Thousands in 25 Countries to Celebrate 1st Global Oneness Day Oct. 24; Tutu, Ono, Chopra, Beckwith, Keating Among Supporters

• 

History's first Global Oneness Day will be celebrated Oct. 24

“Would the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks have occurred if humanity had already recognized we are all one?” Beckwith said. “Would we fight each other under the banner of organized religion and in the name of God?”

Boulder, Colo. (PRWEB) October 18, 2010

Thousands of people in more than 25 countries will celebrate the first Global Oneness Day Oct. 24 by demonstrating humanity’s inner unity and outer diversity, organizers announced today.

The day -- initiated by the global grassroots Humanity’s Team movement and supported by the Association for Global New Thought and some three dozen other groups -- “is a day when the greatness of the whole is reflected in the greatness of its parts,” Humanity’s Team Worldwide Coordinating Director Steve Farrell said.

It is also a day that is a key steppingstone toward creating lasting peace in the world, organizers said.

“Lasting peace requires that we awaken humanity to our underlying oneness, educate people to the beauty of our diversity and alert the world to the imperative that we must embody these values so that life as we know it may not only be preserved, but renewed and transformed,” AGNT President the Rev. Dr. Michael Bernard Beckwith said.

PROMINENT GLOBAL ONENESS DAY SUPPORTERS include South African Nobel Peace laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu; artist-musician Yoko Ono; spiritual writers Deepak Chopra, Marianne Williamson, Neale Donald Walsch and Andrew Harvey; Trappist monk and priest Father Thomas Keating; futurist Barbara Marx Hubbard, and U.N. Culture of Peace emissary Anwarul K. Chowdhury.

The day, planned as the first annual worldwide celebration, provides opportunities for individuals, organizations and nations to create practical acts demonstrating unity, diversity, harmony and compassion on a shared date, comparable to what happens on Earth Day.

Practical action will provide tangible, experiential proof of how we can live “when we come from a place of oneness,” Beckwith said. “It will encourage us all to expand our hopes, beliefs and behaviors so that at any moment oneness may permeate all aspects of life.”

“Would the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks have occurred if humanity had already recognized we are all one?” Beckwith said. “Would we now tolerate accelerated global warming, extreme poverty and hunger, and gender inequality? Would we fight each other under the banner of organized religion and in the name of God?”

Recognizing the oneness of humanity and all of life is the key to solving most chronic and acute world problems, Beckwith said.

U.N. ENVOY: NO PEACE WITHOUT ONENESS

Indeed, peace efforts will continue to fail until people embrace humanity’s oneness, Chowdhury said May 20 on receiving a grassroots plea to the United Nations, signed by more than 50,000 people from 168 countries, appealing to the world body to affirm humanity’s oneness and endorse an annual Global Oneness Day.

“I believe that unless we have that sense of solidarity among the peoples of the world, all our efforts of peace and security will go nowhere,” said Chowdhury, a former undersecretary-general and high representative of the United Nations.

A sampling of scheduled Global Oneness Day events, to date, includes:

•     PHILIPPINES: A Global Oneness Eve Celebration with speakers and workshops at Mogwai Cinematheque in Quezon City near Manila.
•     AUSTRALIA: A Oneness Circle, picnic, free hugs campaign and other “unity in diversity” activities at the Botanic Gardens of Adelaide.
•     SOUTH AFRICA: A five-hour workshop and picnic near Johannesburg to “reflect upon, celebrate and experience that which we have in common, as well as that which is uniquely who we are, in respect of religion, spirituality, culture and our connectedness to all of life.” Organizer Humanity’s Team South Africa -- leading a drive for South Africa’s Parliament to embrace oneness by declaring a National Ubuntu Day -- said it would also hold a food and clothing drive “because we are all one.”
•     GERMANY: A bilingual, German-English public global oneness meditation teleconference, with local phone numbers in most European countries and the United States and free phone service over the Internet through Skype.
•     ITALY: A screening of “ONE: The Movie” near Venice to increase awareness of humanity’s connections “in a world that too often seems disconnected and broken.”
•     ENGLAND: People holding hands in Oneness Circles in at least seven cities, including around the base of the historic Cabot Tower in Bristol, followed by discussions and shared meals in most cities.
•     ARGENTINA: A festival with music, dancing, free hugs, a shared meal and “reflections on practical ways of living in oneness” at the Seven Palms Community in Buenos Aires.
•     BRAZIL: A Festival of Unity at a major square in Salvador da Bahia, a city known as Brazil’s “capital of happiness” due to its joyful population and many outdoor parties.
•     UNITED STATES: Oneness Circles in at least 16 cities, interfaith services in a number of churches, a meditation in Seattle, a rally for oneness in Hagerstown, Md., and a daylong visit to the Montgomery (Ala.) Zoo organized by a group that wants “to develop a greater appreciation for all life.”

In addition, at least three dozen New Thought churches in six countries will hold special services that day, AGNT said. Beckwith’s Agape International Spiritual Center in Culver City, Calif., with more than 9,000 members, will stream its three morning Global Oneness Day services live over the Internet on http://www.agapelive.com.

“Oneness is more than a beautiful word,” Beckwith said. “The voice of science increasingly agrees with what mystics, prophets and sages have said for millennia -- that life is a unified whole with multiple dimensions, each complementing the other. This means we are all one!”

GLOBAL ONENESS DAY TELECONFERENCE

A key official ceremonial event will be a 60-minute public "Global Oneness Day Celebration Connection" teleconference with Walsch, Chowdhury, Hubbard and more than a dozen other international dignitaries, celebrities and grassroots leaders beginning at 10 a.m. EDT (14h00 GMT). The teleconference -- at phone number +1-218-486-3850, access code 52059# -- will include a report on Global Oneness Day activities around the world.

A separate public teleconference spotlighting U.S. Global Oneness Day activities is set for 6 p.m. EDT. It will use the same phone number and code.

A number of activities led up to Global Oneness Day. Three of the biggest included the Humanity’s Team “peace through oneness” International Day of Peace observances Sept. 21; AGNT’s Seasons of Interfaith-Intercultural Celebration, part of its Gandhi-King Season for Nonviolence Campaign; and a free, global “40 Days to Oneness” program of daily practices and weekly teleconferences that Humanity’s Team began Sept. 11 with Walsch as a special guest and will end Oct. 23 with Harvey. The program, supporting the expression and celebration of oneness, is based on the book “The Proof,” by James F. Twyman and Anakha Coman, and done in collaboration with the authors.

“The awareness that even with our individual differences we are all one will shift the political, economic and spiritual reality so humanity can finally realize a dream it has had since time immemorial -- citizens of the world living in peace, harmony and happiness,” Beckwith said.

For more information about Global Oneness Day, visit http://www.global-oneness-day.org.

ATTENTION EDITORS: All Global Oneness Day activities are open to the press. A 60-minute Global Oneness Day teleconference report on the day, also open to the press, is set for 10 a.m. EDT (14h00 GMT) Oct. 24. The phone number is +1-218-486-3850, access code 52059#.

# # #

PDF Print