Sufism: Its Role

Staff report, "Muslims Call for Protecting Al-Quds, Extensive Inter-faith Dialogue at 8th Islamic Call Society Conference" - The Tripoli Post - Tripoli, Libya
Friday, October 31, 2008

More than 460 organizations from all five continents in addition to representatives from International and Christian organization took part in the Eighth General conference of the Islamic Call Society.

The conference lasted from 27 to 30 October.

A number of workshops were organized including one on inter-faith dialogue and common humanity principles that all faiths should respect.

The Eighth Conference called on all Muslims to work for protecting Islamic sacred places everywhere and especially the holy Al-Quds in occupied Palestine. It demanded that all attempts and plans by Israel to harm this sacred place by exposed. It also called for the support of the Palestinian people in their quest for return to their homeland.

The conference expressed its concern over the continuous hindering of Islamic activities around the world by various parties which keeps on intervening in cultural and educational affairs of Islamic organizations.

In the meantime the conference stressed the need for educating the new generation about the principles of Islam and away from extremist tendencies. It called for increasing efforts for helping the newly converted to Islam, especially in West Africa, understand the principles of Islam as well as the social, individual and family Islamic requirements in simplified way.

The conference also called on Islamic organizations to increase their humanitarian aid efforts around the world including in the Horn of Africa and other conflict ridden areas.

The conference reiterated its previous position on condemning all types of aggression, terrorism and the resort to the use of force as well as the policies of sanctions and starving peoples. It maintained that these action undermines world peace. It demanded that there should be a definition of "terrorism" and there must be a differentiation between it and legitimate national resistance.

The conference held high the achievement by Libya of obtaining an official apology from Italy for its occupation of the country and recommended that other Islamic countries should follow the example of Libya and demand apology and compensations from their former occupiers.

The conference stressed that interfaith dialogue should proceed toward common understanding and mutual respect. It demanded that religious institutions should coordinate their efforts to fight all forms of anti-nature practices that would threaten family ties and destroy the value system of humanity.

A number of papers were presented at the conference including "Extremism in Religion: Causes and Consequences," "Shared Values in the Divine sacred laws," "Islamic Da`wah: Actual Reality and possible Horizons," "Sufism: its Role in the Enhancement of Spiritual and Moral Values in the Contemporary World," "The Fatimid state: a model-project for the Renaissance of the Contemporary nation-state," "Cultural and Religious Identity between the Threat of Narrow Modes of Conduct and the Negative Consequences of Extreme Negligence," and "Today's World and the Need for Dialogue" among others.