Home  >   International   >   Middle East   >   Finding Faith

Finding Faith

By Janani Ganesh

The apocalyptic vision of fighting in God's name is the bread and butter of many terrorist groups and militants.  Indeed the moral vision of these groups is incredibly powerful even as it justifies the killing of innocent victims all over the world. 

"How would you react if militants came to your house and killed members of your family and attempted to kill you – shooting you full of bullets? Would you be full of revenge? Would you have a vendetta against the ruthless murderers of your family?" -Janani Ganesh

Nowhere is this vision stronger or more enduring than in Kashmir, which The Economist named "the world's worst neighborhood."  Here assassinations and counter assassinations occur every single day. 

But think about what it would take to change that moral vision.  Indeed, how would you react if militants came to your house and killed members of your family and attempted to kill you - shooting you full of bullets?  Would you be full of revenge?  Would you have a vendetta against the ruthless murderers of your family?

This is what perpetuates the cycle of violence in Kashmir where tens of thousands of Kashmiris have tossed right religious precepts aside, grabbed their guns ready to pledge allegiance to militancy. "You destroyed my family, I'll destroy yours." 

When you think that since 1989 somewhere between 50,000 and 100,000 people have lost their lives in Kashmir because vendettas driven by perverse moral visions have perpetuated a cycle of violence, you wonder whether this conflict will go on until there is just one man or woman left standing.   What will it take for reconciliation between the warring factions to create peace?  Even if reconciliation does occur, wouldn't it be incredibly fragile where one false move could cause its demise? 

For decades various attempts have been made by both the Indian and Pakistani governments as well as the UN to create peace in Kashmir, but to no avail. Indeed, one wonders just how effective it is for leaders of the warring nations to meet, shake hands and create peace. 

But another initiative is making inroads in ways that established military and diplomatic protocols have not.  Since 2000, The International Center for Religion and Diplomacy (ICRD) has been in Kashmir mobilizing faith traditions to be agents of peace.  In Kashmir, their work is rooted in Islam and Hinduism and outside of Kashmir their work is predominantly based on an Abrahamic vision that draws together Christians, Jews and Muslims. 

Dr. Daniel Philpott, a Senior Associate at the ICRD, was not initially convinced that such faith based reconciliations were possible most especially for Indians and Pakistanis embroiled in the Kashmiri conflict.  As arch rivals, these people don't typically trust each other after so much betrayal, war, suffering and killing.  Indeed, how could faith based reconciliation work given that these people were pretty inured to the idea of reconciliation of any kind?

"I was very skeptical given the scale and the bloodiness and the passions that are involved in these conflicts - and the conflict in Kashmir in particular - that this seemed like a naïve crazy idea," he said.

An associate professor in the Department of Political Science at the Joan B. Kroc Institute of International Peace Studies at the University of Notre Dame, Philpott has taken 11 trips to Kashmir each one lasting for 10 days. Despite the apparent danger involved in going to a war torn area of the world where militancy is rife, Philpott has seen first hand what faith based reconciliation has accomplished in transforming people's hearts and minds. 

"Scholars underestimate that there is some kind of theological core, that leads people to fight in very passionate and uncompromising ways for a kind of political interpretation of faith," he said. "I think those kinds of theological visions might well be borne from conditions of oppression, loss of homeland and the like."   

But through a method of faith based reconciliation, during which people from both sides participate in three and a half days of seminars during which they address a whole progression of topics including moral vision, pluralism, the wounds of history, and how to work through social justice, Philpott asserts many feel forgiveness at the end.

A reconciliation healing ceremony is also held where scriptural texts from the religious traditions are read, prayers are said and people have an opportunity to come forward and speak out their feelings, and talk of forgiveness.

ICRD's methods of religious reconciliation directly address the root causes of such conflicts. The key to ICRD's methodology lies in getting participants to see that there is something larger than the conflict, larger than the political order, larger than the homeland.   

"There have been some remarkable transformations," Philpott said. "People have been reconciled in some dramatic ways and I came to have a new sense of what the possibilities can be even in some of the worst conflicts."

Initially their efforts were criticized because it was thought that only people wanting reconciliation were attending the seminars. Philpott said former militants have participated in the seminars - people who have acquired certain war weariness - people who are tired of the confusion and fighting - people who want their lives to regain a certain normalcy.

Philpott feels while factions in Kashmir will continue to perpetuate violence, he believes that religiously motivated people of this region will present a different moral vision. Though progress may be slow, there is a deep purpose and calling to it.

Clearly government reaction to these reconciliation measures are of utmost importance since political influence impacts the conflict. Philpott observed that the response from the Pakistani government has been much more encouraging, ready to align itself with international support, while India prefers to be indigenous.

We can only hope that ICRD's work has a chain reaction, where people who have learned to forgive can influence others and Kashmir can become a safer and more peaceful place to live. Also very crucial is the support from the Indian government, which needs to display some flexibility so that some good may come of the peace talks and conferences.

"Peace isn't held together simply by whether people take up the gun or not," Philpott said. "It is held together by whether it has the kind of legitimacy in the hearts and minds of the people. I think that that is where we can kind of make a difference in building a culture or fabric of legitimacy around the principle of reconciliation."