Promoting 'franchises' to end religious violence
an interview with William Swing

William Swing, the Episcopal Bishop of California since 1980, first got the idea of creating the United Religions Initiative (URI) in 1993, when he was asked to organize an interfaith worship service at San Francisco's Grace Cathedral as part of the upcoming 50th-anniversary celebration of the signing of the United Nations charter. His idea was to create a sort of United Nations of Religions -- if nations could find a way to work peaceably together to solve global problems, why not religions? But in the end, with the help of David Cooperrider, who teaches at Case Western Reserve's Weatherhead School of Management and runs an organization called Social Innovations in Global Management (SIGMA), and Dee Hock, the founder of Visa and an organizational design innovator, URI took the form of a non-hierarchical, self-organizing grassroots network of "cooperation circles," each having at least seven members from at least three different religious expressions. A Global Council manages the operations of the URI, including developing financial resources and processing applications for membership.

The group's formal launch was the signing of its charter on June 26, 2000. Since then, over 150 cooperation circles have been formed in 60 countries on five continents, involving, Swing says, "hundreds of thousands of people." Interest in URI's work, he adds, has profoundly accelerated since September 11.

This phone interview occurred a couple of days before the U.S. began bombing targets in Afghanistan in retaliation for the September 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

The Witness: The goal of URI, as I understand it, is to end religiously motivated violence.

William Swing: Yes. The first part of that is to promote daily, enduring interfaith cooperation. The second is to end religiously motivated violence. Third is to create cultures of peace, justice and healing for the earth and all living beings.

TW: How does URI do that?

WS: We trust that the real problems are going to be addressed and changed not at the top of religion, but at the grassroots of religion. So we allow people to form their own cooperation circles around any issue or activity that they want. When they do so, they have all the authority that is in the URI. In Malawi, for example, we have lots of cooperation circles focused on AIDS. One of our number, Bill Rankin, who was in development for us, has now started GAIA, the Global AIDS International Association. He's using the URI cooperation circle network throughout Malawi to do AIDS education, prevention, treatment, etc. We went from having one cooperation circle there to having multiple circles forming a whole universe of cooperation around one issue.

We believe you're not going to get rid of violence by passing a resolution. What's happened in Kosovo is the result of 600 years of hatred across religious and cultural/ethnic lines. You only get rid of it by 600 more years of dealing with the hearts of the people on the ground. There aren't any quick fixes when it comes to religion -- it's too ancient and too subterranean and the tap root goes down too far. It's really got to be whittled away and addressed every day in a constructive way at a grassroots level.

TW: So it sounds like URI's basic aim is to put people into relationship? They've got a common goal, a project and they are in relationship around that, dealing daily with their differences along the way.

WS: Absolutely. And they have to abide by the 21 principles of the URI.

TW: Those principles are pretty comprehensive. If people can say that they accept these principles, it seems you're ensuring a certain level of shared values from the outset. Without underestimating the power of the differences between people even if they share these values, how can the URI have an impact on deeper divisions? I think about one of the principles that has to do with equity between women and men.

WS: The first thing to say is that if we were trying, at the top of religion, to get one religion to deal with another, there would be too many contradictory and opposing viewpoints about which no one in a leadership position would feel able to cut any slack. But when you're dealing at the grassroots level, there are a lot of people who say, I don't really go along with everything that my religion teaches and therefore that makes it possible for me to meet you and deal with you across the boundary lines. That's why we have more potential for dealing with those deeper differences. There are groups that have a very low esteem toward women, but then there are a lot of people in that group that have a high esteem toward women and they will join the URI. Of course, if the folks at the top ever put the pressure on them to get out of URI, then that would be where the rubber hits the road.

TW: You are not just talking about people with denominational affiliations, right?

WS: We're talking about people in religions, people who are part of indigenous traditions and people who are led in a path of spirituality like spirituality and healing, or spirituality and the environment, etc. So it's a much broader range of people.

TW: Are there limits to cooperation that you've encountered? Is it possible to work cooperatively, say, with fundamentalists?

WS: Looking at it from another angle, a little anecdote. Somebody who is not a fundamentalist, but of a very evangelical nature, came into an interfaith group in San Francisco right after September 11 and said, "Look, you guys have been part of the enemy to me and I have got to start blessing the people I have cursed." And I thought, boy, that speaks volumes.

TW: How are you seeing URI's work in light of the events of September 11?

WS: Forgetting URI for a second, it just was very clear that something most natural happened, which was that every community that had an event of a spiritual or religious nature had an interfaith event. It wasn't like the President sent out a decree, or the World Council of Churches said we would suggest that you do this. Everybody looked around and said that in order to be the full human family here, with our religious differences, we all need to come together. And people flocked toward each other who heretofore would have had nothing to do with each other. And so I think interfaith has just created itself!

For instance, with the ecumenical movement there were two things that happened. Number one, enough time had gone by since the Reformation that people could see that the animosities between Catholics and Protestants were kind of senseless. Number two, people kept praying Christ's prayer for unity and said we just really must do something about ecumenism. So that's where ecumenism came from. But interfaith comes out of a deep sense of the total good of society. It's not a matter of Christ's prayer, or Mohammed's prayer, or anybody's prayer. It's a matter of, when you look around, common sense tells you that we're not going to make it as a nation unless we learn how to deal with each other religiously.

The United Religions Initiative Charter Preamble We, people of diverse religions, spiritual expressions and indigenous traditions throughout the world, hereby establish the United Religions Initiative to promote enduring, daily interfaith cooperation, to end religiously motivated violence and to create cultures of peace, justice and healing for the Earth and all living beings. We respect the uniqueness of each tradition and differences of practice or belief. We value voices that respect others and believe that sharing values and wisdom can lead us to act for the good of all. We believe that our religious, spiritual lives, rather than dividing us, guide us to build community and respect for one another. Therefore, as interdependent people rooted in our traditions, we now unite for the benefit of our Earth community. We unite to build cultures of peace and justice. We unite to heal and protect the Earth. We unite to build safe places for conflict resolution, healing and reconciliation. We unite to support freedom of religion and spiritual expression and the rights of all individuals and peoples as set forth in international law. We unite in responsible cooperative action to bring the wisdom and values of our religions, spiritual expressions and indigenous traditions to bear on the economic, environmental, political and social challenges facing our Earth community. We unite to provide a global opportunity for participation by all people, especially by those whose voices are not often heard. We unite to celebrate the joy of blessings and the light of wisdom in both movement and stillness. We unite to use our combined resources only for nonviolent, compassionate action, to awaken to our deepest truths and to manifest love and justice among all life in our Earth community. Purpose The purpose of the United Religions Initiative is to promote enduring, daily interfaith cooperation, to end religiously motivated violence and to create cultures of peace, justice and healing for the Earth and all living things. Principles We are a bridge-building organization, not a religion. We respect the sacred wisdom of each religion, spiritual expression and indigenous tradition. We respect the differences among religions, spiritual expressions and indigenous traditions. We encourage our members to deepen their roots in their own tradition. We listen and speak with respect to deepen mutual understanding and trust. We give and receive hospitality. We seek and welcome the gift of diversity and model practices that do not discriminate. We practice equitable participation of women and men in all aspects of the URI. We practice healing and reconciliation to resolve conflict without resorting to violence. We act from sound ecological practices to protect and preserve the Earth for both present and future generations. We seek and offer cooperation with other interfaith efforts. We welcome as members all individuals, organizations and associations who subscribe to the Preamble, Purpose and Principles. We have the authority to make decisions at the most local level that includes all the relevant and affected parties. We have the right to organize in any manner, at any scale, in any area and around any issue or activity which is relevant to and consistent with the Preamble, Purpose and Principles. Our deliberations and decisions shall be made at every level by bodies and methods that fairly represent the diversity of affected interests and are not dominated by any. We (each part of the URI) shall relinquish only such autonomy and resources as are essential to the pursuit of the Preamble, Purpose and Principles. We have the responsibility to develop financial and other resources to meet the needs of our part, and to share financial and other resources to help meet the needs of other parts. We maintain the highest standards of integrity and ethical conduct, prudent use of resources, and fair and accurate disclosure of information. We are committed to organizational learning and adaptation. We honor the richness and diversity of all languages and the right and responsibility of participants to translate and interpret the Charter, Bylaws and related documents in accordance with the Preamble, Purpose and Principles, and the spirit of the United Religions Initiative. Members of the URI shall not be coerced to participate in any ritual or be proselytized. URI may be contacted at PO Box 29242, San Francisco, CA 94129-0242; 415-561-2300; <www.uri.org>.

TW: And so you're thinking that what happened on September 11 pushed people into getting past old divisions and understanding the need for being together, for being cooperative?

WS: Although a lot of flags have been sold, when an enemy goes after civilians it's no longer just a national issue, it's a humanity issue. We're not talking about combatants, we're just talking about human beings. Once you have a stronger, broader, deeper understanding of humanity, then interfaith follows immediately thereafter.

TW: Do you have any cooperation circles that bridge national borders?

WS: Yes, in Ethiopia, for instance, with Eritrea and Ethiopia. And in India/Pakistan, along the Jamu/Kashmir border. There are people there on both sides of the border who come together in the summertime at one of our conferences to deal with each other because they can't do it normally at home. And in the Middle East we have five cooperation circles in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, Nazareth and two other cities. They've formed a multiple cooperation circle because they're all dealing with the Middle East issue with Muslims, Jews and Christians together. We're seeing some rapid growth of URI there, heroic growth. It is good to know there are some people who are holding the peace across the borders of religion.

TW: As I understand it, some of what's been going on with URI is that people who are already involved in interfaith activity are signing on to URI to be part of a larger network. How many new cooperation circles have developed -- ones that weren't already functioning?

WS: We're being flooded by applications to start new circles. These are considered by our international board. We've been bringing on about 20 new cooperation circles every couple of months and now we're looking at three times that number.

TW: Has there been especially big growth since September 11?

WS: Not only has there been big growth, but just an awful lot of imaginative things. For instance, all of these people in Salt Lake City, from Native American tribes to Muslims and others have decided that they would like to go back to the Olympic truce that was part of the original Olympics. These people are saying that they'd like to push the Olympic truce for the Olympics and to also push it for religions.

TW: I noticed that there were some cooperation circles in Pakistan. In light of U.S. efforts to forge some kind of cooperative relationship with Pakistan to facilitate its efforts to fight terrorists based in Afghanistan, are you getting any word from folks in that region about cooperative efforts to respond to this situation?

WS: We don't have any work in Afghanistan, because it would just be impossible with that government to make that happen. But in Pakistan, that's the largest Muslim country in the world for us. Their response to URI has been the greatest. We have cooperation circles in Karachi, lots in Lahore, lots around Islamabad. I was just there this spring, in Lahore and Islamabad. I've watched the email coming in from those folks and they are finding it very hard to keep an interfaith coalition together. The mounting vehemence against anything that isn't the local religion is powerful. A lot of our people are ducking for cover right now. They're very afraid.

TW: So that suggests that there is a fair amount of will for cooperation in Pakistan, but that in the current political climate that is being suppressed?

WS: I went to Sri Lanka, three different places in India and a couple of places in Pakistan. What I found was that every place we went we were surrounded by weapons -- the local government was under attack by insurgents no matter where we were. The government would turn to the URI and say, "We need you. We need stability among religions to have stability in this country." So they rolled out the red carpet for us any place we went. That was usually because they were under such siege that they were looking for any group that could do reconciliation, conflict resolution, or who had an ongoing, daily, enduring concept of how you do interfaith work at a grassroots level.

TW: When I've talked to people about the URI, some folks ask whether it is really true that conflict between religions is fundamentally religious conflict or are we talking about a situation in which people are suffering economically or don't have human rights and religious difference is an emblem of that?

WS: There is in religion itself, usually, a deep sense of terrorism that we manufacture. I don't think we're ever going to get toward a solution until we go back to the religions to say, "How many times have we been encouraged to take the jawbone of an ass and slay all the Philistines for the sake of God? Or encouraged to believe that we need to kill every man, woman and child in the village or else we'll be haunted in our dreams like King Saul?" There's enough violence and terrorism in our own tradition that we've never come to terms with.

Secondly, there's a sense of superiority in religions that we're going to have to take care of some day. You know, Nazi Germany would say, "We're the superior race." Well, religions get by with saying almost that, that we're really God's people and the others aren't, that we're going to heaven and the others aren't, that we're of great worth and the others aren't unless they become like us. So some day religions are going to have to become accountable for their own contribution to terrorism. Until we even get a little sense of that, we're all just going to sit on opposite sides of the street and throw stones at each other.

TW: So, taking Northern Ireland as an example, you think that even if we could figure out how to structurally redress the inequity there between Protestants and Catholics in terms of economics and other sorts of social advantage we would still leave unanswered something that's a more fundamental divide?

WS: I would say exactly that. I think religions want to let themselves off the hook by saying, "We are without sin. It's those awful politicians and money people that come in and use us for their ends and we get co-opted." But the truth is that we're more at the heart of this than that and I don't think we ought to be let off the hook. And also, when we get co-opted, we have a lot to gain from that. It means we get to corner the market. And religions are out there in the world trying to corner the market for themselves. As long as we are trying to corner the market for ourselves, that makes it possible to turn your face away and not look while things are being done to other people.

TW: You talk about "cornering the market" -- a business term. You've spoken about turning to business for fresh ideas about how to organize an enterprise like the URI. Given that the church has often modeled itself on business practices, what's different about the kind of business thinking that has gone into the organizing of the URI?

WS: If you take Colonel Sanders, he wants to set up exact replicas with the original recipe all the way across the world. And what we say is, there is no original recipe. You've got to figure out whatever the spirit is leading you to chose as your issue. And then you can go at it the way you want as long as you stick with the principles. So if you look at our franchises, none of them look like each other.

TW: Apparently there's a new wave in business thinking in a globalized environment that is similar to what you are talking about. The ability to take an idea and let it be in a place in a very local way as opposed to one-size-fits-all and golden arches. Is that what you've tapped into?

WS: Absolutely. I think the 19th- and 20th-century models of interfaith and ecumenism just borrowed from the culture, which is to say we thought we needed a president and a vice-president and so many committees and everybody should wear the T-shirt of the company and do things the way the boss or central committee says, from the top down. And what we're saying is, there is no central committee to tell you what to do. The greatest amount of authority is invested in the smallest unit. You create it and do it the way you think best.

TW: Does this have any implications for the Anglican Communion?

WS: I think the Anglican Communion models that a little bit and pretty well. Because we don't have a pope and we don't have a confession. And we just let 38 different groups roll their own out there.

TW: It's actually pretty interesting, because I think that was the conversation that was happening around the edges at the Lambeth Conference of Bishops in 1998. Peoples' negative reaction to the Virginia Report, in fact, was testimony to the fact that that embraced an old model for how to be a global enterprise versus really allowing every province to self-organize. But I guess you turned to business because you weren't finding in the church any model that was going to be useful in this global venture?

WS: We found out that religion knows a lot about competition but very little about cooperation.

TW: What kind of reception have you been getting to the URI from your fellow bishops?

WS: At this fall's meeting of the bishops people kept coming up to me saying, what you've been talking about has come home to roost and we've got to pay attention now to other faiths. They wouldn't have said that if it hadn't been for the events of September 11.

TW: I've noticed that when I've mentioned the URI I've encountered people who roll their eyes and wonder what sort of "whoo-whoo" venture is that? What do you think is incomprehensible about the URI?

WS: Once you're in the Episcopal Church or in the Roman Catholic Church, you think inside the boundaries of that church. To do interfaith work at an international level as well as at a local level means you have to keep two thoughts in your brain at the same time. One thought would be, "Jesus Christ is my Lord and Savior," and the other thought would be, "God has probably been generous to other people in other symbols and other ways." So you've got to both claim the salvation that you see and honor the mystery of God's being generous to other people in ways that you can't comprehend. You've got to hold two things at the same time and give them both high attention and high marks. As long as people don't think in that way, we at URI seem to be in la-la land. But once you see a fanatic religious group murdering the people around you, you realize that you have to elevate the understanding not only of your own faith, but of all faiths.

TW: How has your involvement with URI changed you?

WS: Well, number one, and probably the most important, would be that I now have deeper friends with whom I can speak intimately about faith, who are Jews and Muslims and Sikhs and Hindus, etc. In the old days I might have known a little about their philosophy, I might have seen one or shaken hands with one, but I never had real deep friends among them. Those friendships have changed me considerably.

TW: Are you part of a cooperation circle?

WS: I guess I am. All of us on the global council of URI are part of a cooperation circle. We decided that this administrative level of work had to be organized the same way as any local circle.

TW: What do you think is the biggest change to religion in America that is going to come as a result of September 11?

WS: It's really a coming-out party for the Islamic people in our midst. Up until September 11, Muslims in America had stayed within their ghettos. After September 11, people have come to the fore to say, "Please come out and tell us who you are, teach us what you believe and help us figure out where we should go from here to build America together." After the attacks there were hundreds of instances of violence or discrimination against Muslims in this country. But I bet there have been thousands of invitations to Muslims to speak and teach and come out and be heard that heretofore had never been issued.

I think the defining point of religion in this country was when Thomas Jefferson, looking in the rearview mirror at all the religiously motivated violence of Europe, said, "We've got to create a country that does it right this time around." He came up with two little principles. One was that no church shall be established above the rest. The other was that all the religions will have their freedom of expression. That was figured out by a politician for the churches for the sake of America. The religions in America have never figured that out yet. We're still holding out to corner the market. Some day the religions will catch up to Jefferson. That's what the interfaith movement is about.

Julie A. Wortman, who lives in mid-coast Maine, is editor/publisher of The Witness.

This article is available in Spanish here.