Two Southern California Pastors Seek To End Worldwide Religious Hatred With Ambassadors For Peace Organization
by Kevin Hunter
March 27, 2007
BELLFLOWER CA (ANS) -- In an effort to stop the fear of government and religious persecution, imprisonment and even death for worshipping or participating in peaceful dialogue about religion of any kind, two pastors from a suburb in Southern California have formed a non-profit organization that include a sort of Bill of Rights or Declaration of Independence that is designed to give individuals some of the same religious freedoms we enjoy here in the United States.
Ambassadors for Peace is a religious rights organization founded by Bellflower, CA pastors Gary Ansdell and Ameal Haddad. Ambassadors for Peace was created shortly after the attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City on September 11, 2001. Ansdell and Haddad thought there was a desperate need to have religious leaders of all faiths all over the world to be able to discuss their faiths without the threat of violence.
Ansdell is also the Senior Pastor at Hosanna Christian Fellowship in Bellflower, CA and has taught the word of God's all over the world in places such as China, the Philippines, Africa, Hungary and South Korea. Ansdell also co-founded Living Epistles, an evangelical T-shirt company with Jeff Nicholson.
Haddad is the Pastor of the Bellflower Church of God. Haddad migrated from Jordan to Canada in 1965 and has been in ministry since 1983. He holds a Master's degree in Practical Theology from Talbot Seminary at Biola University in La Mirada, CA.
"After 9/11 there was a lot of confusion about the Muslims and what 9/11 was all about," said Ansdell "There was more blame than solutions and Muslims were not speaking out. There were a lot of issues and I did a lot of studying to find out what it was all about.
"What I found out was that in many of the Arab countries Muslims don't have the freedom to discuss their own religion. So even though there's a great population of Muslims who want to speak out, ask questions and investigate their own religion, it's something they can't do because they don't have the freedoms we have in this country.
"So we wrote the Religious Rights Resolution to give not just them but any religion, no matter what the politics of a nation the right to discuss their religion and the religion of others and make up their own minds without their church, their mosque or whatever putting undo pressure on them."
On its website, Ambassadors for Peace has what Ansdell and Haddad call a Religious Rights Resolution that they say is similar to the United States' Bill of Rights that gives individuals the rights to practice and discuss their various religion. In the Religious Rights Resolution no one religion is excluded.
"It gives people the ability to speak without being harmed," said Haddad. "This is good for the individual because it gives them the freedom to worship and make choices. In this resolution, we are calling on people to accept each other as human beings.
"Dr. Martin Luther King said his dream was that people should not be judged by the color of their skin. I say that people should not be judged by the religion they belong to, but by the content of their character."
There are 17 resolutions in the Religious Rights Resolution. Some of the key resolutions are:
Number 1 - "We understand that there are extremes in every religion."
Number 8 - "Men and women everywhere have the God-given right to convert, or not to convert, to any religion without harm from any other religious or national politic."
Number 12, "Every person no matter what religion, race or nationality has the right to live at peace with their neighbor no matter what their faith."
Number 17, "We therefore assert that all people have the divine right to share what they know and to live at peace with the results."
"What we want is a level playing field," said Ansdell. "We want to be able to agree to disagree and discuss it. When it comes to things like gay rights the government says that you have a right. And even though I disagree with their moral standing, they want to have the right to live their lives the way they want, and I expect the government to say the same about religion."
Ambassadors for Peace has over 450 members that include religious leaders and laymen of all faiths - Christians, Catholics, Muslims, Jews, Mormons and Hindus, and come from all walks of life. There are accounts, film producers, nurses, youth pastors, writers, doctors, layers and students just to name a few who all have signed the Religious Rights Resolution.
Although the majority is from the Christian, Muslim and Catholic faiths, there are also two Atheists members - Richard K. Payne and Dr. Marvin F. Zayed.
Payne is Dean of the Institute of Buddhist Studies at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, CA. He is the author of Tantric Ritual of Japan, and editor of Re-Visioning "Kamakura" Buddhism. Zayed is the Founder and Chairman of the DiaHumanism Institute for Studies in Freethought (DISF).
"I'm what you call a backslidden atheist," said Ansdell. "I was an atheist until I was 27 years old. I think it shows the reality of all this. Atheists are saying 'you guys have got to get over yourselves and you have to be able to talk about things without making it a mandate and using physical violence,' and that kind of thing."
Some of the most influential members of the Ambassadors for Peace include Egyptian Senior Senator Dr. Mohammad El Batran, who has signed the resolution as well as Retired Israeli General Shimon Erem, who fought in the Six Day War, and Sheik Dr. Mohammad Tantowi, the head of one of the largest Sunni populations in the world. According to Ansdell and Haddad, Dr. Tantowi is scheduled to meet with Pope Benedict XVI to present him with the resolution.
Ambassadors for Peace has been endorsed by some of the biggest churches and religious organizations in the nation and the world, including the 300,000 member Church of God based in Anderson, IN and the Church on the Way in Van Nuys, CA with a membership of 27,000, and the Islamic Center of Orange County, which is located in Garden Grove, CA. It's one of the largest Muslim in the Western hemisphere with nearly 7,000 members
Ansdell and Haddad insist that Ambassadors for Peace is in no way an attempt to create a one world religion. Instead he said it's an organization that allows religion to exist and have dialogue without the fear of government involvement or interference. They also said that the organization is not an interfaith or an ecumenical organization.
"That is one of the biggest questions we get from Christians especially," said Haddad. "Are we trying to say that all religions are the same and that we all worship the same God? Absolutely not! We believe that every religion has its own characteristics and so on. We are not an ecumenical movement and we want to emphasis that. There are plenty of them around where people get together and worship the same god and we must get along together.
"That fine. As human beings we must get along together, but that doesn't mean that we are of the same faith, and it doesn't mean that we all have to agree on everything. That is where we differ. We will never compromise our faith and come to the point where we say that we are one religion."
As Sunnis and Shiites still continue to battle against U.S. forces and against each other in Iraq, Ambassadors for Peace has a large number of Muslim as members who hope to end the violence and very soon. Haddad said that they should benefit the most from the organization and from the resolution.
"Instead of killing each other over our differences we need to be able to discuss them without the violence," said Haddad. "Killing is the easy way out. It is encouraging that so many Muslims have signed the declaration, because it says that they are willing to stop the killing and sit down and talk. Only 10 to 15 percent of Muslims believe in violence. The rest are open to discussion."
Not only do Muslims benefit, but there is the possibility of prisoners all over the world who were jailed for speaking out for religion being freed.
And while Ambassadors for Peace's goal is to give people of all religions the right to discuss and worship however they want without any fear or consequences from government or religious leaders, there is the possibility that it could open the floodgates for Christians and evangelicals from all over the world to spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ in places where the word of God is outlawed.
"First off I think the Gospel can handle itself on a level playing field," said Ansdell. "By that I mean that if you put all the religions on the table I believe that the world of God is going to accomplish its purpose. I wrote this resolution to be completely fair when it comes to all religions and not just about Christian Crusades.
"On the other hand, of course I think that as a believer if there's an opportunity to bring others to Christ then do so. By the same token the Jewish faith should have the same opportunity to stand for what they believe in a community. Basically we want everyone to have the same freedoms we have in this country around the world."
For more information on Ambassadors for Peace go to the website at http://www.am4peace.org.
© 2007 ASSIST News Service, used with permission.
