NAIROBI DECLARATION OF THE
FOURTH WORLD ASSEMBLY

1984

Religions for Peace I 777 United Nations Plaza I New York, NY 10017 USA I 212-6871-2163 I www.religionsforpeace.org

In Nairobi in 1984, we of the World Conference ofReligions for Peace have met in our Fourth World Assembly. We have come, nearly 600 of us, from 60 countries
and from most of the world’s religious traditions-Buddhist, Christian, Confucian, Hindu, Jain, Jewish, Muslim,Shinto, Zikh, Zoroastrian, the traditional cultures of Africa and North America, and others. From our diversityof cultures and traditions, we have come to address atheme of urgent common concern: Religions for Human Dignity and World Peace. We address these goalsof human dignity and world peace together, for they are
inextricably linked and must be pursued together.
Our previous Assemblies in Kyoto in 1970, Louvain
in 1974, and Princeton in 1979 have been milestones in
the growth and work of Religions for Peace as we strive
for peace, united by a spirit of cooperation. In Nairobi,
in 1984, we find ourselves at a major turning point.
In the five years since we last met, the world has seen
little progress in either the cherishing of human dignity or the movement toward world peace. While thenuclear arms race has continued to escalate in its staggering expenditures, in its rhetoric, and its incalculable
danger, the massive human needs of poverty, hunger,
unemployment, and lack of education have been grossly
neglected. Militarization of societies, trade in arms, recourse to violence, religious and ideological intolerance,
and assaults on human rights continue. The structuresof economic and political oppression which perpetuate
the privilege of a few at the expense of the masses arestill firmly in place.

We are encouraged, however, by the widening awareness and public consciousness of the dangers and costsof our present world situation, and by the worldwide
growth of grass-roots movements expressing the determination of people everywhere for change. It is time for
new strategies and priorities for peacemaking, and forrenewed commitment to our work.
We have met in Nairobi as men and women rooted
in our religious traditions, and linked to one another invision and action. We acknowledge the painful fact thatreligion too often has been misused in areas of strife andconflict to intensify division and polarization. Religious
people have too often failed to take the lead in speaking to the most important ethical and moral issues ofour day and, more importantly, in taking steps towardchange. In meeting together, we have not turned fromself-criticism or from very difficult discussions of sensitive issues. And yet our affirmation is one of hope.
The Nairobi Assembly has changed us. The new participation of over 100 youth delegates has given us thevitality and vision of a new generation, eager to joinhands in concrete inter-religious projects for peace. The
strong and energetic contribution of over 150 womenhas made clear the necessity of women’s equal partnership not only in family life, but in the leadership of religious communities and social and political institutions.
Over half of us here are participants from Asia, Africa,and Latin America, who have called Religions for Peace
to a deeper understanding of our global inter-relatedness
to working for peace.

“Disarmament means liberation, not only from arsenals of weapons ready for use, but from the perpetual fear and insecurity which have accompanied our obsession with the instruments of death. Development
means liberation from hunger and poverty; it means a just sharing of the natural and economic resourcesof the world, and the investment of our energies in life, and in the future. As men and women of religion,
we cannot tolerate the priorities of a world in which there are at least three tons of explosives, but notenough food, for every man, woman, and child on earth. We pledge ourselves...to reverse these priorities.”

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Through our struggle, we have been able to buildtrust. We have shared in worship and meditation. We
have discovered once again that our differences of culture and religion, far from being a threat to one another,
are a treasure. Our multiplicity is a source of strength.
We bear a testimony of experience that world community is possible. From our diversity of traditions, we areunited in faith and hope, and in our common pursuit ofhuman dignity and world peace.

I. The Context of Africa
Africa has not only been the place of this Assembly;
Africa and the concerns of its peoples have shaped thevery context and perspective of our discussions. The
African traditional cultures have a strong spirit of community and family, and a vibrant sense of the wholeness of life. Many religious traditions now live together
in the continent of Africa-the traditional religions, alongwith Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Jainism, Sikhism andJudaism. The many religious communities of Nairobi
have welcomed us and given us a sense of the riches andchallenges of living together in the pluralistic society ofKenya.
The peoples of Africa have also experienced sharply
the very issues we have addressed in our Assembly, andhave helped us all to see these issues more clearly. The affront to human dignity of the apartheid regime in South
Africa calls us to repudiate separation and division andto seek the community of all races. The cry of humanneeds in drought and famine, the growing militarism ofAfrican governments, the increasing arms trade in Africa, the instances of political intolerance, the penetrationof East-West rivalry into African political affairs-all call
us to a wide understanding of the dynamics of global insecurity and the effect of global, political, and economic
structures on the emerging African states.
The new Religions for Peace/Africa is beginning toarticulate the common values religious people bring to
the creation of a just society. It stresses the need for active engagement in struggles for change and is committed to the realization of a new Africa.

II. Reconciliation in Regional Conflict
We are convinced that a major new priority of Religions for Peace must be to address ourselves to areasof chronic regional tension and conflict-in Southern Africa, the Middle East, South and Southeast Asia, Central America, and Europe. Since World War II, over 150
wars, most of them in the Third World, have claimed atleast ten million lives. Regional conflicts become swiftly
polarized by East and West, and raise the level of instability and insecurity in the entire world.
The roots of these conflicts vary and are complex.
But wherever such conflict takes on the language andsymbolism of our religious traditions, pitting one against
the other, it must be the business of Religions for Peace
to be involved, both regionally and with Religions for
Peace/International support.
We commit ourselves, as religious men and women, toundertaking the work of reconciliation and peacemaking. We must deal with the issues of religious discord
where they arise. We must deal with the economic andpolitical struggles which take on religious rhetoric fornarrow or chauvinistic purposes. We must take action,
as a multi-religious body committed to peace, in the very
areas where religion and peace seem to be in opposition.

III. DisarmamentDisarmament has long been a priority for the work ofReligions for Peace, and the urgent necessity of working for disarmament today is undiminished. With one
voice, from our various traditions of faith, we insist that
nuclear weapons and all weapons of mass and indiscriminate destruction are immoral and criminal, and that thestockpiling of such weapons with intent or threat to usethem erodes the very foundation of moral civilization.
We join the scientists, physicians, educators, and statesmen who have taken an active role in opposing the arms
race. We pledge our determined commitment to disarmament as we continue to work as a Non-Government
Organization at the United Nations, and as we work toinfluence our religious communities and our nations.

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Specifically, we call for an immediate freeze on all further nuclear weapons research, production, and deployment; the strengthening of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty; a Comprehensive Test-Ban Treaty; and a No
First Use commitment on the part of nuclear nations
as essential initial steps toward the dismantling of all
nuclear arsenals.
Conventional weapons are also instruments of deathand oppression. Halting the spread of militarization andthe commercial exploitation of developing countries bytrade in arms leading to military and political dependency is a crucial part of our commitment to disarmament.
It is a sign of hope for the future that the youth of
this Assembly have called for the establishment of ministries and departments of peace to work for the global
security that ministries and departments of defense havebeen unable to realize.

IV. DevelopmentDelegates from Asia, Africa, and Latin America havegiven us all a new perspective on the arms race, as seen
through the eyes of the poor. For the poor, survival is
not primarily a question of the future in a nuclear world,
but an urgent question of the present in a world besetwith hunger, drought, and disease. Our common commitment to peace is based upon the clear inter-relatedness between disarmament and development.
Disarmament means liberation, not only from arsenalsof weapons ready for use, but from the perpetual fear
and insecurity which have accompanied our obsession
with the instruments of death. Development means liberation from hunger and poverty; it means a just sharingof the natural and economic resources of the world, andthe investment of our energies in life, and in the future.
As men and women of religion, we cannot tolerate
the priorities of a world in which there are at least three
tons of explosives, but not enough food, for every man,woman, and child on earth. We pledge ourselves, throughour religious communities and our governments, andthrough continued Religions for Peace cooperation with
the U.N., radically to reverse these priorities.

We have a vision of a world in which the economic
and political structures which perpetuate injustice andpoverty are completely changed, and in which the armaments necessary to maintain these structures of injusticeand oppression may be turned to plough-shares for thework of peace.

V. Human Rights
Along with disarmament and development, humanrights are an essential part of the total and holistic peace
we seek. We mean not only civil and political rights, butthe right to live with all the basic economic, social, andcultural rights of life of fullness and freedom, including
religious freedom. We reaffirm our commitment to theU.N. Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and weinsist that these rights are the very basis and foundationof a just and humane society and can never be postponed or suspended in the name of national security.
Our support for human rights must be consistent.
Wherever human rights are trampled upon, we must
speak out and act. We must resist and unmask selectiveand tactical use of human rights issues by nations, especially the US and the USSR, which raise their voices inone instance and ignore violations in another, as it suits
their political ends.
Our South African delegates-Hindu, Muslim, andChristian-have all made us sharply aware of the suffering and incalculable violence done to individuals, families, and whole peoples by the racist ideology and “theology” of apartheid. We commit ourselves to work towardchanging the international political and economic structures which support the South African regime.
In our concern for human rights, we must also work
regionally and internationally on many other affronts tohuman dignity. Despite efforts being made by politicalleaders and religious people, there is deep-seated prejudice resulting in many forms of discrimination against
scheduled castes and economically oppressed and socially stigmatized classes in South Asia, against the Burakumin of Japan, and against the indigenous peoples ofthe Americas, Australia, the Philippines, and elsewhere.

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The world has many millions of refugees, with no rightto the roots of home, four million of them in Africa
alone. And there are countless human beings stripped of
their human rights behind closed doors. They have disappeared; they have been imprisoned without trial; theyhave been victims of torture. Wherever, and in whateverway, human rights violations occur, it is our concern, internationally and inter-religiously.

And we need one another in order to undertake together
work that will require the resources and energies of people throughout the world.
The spiritual resources of our religious traditions give
us strength to dedicate ourselves to the task ahead. We
are compelled to turn the faith and hope that sustain us
into dynamic action for human dignity and world peace.

We support with conviction and hope the 1981 UN
Declaration on the Elimination of All Forms of Intolerance and of Discrimination Based on Religion or Belief,
and we pledge to support its implementation.

VI. Peace Education
Education for peace is more urgent than ever before.
As religious men and women, we pledge ourselves tostressing and raising to public consciousness the foundations of peacemaking within our own religious traditions, through education in temples, churches, mosques,
synagogues, and homes. This will require our commitment to planning, training, and funding for peace education programs. As religious people of action, we mustdeliberately link our personal lives and daily choices to
our wider work as peacemakers.
In our religious institutions, and in schools, colleges
and universities, we will encourage new initiatives forpeace education. Our public and community life must
include knowledge and discussion of the realities of thearms race, the conflicts that lead to war, the means andstrategies for non-violent resolution of conflict, and thework of the UN and UNESCO.
Essential to peace education is learning about andcoming to understand those of different religions, ideologies, and cultures with whom we share our communities, our nations, and our world. In many cases, theopposite of conflict and violence is knowledge, and so
educational efforts must be made that fear may begin togive way to trust. We must strengthen and deepen mutual understanding by sustained dialogue, and by undertaking common work together. We need to understandone another. We need one another in order to see andunderstand ourselves more clearly.
Religions for Peace I 777 United Nations Plaza I New York, NY 10017 USA I 212-6871-2163 I www.religionsforpeace.org