in China because eight of them were the only operas permitted in the country during the Cultural Revolution, from 1966-1976. It is most well-known for being performed for President Nixon when he visited China in 1972.
The open letter, sent to media, politicians, and the Kennedy Center, argues that the performances are part of the CCP’s comprehensive approach to Western nations, which conceals hostility and a desire for dominance, while engaging in spying, propaganda, and infiltration.
A landlord from the ballet cowers as one of the revolutionary woman soldiers hardens her face and strikes a pose with her pistol. Land owners were a class to be struggled against and mercilessly eliminated in the early years of communist insurgency and rule in China. (Maopost.com)
Organizations that signed the letter include Washington Forum, the United League for Democracy in Laos, and the Non-Violent Movement for Human Rights for Vietnam—all groups opposing communism in one way or another.
The thrust of the activists’ complaints is echoed by academics. As Xing Lu, a China scholar, writes in her book: “Hatred permeates every model opera.” The basic message of these operas, Xing Lu writes, is that those designated as villains must be eliminated through violent struggle so a new society can be established.
The plays are meant to foster a “deep hatred for all class enemies and love for the Communist Party,” Xing Lu writes. The “Red Detachment” is the epitome of the genre. It eulogizes communist ideology and showers hatred on class enemies.
The “Red Detachment” is adapted from historical events during the early 1930s, telling the story of how a victimized peasant girl joined a woman’s detachment in the CCP’s red army and overthrew the landlords on Hainan Island, off the south coast of China.
The sinologist Simon Leys explains what land reform, carried out in various regions from the 1930s until the early 1950s, entailed: “By the fall of 1951, 80 percent of all Chinese had had to take part in mass accusation meetings, or to watch organized lynchings and public executions,” he writes.
The crowd was expected to roar in unison when the accusations were read out. “These grim liturgies followed set patterns that were once more reminiscent of gangland practices,” he says, with the purpose being to “ensure collective participation in the murder of innocent victims.”
The airbrushed version of one such history, on which the “Red Detachment” ballet is based, went from novel to ballet to film and then into ballet as commissioned by Jiang Qing, Chairman Mao’s wife.
Jiang was czar of the arts and guardian of revolutionary ideology in China during the Cultural Revolution, and personally made sure the performances were sufficiently red. She added rouge to the cheeks of the female lead and ordered that red flannel be used for collar tabs. She also made a Party representative the protagonist of the play, ensuring it would “present correctly the relationship between the army and the people.”
The Kennedy Center at night. (Lisa Fan/Epoch Times)
The depictions of females engaging in violence (in the play they wield rifles and large knives, strike aggressive poses, and kill landlords without mercy, for example) were anathema to prevailing notions of femininity in China at the time.
Scholars have suggested that such imagery may have contributed in no small part to a culture that saw young female Red Guards run rampant during the Cultural Revolution, torturing and killing their school teachers, ransacking houses, and brutalizing other supposed “class enemies.”
Along with the ballet format, acting techniques are pulled from Beijing opera and Chinese folk dances, and the music is meant to be clear and simple so as to communicate the message effectively. The dumbed down messages also had the useful outcome of “enforcing the uniformity of thought characteristic of… totalitarian societies,” Xing Lu writes in her book.
As simple messages are repeatedly drilled into people’s minds through performances like “Red Detachment,” “the range of word choices became smaller and smaller, the Chinese worldview became narrower and narrower,” Xing Lu says. “Especially when singing became automatic, lyrics and music exercised a hypnotic power to take away the ability to think.”
According to a number of scholars who have written about the play, the story finishes with the protagonist vowing to follow Mao’s motto that “political power grows out of the barrel of a gun.”
The play will be performed in the theater named for former president Dwight D. Eisenhower. Perhaps it is best that this staunch anti-communist is not around to hear the refrain “Communist ideology is the truth, the Party leads the way” sung in the theater that bears his name.
The Kennedy Center could not be reached at press time.
Around the United States of America, people are remembering this day as “Patriot Day.”
Ten years ago today, terrorists attacked New York City, Washington DC crashing jets into buildings and murdering thousands. Another planned attack on Washington DC was thwarted in mid-air on Flight 93 by courageous people, and it crashed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania.
We remember.
But we do more than remember than tragedies and the loss of lives.
How many memorial services, how many funerals have you gone to that simply remember loss and death?
No, when we REMEMBER, we also and most importantly remember life. We remember dignity. We remember joyous days. We remember mercy. We remember our common bonds with one another. We remember not just death, but we remember what makes our lives worth living. We remember our hearts and our love for one another.
I believe we do have a destiny. I believe all of our lives are lived for a purpose. I believe that all of our lives have meaning and are special. Those whose lives were ended on 9/11 came from many different backgrounds, different religions, and different identity groups. For some, they died so that we here could live. For others, their last moments were of courage in seeking to save their fellow human beings. They included Todd Beamer, Steven Weinstein, Sophia Addo, New York Fire Department Captain Patrick J. Waters, Lydia Bravo, Army Major Wallace Hogan, NYPD Cadet Mohammad Salman Hamdani, and nearly 3,000 more. Their deaths from the terrorist attacks were not an end, and their lives will be remembered by Americans forever.
We remember our brothers and sisters on 9/11. We remember them and we reach out to them across the universe and across the heavens.
We miss them and we love them. We love them, no matter their names, no matter their ethnic group, no matter their race, no matter their gender, and no matter their religion.
Some worry that our love and compassion will be seen by others as weakness. Our love for one another is not a weakness, but it is the greatest strength in the world. It is a bond to holds fast our diversity around the globe into one singular and special human race.
In the Washington Post today, a writer writes that the 9/11 attacks were the “end of American innocence.” But in our nation and around the world, there are innocent children born every day, who are born into a world and a nation, where they are loved. We have opportunity for such innocent compassion to our fellow beings every day of our lives. So I don’t see any end to innocence in America, or anywhere in the world, I see the endless opportunity for innocent love towards one another.
There are some who ask, ten years later, isn’t it time for Americans to “get over” 9/11? Some of those people mean well. Some of those people are concerned about the divisions we have seen grow in our nation and the world. But we have a choice. As we remember the lives lost on 9/11, we also must continue the courage and dignity of those who were killed that day. We have the choice to remember 9/11 for the fearlessness and sacrifice that so many made to save their fellow human beings in New York City, in Washington DC, and on Flight 93 in the sky. We should never “get over” such profiles of courage, and we should use their inspiration today and every day.
Today, our nation and our fellow human beings must have a united message to those who seek to promote hate and violence.
We are not afraid.
We don’t make that statement arrogantly, but simply as a statement of the truth in our hearts.
We won’t allow ourselves to be dragged into the fear and hate that undermines the joys and the blessings that we have in our lives.
We urge our fellow human beings to choose peace, not violence, to choose human dignity, not disrespect, and to choose love, not hate.
Sunday, September 11, 2011
12:30 pm Registration Opens – Washington Hebrew, 3935 Macomb Street, Washington, DC 20016
12:30-2:15 pm Service Fair – Details TBD
1:00-1:25 pm Kirtan Musicians – performing in auditorium as participants gather
1:25pm Muslim Call to Prayer – Imam Abdullah Khouj, Islamic Center of Washington
1:30-2:00 pm Program Begins – Welcome and Opening Remarks
Opening Remarks – MC Maureen Fiedler, SL Interfaith Voices, WAMU 88.5
Senior Rabbi Bruce Lustig, M.A.H.L., Washington Hebrew Congregation
Special Remarks – “title of speech,” Sheikh Hamza Yusuf
Most Rev. Barry Knestau, Auxiliary Bishop, Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington
2:15 – 4:15 pm Open Houses – Participants must choose between activities during three blocks of Open House presentations. Volunteer ushers will guide foot traffic between stops and at major road intersections.
2:15-2:45 pm
Christ Church – “Blessings, Speaking in Tongues and Miracles” 3855 Massachusetts Avenue, NW
Annunciation Catholic Church – Guided tours of the church 3810 Massachusetts Avenue, NW
National Gurdwara- Turban-tying demonstration
3810 Massachusetts Avenue, NW
St. Albans- Choral Music Presentation and Tour 3000 Wisconsin Avenue, NW
3:00-3:30 pm
National Gurdwara- Turban-tying demonstration 3801 Massachusetts Avenue, NW
Community of Christ – TBD 3526 Massachusetts Avenue, NW
St. Nicholas Cathedral – Guided Tour 3500 Massachusetts Avenue, NW
Soka Gakkai International- “A Chance to Chant” 3417 Massachusetts Avenue, NW
3:45-4:15 pm
Embassy of the Vatican- Greeting from Jean Francis 3339 Massachusetts Avenue, NW
Khalil Gibran Memorial Park –“The Experience of Mantra Meditation” led by Bali Adawal 3100 Massachusetts Avenue, NW
Islamic Center of Washington – Guided tours of the Mosque preceding the program
2551 Massachusetts Avenue, NW
4:30-5:00 pm Unity Walk Program Resumes
Islamic Center of Washington, 2551 Massachusetts Avenue, NW
Welcome: Imam Abdullah Khouj, Islamic Center of Washington
Special remarks – The Rev. Bill Haley / Rabbi Jack Moline
Title of speech: Karen Armstrong, Charter for Compassion, Winner, TEDPrize
Tell People to walk – Arun Gandhi, Grandson of Mahatma Gandhi
“Amazing Grace,” St. Augustine’s Gospel Choir – All faiths join together for a dramatic statement from the Islamic Center in Washington, DC to the World
5:00-5:45 pm Procession and Closing Celebration ending at Mahatma Gandhi Memorial
“O Happy Day!” – A “Gandhi-style Walk” and gospel procession led by Arun Gandhi and the St. Augustine Gospel Choir
Introduction – TBD, representative, United Hindu Jain Temple Association
Arun Gandhi, Grandson of Mahatma Gandhi
Imam Mohamed Majid, Islamic Society of North America
Closing Prayer – TBD
Our goal is to DEMONSTRATE that the love we have for one another is GREATER than the differences that some seek to emphasize.
We seek to DEMONSTRATE that people of all religions, identity groups, and genders, can share our common bonds of human dignity, human respect, human rights, and human love.
