Speech of Kuni Kuniaki, Chairman of Jinja Honcho (Association of Shinto Shrines), Japan

Thank you for your kind introduction, Mr. Chairman.
Distinguished Guests, Colleagues,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

I am Kuni Kuniaki, Chairman of Jinja Honcho, or the Association of Shinto Shrines. It is very significant that today leaders of traditional religions of the world have gathered to discuss the construction of world peace and further advancement of the international community in this beautiful Republic of Kazakhstan.

My deepest appreciation and respect go to His Excellency President Nursultan Nazarbayev as well as to numerous staff who made this Congress possible. I am representing Jinja Honcho which integrates and coordinates about 80,000 Shinto shrines at every corner of our land. As such, it is a great honor for me to have an opportunity to talk to you today.

The land of Japan lies off the eastern tip of the Asian Continent, across the Sea of Japan, an archipelago of some 7,000 islands around four "main islands". It is a much-privileged country, with beautiful seas, verdant mountains and hills, a number of flowing rivers and streams, and small-but-fertile plains. On this land there are traditional, verdant agricultural areas and urban regions, where highly advanced technology and service sectors are concentrated.

The Japanese traditionally dedicated their appreciation to deities, including those of seas, mountains and rivers, who provided the virtue of Nature's gifts, while always praying for peace and tranquility of the community. It was within this mindset that Shinto - a faith which believes deities do reside in the nature - has developed itself. And that belief had been inherited to this day through seasonal rituals and festivals.

Japan has been an agricultural society until very recent years. And in that kind of society it is mandatory and indispensable for people to work in the nature by cooperating and helping each other. Each villager offers skills that he/she is the most competent in, shoulder his/her responsibility and make up for shortfalls of others and, while doing so, attaches importance to concordance with the nature-that was what he/she believed the best way to lead to prosperity.

In other words, Shinto shrines in each township and village were the forums to express appreciation as well as to inherit the spirit, namely diverse cultures and traditions, as well as to encourage inter-generation exchanges.

Deities gathered around, consulted with each other and then made a necessary decision-such anecdotes abound in Japanese myths which are one of the pillars of the Shinto faith. The Japanese, as the myths suggest, gathered at shrines whenever it was needed to decide on the best solution and to sustain harmony among them.

Japan is the world's oldest constitutional monarchy. The Emperor by the Constitution is defined as "the symbol of the state and the people's unity and has been ceaselessly conducting rituals to pray for peace in Japan and in the world. Meanwhile, the Grand Shrines of Ise (Ise Jingu), where Amaterasu Omikami (the Sun Goddess)-is enshrined, stand out as the most divine of 80,000 shrines established at every corner of the country. Amaterasu Omikami is thought to be the very ancestor of the Emperor.

At Ise, the Shrines are rebuilt and their sacred treasures are crafted anew every 20 years, so that the most sacred of the deities would move into new shrines, an extremely important ritual called "Shikinen Sengu (Regular Removal)". Currently, preparation for the 62nd Regular Removal is solemnly under way.

Partially a personal story, I did have a privilege of serving the 61st Regular Removal as the Chief Priest of the Grand Shrines of Ise. I dedicated my gratitude that I was privileged to serve Amaterasu Omikami and prayed for peace and prosperity of Japan all the way during that special period.

As you may be well aware, the land of Japan had been grossly devastated 61 years ago, when the War ended. Urban areas had been burned down to ashes, whereas rural, farming regions were left desolate due to manpower shortage. (Conscription robbed villages of healthy, young men.) Japan, in short, was living on a subsistence level.

As you may also be aware, the Occupation Forces' policy severed the ties of the national government and the Grand Shrines of Ise, despite it is the faith of the Japanese people, tossing Ise into a very difficult situation, both politically and economically. But what stood unchanged was the faith to Ise of the Japanese people. While struggling to rebuild local shrines, people focused on the next Regular Removal, originally scheduled for the year of Showa 24 (1949).

It was a time, when few of the Japanese could find modest satisfaction even in their daily routine life. But they bit the bullet - a vast number of the Japanese contributed and donated funds, often out of their not-so-thick pocketbook. It was four years later when, the Regular Removal was completed, beautifully and solemnly, in the year of Showa 28, 1953 AD.

What the Japanese in those days were trying to find was a ray of hope for national recovery and reconstruction by completing the Regular Removal. Since then, Japan has recovered, and it is now one of a handful of economic and industrial giants of the world. The lesson: at the bottom of the Japanese vitality burn the spirit of Shinto which attaches the most importance to gratitude to deities and the mind of cooperation and concordance.

This 2nd Congress here has an agenda to discuss "Religion, Society and International Security". As globalization of economy accelerates, the gap between the poor and the rich is widening. And those who exclusively pursue more convenient and more comfortable life often seem to have forgotten appreciation of the nature's virtue, value of living peacefully together with their neighbors, toil and efforts of our forerunners whose days were much harder than now. The trend, of course, clouds Japan, too,

Never in history of mankind has it been so important to re-recognize the importance of life filled with gratitude to divine presence(s). For that matter, I would say that this Congress where leaders of traditional religions have gathered to pray for peace-in their own ways of their faith -and deepen mutual understanding through dialogue is nothing less than what the modern day badly needs.

I believe that culture of each and every country does have its own religious worldview and value which form the bottom line of that specific culture. Of course there are differences in history and track records depending on what faith we are talking about, but I believe they share one sense in common: to thank the divine presence(s), and work hard to achieve stability and peace of the world through mutual cooperation.

Never in history of mankind are we so much in need of sincere efforts to listen to other peoples' opinions, understand them, and repeat dialogues and to cooperate with each other. Let us do as our holy presences(s) have done, as have been described in myths, legends and scriptures.

Today, environmental contamination on a global magnitude, pure wasting and resulting shortages of natural resources have surfaced as major issues. Then, an important point to ponder would be, how we can live effectively and meaningfully without wasting what we are given. History has proven time and again that endless pursuit of economic wealth has triggered frictions and offered the seed of confrontations, as have been shown by so many wars.

Let us admit and recognize, deep in our heart, that there is a limit in what the nature can offer, and that we must deal with Mother Nature with utmost modesty. And we also must probe, seriously, how we can live a life, rich but sustainable concurrently.

I talked earlier about the Regular Removal of the Grand Shrines of Ise. There we plant hundreds of cypress saplings on the premises every year so that we can be as self-sufficient as possible when we harvest woods for the Removal project. Furthermore-this may be a bit more of a surprise to you all, the shrine' daily offerings to deities, namely, rice, vegetables, fruits and even salt are produced in-house, i.e. at our own rice paddies and fields.

This I point out as an example of how self-conclusive the shrine is. Of course at each and every seasonal turning point, we hold a ritual and/or festival of gratitude dedicated to, for example, deities of mountains who grow trees, to deities of rice paddies who grow rice, and to many others. And I understand that all the religions and cultures do have their own prayers for appreciating harvest and pay gratitude to the divine presence(s).

This point alone, ladies and gentlemen, can convince us that we can share a "pinhole" through which we will be able to start inter -religious dialogues overcoming a phantom idea we wrongly have been led to believe, that religious differences are insurmountable.

Ladies and gentlemen,

Let me say this here and now, loud and clear,

Let us not allow religious differences to continue prevailing as sinister agents to obstruct dialogues. Let us remind ourselves that in your neighboring country, too, its citizens are trying hard to build a modest but happy life in which they can live in prevailing peace, even if their faiths are different from yours.

Let us recognize, from this viewpoint that responsibilities and duties the world's religious community is expected to carry out today are more vital and important than ever partly because our goal sounds so simple, but, at the same tine, it is so difficult to achieve. Let us reconfirm that our goal is to enhance the momentum for peace, in concordance with each other but in our own ways as our faiths call for.

Ladies and gentlemen,

Let us continue our efforts towards this noble goal through dialogues to understand each other's history, tradition, thinking and culture. Let us continue our duty as pathfinders, with each of us contributing what it is the best to. Let me add that in that process our own piety will also be further deepened.

Let us once again reiterate that religions must never ever be used as a tool of confrontations. And I am grateful that this Congress is offering a highly befitting forum to tap all the wisdom of all the faiths on earth.

At last but not least, allow me to pray for health and success of you all.

May our deities bless you.

Thank you very much for your attention.