Wisdom for a World in Balance
The Fuji Declaration Symposium held in Tokyo on May 12—entitled “Co-creating a World in Harmony and Balance”—brought together a diverse group of visionary leaders from different countries working in a variety of fields, from government and business, to education and the arts, to spirituality and conflict resolution.
“By restoring harmony and balance between the feminine and masculine,” the symposium proposed, “we can create harmony in all aspects of life—harmony between body and spirit, harmony between men and women, harmony between humanity and nature, harmony between our inner and outer worlds, and harmony between the present and the future. By overcoming the imbalances of life and returning to wholeness, we can give full expression to our innate potential, in service to humanity and the whole web of life on the planet.” Through presentations and panel discussions, the participants delved into each area of this theme.
Following the symposium, many of the participants traveled to Fuji Sanctuary to attend the Symphony of Peace Prayers. Some of them had taken part in a previous SOPP ceremony, while others were new to Fuji Sanctuary. They were introduced to the sanctuary and the work of Byakko Shinko Kai, and during the ceremony were welcomed on stage as special guests. Mr. Hiroo Saionji, President of the Goi Peace Foundation, spoke briefly about the symposium and then introduced each guest on stage, inviting them to give a brief message to participants.
Hiroo Saionji, President of the Goi Peace Foundation
The day before yesterday, we held a Fuji Declaration Symposium in Tokyo, and I’d like to tell you about what we discussed. In 2015, the Fuji Declaration was inaugurated, and last year we launched the Soul of WoMen campaign to rekindle the divine feminine.
This year, our theme was restoring the balance between the divine feminine and divine masculine in our society. Thought leaders from around the world gathered to discuss how to find this balance, through which we can also restore harmony in other aspects of life—between body and spirit, between the inner world and outer world, and between the present and the future.
Through various perspectives, we’ve looked at how to restore this balance based on the principles of the Fuji Declaration—rekindling the divine spark within ourselves and becoming more connected with nature and the world around us.
All of the participants are at the forefront of their respective fields, and we had a very lively discussion. It was wonderful to be able to welcome them all here, and today they have come to Fuji Sanctuary and received a tour of this place. They all said that they felt affected by the prayers that have been continuously offered and have accumulated at this sanctuary.
So now, I’d like to ask each of the participants to say a few words to you.
Ms. Preeta Bansal, Former General Counsel and Senior Policy Advisor in the White House (United States)
I am honored to stand here with you at the foot of a brilliant and absolutely divine mountain that came up from the sea with its flow of sparks. We’re currently in a world where our divine feminine energy is buried in a sea of collective unconsciousness. With your prayers and inspiration, we can each work to uncover those sparks, so that the divine feminine can come forth, like a buried mountain emerging from the sea in balance and harmony, to create a beacon of sustaining peace for the world. With love and deep gratitude, reverence and awe for all of your decades of stillness and prayers that have created the conditions of peace for the world, thank you.
Ms. Bansal was joined by her sister, Dr. Ameeta Bansal Martin, a pediatric cardiologist and businesswoman in the United States.
Dr. Joserra González, Activist and social entrepreneur (Spain)
I can feel the sacredness of this beautiful land of Japan. Thank you all for this beautiful welcome. I think we are in a time when we all need to be leaders of peace. We have been through a time of very big leaders doing very big things, and we probably still need those big leaders and big systems to create peace. But I think we are now in a time where, at every moment, we have to be conscious that we can create peace. With every thought, with every action, with every word, we all can be peace. Gandhi had a very big fight, but he was not able to bring peace. Many other fighters were like that, too. I think that only all together can we bring about the peace that we want in the world. May we all be leaders of peace, through all our small actions and thoughts. Thank you so much for your love.
Dr. Barbara Fields, Executive Director, Association for Global New Thought (United States)
You come here today with your hearts most pure. Please hold us in your prayers, so that we can go home to our own countries and continue to work for peace supported by all of your divine sparks.
Mr. Stephen Travis Pope, Composer, filmmaker, computer scientist and social activist (United States)
In the tradition of the Quakers, we believe that every object and being in all of creation is filled with God’s light, and that we should respond to that light we see in one another. I am grateful to be here, to be inspired by your hearts as we pray together today for peace, and I am reminded of what Ms. Saionji told us—that prayers are things. When we put a prayer out in the world, we have changed the world forever.
Dr. Alan Briskin, Co-founder of the Collective Wisdom Initiative; author and consultant (United States)
My gratitude for being on this sacred land, and many thanks for the prayers that have flowed with love to all parts of the world.
Ms. Shamima Amin, Chief Operation Officer, Yunus Creative Lab (Bangladesh / United States)
I am so grateful to be here. I feel so peaceful. May God bring peace to this beautiful world. Thank you.
Dr. Mohammad Bhuiyan, CEO, World Summit of Nobel Peace Laureates – Atlanta, 2015 (Bangladesh / United States)
I am so impressed and blessed. May the Creator bless all of you for being part of this peace movement. I’m a believer in prayer followed by action. This prayer that all of us are doing together creates an environment such that, when you go home, I ask you to please identify one action that you can take to promote peace in the world, and share it with the Goi Peace Foundation, so that it becomes an example for the rest of the world—every country in the world.
Sally Ranney, President and Co-founder, American Renewable Energy Institute; Co-founder, Women’s Earth and Climate Action Network (United States)
I want to bow to all of you and say thank you so much for sharing your beautiful spirits with me. This land is sacred. The ravens have been going overhead, and in some Native American cultures, those are the ancestors—those are the grandmothers—and they’ve been speaking to us. Everything that is manifest, we are, and we are everything that is yet unmanifested. In that is our God-seed: our divine spark, our divine power, and our divine right to be love in everything that we do—to be love, in no harm to each other and no harm to our sacred Mother Earth.
Dr. Nina Meyerhof, President, Children of the Earth (United States)
Peace being. Peace doing. Inner and outer peace for love and harmony. Deep gratitude.
Mr. Domen Kočevar, Founder and Director, Theosophical Library of Alma M. Karlin (Slovenia)
I’m feeling really humble seeing so many dedicated souls doing selfless prayers for so many years, unseen by others. Thank you for that, and let it be an inspiration to all of us to be in that prayer 24 hours a day, wherever we are and whatever we do.
Dr. Raymond Moody, Researcher and author (United States)
I am so humbled to be here, in this beautiful spot in this beautiful country. Since 1965 I’ve interviewed thousands and thousands of people, from all over the world, who were pronounced dead but revived. In that interim, all over the world, people say that they had a review of their lives, in which they saw everything they had ever done in a panorama. And in that panorama, it became obvious that whatever they had been chasing in their lives—power or fame or money or anything else—what came forward in this review was that the most important thing we can do while we’re alive here on earth is to learn to love. I think, and I pray, that that love will go forth all over the world, and bring peace to all the generations that follow us.
[Before Dr. Moody spoke, his daughter Carol Ann performed a short song.]
Mr. Sam Beard, Founder, Global Investment Foundation for Tomorrow (GIFT) (United States)
(Spoken in Japanese) Peace, peace, peace, and love, love, love.
Rev. Wendy Craig-Purcell, Founder, Unity Center in San Diego; author and speaker (United States)
The divine spark in me recognizes, acknowledges, and greets the divine spark in you in friendship. With open eyes, I see your divine spark. With an open heart, I hold your divine spark. And with open hands, I serve your divine spark. Namaste.
Ms. Hafsat Abiola-Costello, Founder, Kudirat Initiative for Democracy (Nigeria)
For 13 years, you have nurtured peace in your hearts at the foot of Mount Fuji, and you have sent your energy into the world. I want you to know that for months and months, I have been feeling in my heart the need to come and be with you by the foot of this mountain. I have come and I have seen and I have heard and I have felt your peace and your love, and I will take your message back to Nigeria and Africa, where the world first began. I will say to them that the people of Japan are nurturing peace and sending energies of peace into the world—let us join them. One day, the whole world will join us, and we will be a human race at peace.
Ms. Linda Francis, Co-founder, Seat of the Soul Institute (United States)
Last year, I came here, and I fell so much in love with you, I wanted to come back again. I’m so grateful and so honored to be here again and to see and feel all the prayers that have gone out into the world for peace. I love you all, and I love everyone in the biggest community that we all are.
Mr. Gary Zukav, Co-founder, Seat of the Soul Institute (United States)
My spiritual partner, Linda Francis, is always an inspiration to me, as are Mr. and Mrs. Saionji and their beautiful family, and you. I cannot think of a more appropriate place to suggest something that has been burning in me for 30 years. This place is an inspiration that represents the birth of a new human consciousness. And that’s good news. The old consciousness is dying, and a new human consciousness, unprecedented, is emerging in all of us—in hundreds of millions of us. And it brings so many riches. One of them that I want to suggest, I think you already know. The biggest community is the one that includes everyone and everything—everyone and every thing. Let’s all think about that. We are part of the biggest community.
Ms. Sande Hart, Director, Charter for Compassion’s Women and Girls Sector; Founder and President, Spiritual and Religious Alliance for Hope (United States)
I humbly ask you to accept my highest gratitude and my deepest bows for showing up here today, with your prayers and your divine spark, and perhaps, if you’re like me, a deep discomfort that there’s suffering in the world, and a feeling that you want to be part of its healing. This is the definition of compassion, and it is indispensable for a world that works for everyone—a world of balance, a world of a just economy, a world of harmony and peace and perfect balance between the feminine and the masculine energies.
Mr. Parag Shah, Owner, K. Girdharlal International; Co-founder, Fountainhead School (India)
We are here to bow to you, to pray with you, and tell you all that we love you all. Thank you.
Mr. Shah was joined on stage by his wife, Mita Shah, clothing designer and co-founder of Zumbish (NGO).
Mr. David Leal Garcia, Facilitator and conflict mediator (Spain)
(Speaking in Japanese) For 70 years, the people of Japan have very courageously served peace, which gives great hope to the rest of the world. In this dark age, we are faced with environmental crises and the threat of war, and the memory of peace in Japan is needed more than anything else. In family, community, and nation, and in nature, we really need peace. Please continue to work for a peaceful future. Please show the rest of the world the path to a future of peace. Let us work together to make sure we have a better society and world. May peace prevail on Earth.
Mr. Sesto Giovanni Castagnoli, Development consultant and entrepreneur (Switzerland / Austria)
When I was here two years ago, I was already overwhelmed by what I saw and felt, and I kept it in my heart all the time when I traveled the world. I talked about you a lot, and I’m still impressed, crying. It’s so incredible, what you are doing. I’m overwhelmed. I admire you all, and the world needs you more than ever. It is so incredible what Masahisa Goi started. I pray for us all, and I say ‘thank you,’ looking up to him, that he has such wonderful people here following his path—the Saionji family and all of you. I can only say from the bottom of my heart, I love you all, and let’s love all the world. May peace prevail on Earth.
Ms. Gabriele Castagnoli, Speaker, moderator, event curator (Switzerland / Austria)
Words couldn’t describe what I see and what I feel being here with you. There is just one image I want to share with you. Being here at this place looking at you, it’s like I’m looking at myself, and I wish to take this impression and this memory with me back into my daily life. I look at you as if you were myself, and you are beautiful and very diverse. I wish for all of us that when we encounter another person, that we can have this look of “it’s different, but it’s beautiful, and it’s so diverse—and all together, this is what makes this world.” I thank you for being here with me, and it’s a gift I take home with me.
Following these heartfelt messages, Masami Saionji offered some words of gratitude to the guests and to all participants:
Thank you, one and all. From the bottom of my heart, I offer all of you my gratitude. I thought I could never invite all of you here on my own. I always seek to elevate my consciousness, and I have read many of your books and writings, and I’ve wanted to work with you. I’ve always had this feeling as I read your books and heard about your activities. I continue my own prayer work, but in my heart, I’ve felt a little intimidated by all of the great work that you are doing. And I felt that it might not be possible to invite you and have you all here in Japan. But, the miracle happened, and you have brought your presence here, so that we can be together in this way. It is such a miracle for me that all of you said, yes, I will come, I want to be here with you in Japan. It’s so amazing for me that you are here.
To the participants, all of your accumulated peace prayers have supported my vision, and through your help, I was able to gain the opportunities to meet all of these beautiful people. So please, hold onto the vision that nothing is impossible. Believe in the path forward, and maintain your faith and trust. Hold the possibilities within your consciousness. I held a huge possibility for this event, for all of these people to gather here today, and it came true. I appreciate all of your words. Your words of love and compassion are echoing in my heart, and we are joining together for building a culture of peace. Thank you so much.