[thouworm]

From the publisher’s blurb in False Dawn by Lee Penn:

The interfaith movement, which began with the 1893 World’s Parliament of Religions in Chicago, has grown worldwide. Although this movement has been largely unknown to the public, it now provides a spiritual face for globalization, the economic and political forces leading us all from nationalism to “One World”. The most ambitious organization in today’s interfaith movement is the United Religions Initiative (URI), founded by William Swing, the Episcopal Bishop of California.

Investigative reporter Lee Penn, a Catholic ex-Marxist, exhaustively documents the history and beliefs of the URI and its New Age and globalist allies, the vested interests that support these movements, and the direction they appear to be taking. The interfaith movement is no longer merely the province of a coterie of little-heeded religious idealists with grandiose visions.

The URI’s proponents have ranged from billionaire George Soros to President George W. Bush, from the far-right Rev. Sun Myung Moon to the liberal Catholic theologian Hans Küng, and from the Dalai Lama to the leaders of government-approved Protestant churches in the People’s Republic of China.

The interfaith movement, including the URI, is being promoted by globalist and New Age reformers who favor erosion of national sovereignty, marginalization of traditional religions, establishment of “global governance”, and creation of a new, Earth-based “global spirituality” — in effect, a one-world religion.

http://www.amazon.com/False-Dawn-Religions-Initiative-Globalism/dp/159731000X/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1256532179&sr=8-2

[Fred Nerks]

In 1966, Hubbard was a founding member of the ‘World Future Society’; she subsequently co-founded the ‘Society For The Universal Human’, and the ‘Foundation For Conscious Evolution’. In the 1970s, Hubbard organized and co-produced twenty-five ‘Syncons’ (’synergistic conferences’), and the multimedia ‘Theater For The Future’. In 1984, Hubbard made political history when her name was placed in nomination for the vice presidency of America.

During the Armageddon-obsessed 1980s (signified by Reagan’s ‘Strategic Defence Initiative’), Hubbard developed and co-chaired US-Soviet citizen summits. She hosted ‘Potentials: Envisioning The New Millennium’, a stunning television series which featured Gene Roddenberry, Timothy Leary, Buckminster Fuller, Toni and John Lilly, Jerry Pournelle, and Ray Bradbury as guests. Space migration, life extension, and macropolitical models are just some of the memes that Hubbard has promoted over more than thirty years of advocacy.

http://old.disinfo.com/archive/pages/dossier/id367/pg1/index.html

[thouworm]

“The most ambitious organization in today’s interfaith movement is the United Religions Initiative (URI), founded by William Swing, the Episcopal Bishop of California.”

United Religions Initiative (from URI website)

History: Creating the Initiative

The seed for the URI was planted in 1993 when the United Nations invited William Swing, Episcopal Bishop of California, to host an interfaith service in San Francisco. That night the Bishop found it hard to sleep … he told himself, “If the nations of the world are working together for peace through the UN, then where are the religions of the world?” From this inspiration, a vision took shape to create an organization whereby people of diverse faiths and from all sectors of society would cooperate for peace and justice for all.

From the first global summit in 1996 to the Charter signing in 2000, URI engaged thousands of people from diverse religions, spiritual expressions and indigenous traditions to create the URI Charter. Five global summits and numerous gatherings and consultations took place in different regions of the world. URI used a highly effective methodology for positive change, Appreciative Inquiry, pioneered by Dr. David Cooperrider of Case Western Reserve University and the revolutionary insights for organizing offered by Dee Hock, founder of VISA international.

Global Council Trustees

There are currently 28 Global Council Trustees. The Trustees of theURI are exemplars who manifest the vision and values of the Preamble,Purpose and Principles, and who model leadership and service by theiractions. They have a deep commitment to serve the whole of the URI community.

Founding Trustee
The Rt. Rev. William E. Swing, USA - President

Executive Trustee
The Rev. Canon Charles P. Gibbs, USA - Executive Director

Chair
Ms. Yoland Trevino, USA

Vice Chair
Ms. Marites Africa, SEAPac
Mr. Shlomo Alon, MENA

Finance and Operations Committee Chair
Rabbi Doug Kahn, USA

Secretary
Ms. Perri Kathryn McCary, USA

Assistant Secretary
Mr. Pelecinnah Josiah-Pele, Nigeria

http://www.uri.org/hist.html

~~~~~~~~~~
Another Perspective of United Religions Initiative

While Christians around the world lament the election of a homosexual Bishop at the recent Episcopal General Convention, few realize that this denomination has condoned outright paganism for years.

Majestic Episcopal cathedrals built long ago to honor God have welcomed the world’s pantheon of deities. Occult rituals at New York’s Cathedral of St. John the Divine and San Francisco’s Grace Cathedral have spread the twisted message that the Biblical God is only one among a multitude of equal deities, spirits, forces and ascended masters.

While their respective bishops have turned a blind eye to the pagan intrusion, California’s Bishop William Swing went a step further. In 1996, he founded the United Religions Initiative (URI), a global organization designed to bring all religions together to dialogue and seek common ground. “You can work in terms of the model of the UN,” he explained, “where you have the General Assembly and the Security Council.”

Bishop Swing’s ambitious quest has found favor among others who share his vision for spiritual unity — a oneness designed to replace the old “divisive” Biblical absolutes blamed for war and conflict.

The fact is, those who base their faith on the Bible can’t join Bishop Swing’s converging streams toward planetary oneness. They know only one God, only one sacred Book, and only one Door to eternal life. Since they can accept nothing less, they must reject an all-inclusive global spirituality.

No wonder interfaith leaders like Bishop Swing see such Christians as narrow and intolerant “extremists” who block their vision of unity. Not only do we clash with the URI, we violate UNESCO’s 1994 “Declaration on the role of religion in the promotion of a culture of peace,” a “soft” international law.

By 1999, Bishop Swing had moved his headquarters to the Presidio, a former U.S. military base overlooking the entrance to the San Francisco Bay.

The Presidio’s other tenants included the Gorbachev Foundation, FEMA and the Thoreau Center for Sustainability — an office complex that would unite a multitude of globalist environmental, spiritual and educational organizations in a common pursuit: to establish a new world order based on universal beliefs and values.

Visiting San Francisco in 1999, I stopped by the Presidio. As I searched for the new URI headquarters, I took note of some of its neighbors. They included:

* Resource Center for the United Nations

* The Institute for Sustainable Development

* Partnerships for Change

* Rudolf Steiner Foundation

* International Forum on Globalization

* Tides Center (had what seemed to be a Buddhist altar in its large reception room)

(footnotes provided at the link)

http://www.crossroad.to/articles2/2003/heresy.htm

[thouworm]

More powerful one-world religion proponents: Maurice Strong and his wife Hanne, Robert Muller, Al Gore

Together the Strongs run the private Manitou Foundation. A gathering place for religious sects (Hanne is into “spiritual interests”), it backs, among other things, research into ethnobotany-the interactions between humans and plants.
~~~~~~~~~~

MANITOU FOUNDATION is part of GAIA worship--the new global religion in service to GLOBALISM. The globalists created a "god" they can control and seek to put all religious organizations in its service, thereby religiously controlling the masses---not to mention the vast number of nonprofit "religious" organizations that can be created.
~~~~~~~~~~~

The marriage of religion, nature, and politics: The "why" behind the new world order

Freedom of choice and basic individual rights are being sacrificed in the interest of the common good, under the United Nations' agenda for the 21st century, called Agenda 21. Under the veil of feel-good terms like "sustainable development" and "social equity", a self-described "new world order" is being systematically implemented around the globe, that is organized around the principle that nature is the most fundamental truth, and which requires all spheres of society to conform to that principle, under the government of a ruling elite (the United Nations and the organizations that support it). When faced with evidence of this unbelievable agenda, the natural question that comes to mind is "Why?"

Two Major Forces

There are really two major engines driving the new world agenda: a quest for control, and fundamental religious belief. What makes this paradigm so dangerous, and effective, is that it merges both forces together under the stated goal of taking care of the environment. The religious background to this environmental agenda is called Gaia, or the worship of the earth. Based on the gaia hypothesis, originally proposed by James Lovelock, this new age religious movement, cosmology, is woven throughout all of the major initiatives, forums, and organizations of the sustainable development agenda.

To begin to understand the reasons behind the agenda for a new world order, it is critical to investigate the religious beliefs of the organizations and individuals behind it, and how those convictions undergird an agenda of control. The new age spiritual movement of Gaia One of most influential NGOs (Non-governmental organizations) allied closely with the U.N. and intimately involved in their creation of agenda is the Temple of Understanding (TOU), located in The Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City. This organization's objectives are, according to its website, "developing an appreciation of religious and cultural diversity, educating for global citizenship and sustainability, expanding public discourse on faith and ecology, and creating just and peaceful communities".

Most importantly, although not explicitly stated by the TOU, the cathedral is the center of cosmology, or the worship of Gaia. The Cathedral of St. John the Divine is not only home to the TOU, but has also previously housed the National Religious Partnership for the Environment, the Lindesfarne Association and the Gaia Institute, which are all proponents of the gaia hypothesis.

Global Forum: Where religion of nature meets the politics of control

The 1988 Global Forum of Spiritual and Parliamentary Leaders for Human Survival began the marriage between religion and environmental objectives on a worldwide scale. From this conference, many additional forums around the world were organized to bring together world leaders in government, environment, religion, and science for the purpose of collaborating around the goals of sustainable development.

The National Religious Partnership for the Environment (NRPE), created in 1993, came out of these global meetings. The NRPE developed a plan for "integrating issues of social justice and the environment" which included education and action kits to religious congregations around the world, training programs for religious students and leaders, and a variety of other worldwide actions specifically targeted to ensure that religious groups adopted the goals of this globalist environmental agenda. Worldwide religion, the objectives of sustainable development, and the Gaia movement all became wedded together into a tapestry which could only be woven effectively through broad-scale, worldwide control.

Religion of nature meets politics: Robert Muller

Dr. Robert Muller, former Assistant Secretary General to the U.N. and member of the Board of Advisors to the Temple of Understanding (which founded the Global Forum), gives evidence to the marriage of Gaia with the movement of sustainable development in his paper A Cosmological Vision of the Future from 1989:

*** "Now we're learning that perhaps this planet has not been created for humans, but that humans have been created for the planet...We are living Earth. Each of us is a cell, a perceptive nervous unit of the Earth. The living consciousness of the Earth is beginning to operate through us...

***We have now a world brain which determines what can be dangerous or mortal for the planet: the United Nations and its agencies, and innumberable (sic) groups and networks around the world, are part of the brain. This is our newly discovered meaning...we are a global family living in a global home. We are in the process of becoming a global civilization...

***The third millennium should be a spiritual millennium, a millennium which will see the integration and harmony of humanity with creation, with nature, with the planet, with the cosmos and with eternity."

This key U.N. leader, in charge of creating policy on a worldwide scale, shows how cosmological faith drives an agenda for a global community, in the interest of protecting the god of nature. When the scope of this religious conviction becomes clear, it is easy to understand how it leads to an agenda of globalized control, in order to align the actions of human society toward elevating the goals of taking care of Gaia above all else, including the people who are a part of her.

Muller won the UNESCO Prize 1989 for Peace Education for his World Core Curriculum, an educational initiative to make students into global citizens who take care of the planet. According to Muller's website, robertmuller.org, Muller says, "The entire humanity must be reprogrammed through a right global inducation (Latin ex-ducare, to lead out, in-ducare, to lead into)". Just what is this U.N.-endorsed global education, as created by this proponent of Gaia?

Muller explained the reasons behind his World Core Curriculum in a 1995 speech to the College of Law at the University of Denver: "I've come to the conclusion that the only correct education that I have received in my life was from the United Nations. We should replace the word politics by planetics. We need planetary management, planetary caretakers. We need global sciences. We need a science of a global psychology, a global sociology, a global anthropology. Then I made my proposal for a World Core Curriculum."

The first principle of the curriculum is: “Assisting the child in becoming an integrated individual who can deal with personal experience while seeing himself as a part of 'the greater whole.' In other words, promote growth of the group idea, so that group good, group understanding, group interrelations and group goodwill replace all limited, self-centered objectives, leading to group consciousness."

Muller's influential philosophy is the perfect example of how nature-centered spirituality and an agenda of worldwide control go hand in hand with the United Nations and its supporting organizations.

Religion of nature meets politics: Maurice Strong

This religious conviction and political agenda of control is shared by, according to many accounts, the most powerful man in the world. Maurice Strong was Secretary General of the U.N.'s Rio Earth Summit in 1992 (where Agenda 21 was adopted), and former Executive Director of United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). According to Henry Lamb, one of the most researched writers that exists on the issues of globalism, "He, perhaps more than any other single person, is responsible for the development of a global agenda now being implemented throughout the world." [NOTE: from the article by Lamb previously posted]

Strong, a billionaire and a brilliant, phenomenally influential U.N. bureaucrat, is a devotee of earth-bound spirituality aligned with the Gaia movement. To help illuminate the scope of his influence, consider that he has served in a multitude of key international positions, including Director of the World Economic Forum Foundation, Chairman of the Earth Council, Chairman of the Stockholm Environment Institute, Senior Advisor to the President of the World Bank, Chairman of the World Resources Institute, and, most interestingly, Finance Director at the Temple of Understanding.

Strong and his wife, Hanne, created the Manitou Foundation in 1988 "to provide land and financial support to qualified spiritual organizations, earth stewardship programs, and related educational opportunities for youth and adults" according to the Crestone Institute. Their 200,000 acre ranch near Crestone, Colorado, known as Baca Grande, is now a new age spiritual center run by Strong's wife. The modern face of Gaia and the environment: Al Gore

Former Vice President Al Gore is a devotee of Gaia, and the modern face of the environmental movement. Gore has been involved with the Temple of Understanding, including giving a sermon at its annual celebration of St. Francis, a ceremony whose Blessing of the Animals included blessings for an elephant, algae, and a bowl of worms and compost. According to a 1994 publication by the Cathedral at St. John the Divine, at this sermon Gore asserted, "God is not separate from the earth".

Many footnotes and source-material links here.

Sunday, May 10, 2009
Mohawk Nation News: “NEW AGE” PSYCHOBABBLE BEING SWALLOWED BY A FEW

At Maurice Strong’s Manitou retreat in Colorado, treatment includes everything being taken away from the follower to suck out the core of their being. Under the guise of meditation and sensory deprivation, they are confined into a small space to strip their identity. A low protein diet is part of this.
~~~~~~~~~~

This list is referenced from a link that does not work, but refers to this book:

False Dawn: The United Religions Initiative, Globalism, and the Quest for a One-World Religion by Lee Penn

LeePenn.org

Biggies in the new age movement: www.leepenn. org/LP-NewAgeInd ex: Robert Muller, former Secretary General of the UN; James Parks Morton, Dean of Episcopal Cathedral of St. John the Divine NYC; Episcopal Bishop of San Francisco; William Swing, Rudolph Steiner Foundation, World Goodwill; Lawrence S. Rockfeller, whose fund has financed new agers; Mathew Fox, Barbara Marx Hubbard; power brokers ArcherDanielsMidlan d; CNN; Hewlett Packard; Occidental Petroleum; Carnegie Corp.; Kellogg Foundation; Rockfeller Brothers Fund; Georges Berthain, president the Tri Lateral Commission; Desmond Tutu; Gorbachev, Ted Turner; Fredrico Mayer of UNESCO; Maurice Strong and his Manitou Foundation in Colorado, and many other biggies. SOURCE