First, let me express my gratitude and thanks to the organizers of this conference for the privilege they have graciously extended to me to participate in a meeting of representatives of all religions in the U.S.S.R convened to promote peace in the world. No cause on earth is nobler than that of peace with Justice and dignity for all mankind. No cause on earth is dearer to my heart than that of a world-wide society without war and aggression, without oppression and injustice, where the weak individual or the small nation is never at the mercy of the mighty, where might is always tempered with love and justice. Where power is fully controlled by the whole of society and used for the welfare of all and not to stamp out dissent and criticism.
And we, the representatives of all religions, have a special role to play in this noble cause. Our record as religions in the matter of pursuing peace with Justice has not been the best. We have often sided with reaction and supported the status quo in the name of God. We have closed our eyes at the spectacle of the rich oppressing and exploiting the poor, the mighty bullying and harassing the weak.
We owe it to the poor to champion their cause and make amends for our past neglect. And peace ean never come to the world until the rich and the mighty are brought under control of the whole of humanity. Peace can come only when aggression, oppression, and exploitation are removed from the face of the earth.
What can ordinary human beings do about this? That is our question. The individual I am not greatly interested in. He is a creation of human selfishness, the ego who breaks himself off from the community to pursue his own individual faith and profit.
Persons, I am interested in. But persons always exist in relation with other persons and within society. Persons are shaped just as much by the society in which they grow up as by their own individual choices.
What can persons do in relation to the political and economic structures in order to bring peace to the world? I wish to propose different things that persons like you and me who are in positions of religious leadership can do to promote peace in the world.
1. Study and take pains to understand the structure of human economic and political organization in the world and within each nation. We should find out how in each country the the rich are exploiting the poor, by what means the mighty are oppressing the weak. We should find out how some rich nations are getting richer and are at the same time exploiting the poor nations of the world through aid and trade. We should study how it is inevitable that in any uncontrolled economy, the richer classes who have the necessary infrastructure go on exploiting the poor and getting richer and richer, while the poor are still hardly able to make both ends meet. Study how the same pattern operates among nations, how the rich nations who already have the infrastructure for industrial development are able to exploit the poor nations while pretending to aid them.
2. Unite with the poor of the world to demand a world society with justice for all. It is all right to build socialism in a country or many countries, but if we forget the poor of the world, even within a socialist economy we can become bourgeois, comfort-loving, acquisitive, selfish, nationally chauvinistic. We should never allow our nations to forget the poor of the world. This is something which we need to say particularly to all the nations of eastern Europe. The socialist countries have been champions of the poor and the oppressed both in their own country and abroad. Now several socialist countries are reaching the stage where most people are fairly well off. We know that these nations do not want to forget us the poor of the world, but we are afraid they are tempted to pay more attention to building a consumer economy and to provide themselves with bourgeois comforts, while the rest of the world is still in wretched poverty. Affluence inevitably brings the love of comfort. A little money in the hand makes one desire for more, especially if there are rich fellows around. And one may be able to make more money by collaborating with the rich nations of the west than by being a friend of the poor nations. Soon, before one realizes it, one finds it convenient to forget us, the poor of the world. I know that you will not let that happen to you. You the citizens of the USSR will keep up the struggle against the rich oppressors of the world and will not join hands with them. We know that you will not settle down to enjoy your wealth, while we are still starving. You are our brothers. We know that you do not want to betray us.
The role of the citizen today is to keep society from becoming too consumption-and-comfort-oriented, while there is still so much poverty around. And this can be done only by being in close touch with the poor of the world and by refusing to adopt bourgeois standards in our own personal life. We also to seek solidarity with other anti-bourgeois and anti-oppression movements like the new wave of student protest and the determined struggle of the Negroes in the USA against the white domination.
The people in the USSR are a pioneer people in the struggle against oppression and exploitation. And even when they have overcome their own poverty, they should not lose their solidarity with the poor and oppressed of the world, even if such poor are in nations that harass your borders and threaten your society. The poor of the world cannot afford to be divided. And religious citizens have a major responsibility in maintaining awareness of the solidarity of all human beings, especially the poor and the oppressed in the world.
Change the structures of the world
International structures today are adequate only to foster injustice. The rich and the mighty control the international organizations. Trade, commerce, and banking are all loaded in favor of the rich nations of the west, and even when new international monetary agencies are established supposedly under the auspices of all nations, they tend to sere more the interests of western finance than of the economy of the developing countries.
It is the citizens' responsibility to rouse the conscience of men to see the pattern of injustice in the world-wide economic structures. There has to develop a new pressure all over the world among common people to seek and to find the beginnings of a new international economic structure which is not controlled by the rich alone. We have to begin to agitate for a world government and a world economic structure which is open, which is controlled by the masses, and which does not grant special protection to the interests of the rich. Only that way can peace be assured. We must agitate for the liquidation of all nuclear armaments and the gradual demilitarization of nations. The colossal wastes of today in armaments, packaging and advertising should be devoted to education, health, and industrial and agricultural development. Only a world government can do this. And our job as citizens is to break through the pessimism and cynicism of those in power in all our governments who regard a world government as a utopian dream. What can mankind achieve if it has no utopias to strive for? Let not the power interests of the world, who are threatened by the idea of a new world government, deceive us. It is both possible and necessary. There is no other solution. And citizens should boldly demand such a world government.
Getting Down To The Primary Structures
The citizens' major contribution, however, will not come at the level of international and national structure, but rather at the primary base of human economic and social relations. In a country like mine, the five-year plans have been a general failure mostly because the plan programmes were handed from above, rather than being developed by people in the villages. The primary base was not educated to see their common interests. Their basic egoism remained unaltered, and the ship of national planning foundered on this bedrock of the primary economic base which had not been reeducated and restructured. The citizens alone can develop the right primary structures. Selfishness and individualism, the poisonous weeds of modern capitalism, are spreading even in socialist societies. The case is much worse in countries like India. Unless we even mobilize the masses at the village level, we have no hope for the future, whatever government comes at the centre. In socialist countries also the fight against individualist egoism must go on for ever and ever.
Peace is undivided-- for all mankind. So we need world structures of peace. But peace is primarily a quality of the human spirit both collectively and personally. There is a natured tendency in man to fight against the other and to fend for oneself. This applies at local, regional, and national levels. The clash of collective egoism is the enemy of peace. The task of religions is to train man away from personal and collective egoism. To hold all things in common as a trust, to be concerned first for others and for all, and to work to produce in order that we may get all that we need.
May God grant us wisdom to unite in the cause against aggression and war by promoting unselfish service and love for all Mankind.