Someone asked Dr. Warren who will mediate if two of the three sectors are on opposite views. He said like preaching in strange places, one must look for the man of peace. Just like the disciples of Jesus Christ, when they went to a village to preach, they look for that man, an influential member of the community not because he has money or power but because he is respected for his virtues.
‘Among the three, there will always be one who will influence the others. Start from there. Step by step, your goal will be achieved,’ he said.
(“Words of wisdom from the Warren couple,” Totel V. de Jesus, Manila Standard Today, 9/5/06) [emphasis added]
The Generic Global PEACE Plan is easy to implement if you think outside the denominational box. The world needs to be united around a common PURPOSE — i.e., PEACE — however that comes to be defined.
PEACE can be achieved by building upon the foundation of a common purpose. This is management guru Peter Drucker’s 3-legged stool — the Church collaborating (“partnering”) with the State and the Corporate. Essential to the success of this model is locating any generic “man of peace” who is willing to be trained as a facilitator/change agent.
Tamara Hartzell devotes a good portion of Chapter 15 in her book In the Name of Purpose: Sacrificing Truth at the Altar of Unity to Rick Warren’s obsession with finding a generic “man of peace” in each community. We quoted from this chapter extensively in the past few Herescope posts. The remainder of this chapter is worth a read. Then, continuing on this topic in Chapter 16, Hartzell notes how Rick Warren believes that unity is achieved globally by finding a common purpose:
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“Unity Comes from Purpose, Not from Anything Else”
“Now let me tell you something. We’ve been talking a lot about unity out of diversity this week. We will never have unity over all of our doctrines because I can’t even get my family to agree on it, much less my church and your church. And we’re never going to get everybody to agree on all of the worship styles.… We’re never gonna agree on all of our styles and all of our methods, so let me tell you what we can agree on: the Great Commandment and the Great Commission. Unity comes from purpose, not from anything else. It comes from purpose.…
“Friends, it’s time to stop debating and start doing. Stop debating the Bible, and start doing it. It’s time to stop criticizing and start cooperating. It’s time for the church to be known for love not legalism, to be known for what we’re for not just what we’re against. It’s time for the church to be the church. That is the new Reformation that I’m praying for.… The critical question of this night is this, ‘Will we accept the challenge?’” —Rick Warren (Emphasis added)29
Rick Warren gave this challenge at the Baptist World Centenary Congress — the 100th birthday celebration of the Baptist World Alliance (BWA). It was held in Birmingham, England on July 27-31, 2005 and featured a variety of speakers, including former U.S. President Jimmy Carter.
“When Warren was asked what was hoped to be gained from the four-day event, he answered: ‘This is a celebration of diversity and unity at the same time.… If we all have to agree to make a fellowship then the fellowship would remain very small. So celebrating both unity and diversity is what this congress is about.’” —Christian Today, 7/28/0530
This Centenary Congress, which covered topics such as “poverty, prostitution and the Purpose-Driven Church,”31 included a drive for unity with other religions (faiths) in its celebration of unity and diversity. The following comments of Jimmy Carter were noted in the article, “Carter: global ‘hunger’ for healing outweighs beliefs that divide faiths”32:
“There is an ‘intense hunger’ among Christians worldwide — and among people of all faiths — to work for justice and oppose terrorism, despite serious differences of faith, Jimmy Carter said July 30.
“‘There is an intense hunger among Christians around the world for a healing of the differences that now separate us from one another,’ Carter … told reporters gathered for the July 27-31 Baptist World Centenary Congress in Birmingham, England.”
“Differences of belief — even among Muslims, Jews and Christians — are outweighed by a common commitment ‘to truth, to justice, to benevolence, to compassion, to generosity and to love,’ Carter told a roomful of reporters from around the world. Those commonalities ‘make it easy for us to stand united without dissention [sic] and for a common purpose.’
“‘We need to come back together,’ he said emphatically.”
“‘I think the main impediment is not knowing each other, not understanding each other, not recognizing that basic truth … that every religion emphasizes truth and justice and benevolence and compassion and generosity and love.’” (Ellipsis dots in the original; emphasis added)
“The tough work of interfaith dialog is not pointless but well worth the risk and investment of time, he said.”
Continuing the challenge for pragmatic unity of purpose, the “closing charge to delegates” at its Freedom conference was given by Baptist minister Dr. Michael Taylor. It was reported in the July 27 Press Release for the Baptist World Congress:
“Christians must unite with those of other faiths to tackle oppression around the globe.…
“‘The only potentially realistic way to get western governments to tackle these issues is to build the strongest, most proactive networks of activists around the world. This will mean linking with other Christians and with people of other faiths, working together in different ways for the common good.’” (Emphasis added)33
Rick Warren, whose own P.E.A.C.E. Plan calls for an interfaith network of “men of peace” and “houses of worship” working together in world service, boldly challenged this Congress with, “We will never have unity over all of our doctrines” so “unity comes from purpose, not from anything else.” Clearly, in today’s pragmatic Christianity which is striving for a purpose-driven unity of faiths, this challenge to relegate doctrinal differences to the list of non-essentials refers to more than just doctrinal differences between Christians.
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Religion doesn’t matter. But unity of purpose does!
It is interesting to note that the New Agers also have a PEACE Plan and theirs coincides perfectly with this “service” to humanity agenda. It is therefore conceivable that the “man of peace” in any given locale could be someone sympathetic to the Theosophical doctrines of the newly restructured global Peace Alliance. From the Chapter 7 Update of Warren Smith’s recently updated Reinventing Jesus Christ: The New Gospel, we learn the specifics of this new unity of purpose:
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The New Age Peace Alliance
The Global Renaissance Alliance – originally co-founded as the American Renaissance Alliance in 1997 – was renamed the Peace Alliance in 2005. By transforming the more hard-core New Age Global Renaissance Alliance into the more spiritually and politically pleasing Peace Alliance, co-founders Marianne Williamson and Neale Donald Walsch had removed most of the spiritual trappings that made the Global Renaissance Alliance such an easily identifiable New Age organization. Gone from the new Peace Alliance website was any mention of the organization’s more controversial co-founder Neale Donald Walsch. Also gone were most of the board members who were obvious New Age leaders – people like Barbara Marx Hubbard, Gary Zukav and Deepak Chopra. And gone from the new website was the original recommended reading list that had included Williamson’s book about A Course in Miracles (A Return to Love), Walsch’s books that downplayed the serious crimes of Hitler (Conversations with God: Books 1&2), and Hubbard’s book that mandated the “selection process” (The Revelation).
In fact, most people looking at the reinvented Peace Alliance website would never know that this “peace” organization had been originally founded by New Age leaders for specific New Age spiritual/political purposes. Like Walsch and his Humanity’s Team, the Peace Alliance was yet another way for these New Age leaders to tempt the world – and the church – with their repackaged New Age teachings. The Peace Alliance is, for all intents and purposes, still the New Age Global Renaissance Alliance. But now these “spiritual activists” have become more radical as they boldly proclaim their spiritually-based peace movement to be a “civil rights movement for the soul” – a phrase coined by Neale Donald Walsch’s “God” to describe his New Spirituality. In Walsch’s book Tommorrow’s God, Walsch and “God” discuss the ominous implications of this clever catchphrase:
“God”: I have said repeatedly that the New Spirituality is a civil rights movement for the soul. It is a message of freedom from humanity’s belief in an oppressive, angry, violent, and killing God. When this message is received by the people, it will not matter how powerful a dictator’s government is, or how repressive a religion is. When the number of people who no longer support oppression and repression reaches critical mass, that government will fall, and that religion will disappear.
Walsch: There is another profound political development that I see emerging from the New Spirituality.
“God”: What is that?
Walsch: I see the present form of democracy disappearing.
“God”: Yes? And why? Why do you see this happening? Is this what you choose to create?
Walsch: I think so, yes.
“God”: Why?
Walsch: Because another of the foundational truths of the New Spirituality is Oneness, and those who embrace this New Spirituality –
“God”: – the number of which will increase exponentially each year –
Walsch: – will see themselves as separate from no one and nothing. I believe that this sense of unity will not be merely theoretical or conceptual, but experiential.
“God”: I agree with you. The New Spirituality will produce this shift. People will not merely know themselves to be one with everything, they will feel this unity.
In the days of the New Spirituality the unity of all things will be experiential.
Walsch: This will dramatically change people’s attitude about many things.
“God”: It will, indeed. (22) [emphasis in original]
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To read more about the restructured Global Renaissance Alliance, now called the Peace Alliance, see the Chapter 7 Update to Reinventing Jesus Christ posted online. Here you will learn about an actual bill in Congress to establish a Peace Department!
The Truth:
“The way of peace they know not; and there is no judgment in their goings: they have made them crooked paths: whosoever goes therein shall not know peace.” (Isaiah 59:8)
“And the way of peace have they not known: There is no fear of God before their eyes.” (Romans 3:17-18)