More than 40,000 converged on a beach in Hawaii to witness and participate in Tōrō Nagashi, the floating lantern ceremony on Memorial Day this year. Millions more witnessed it on television and the internet. Veterans, city officials and state legislators, clergy from various traditions, and thousands of children, gathered at Ala Moana Beach Park on O’ahu’s south shore at dusk Monday, May 28. They joined in a day of memorial observances culminating in 3,300 lantern-bearing paper boats floating into the sunset with prayers for lost loved ones and for peace.[Ala Moana Beach Park on Memorial Day 2012]
October 2023, LGBTQ, Meaning Making
by Maij Vu Mai
What is religious pluralism to the Survivor? To the one who’s lost faith in themselves? Lost faith in other people? Lost faith in humanity? To the one who’s lost faith in their ability to connect because…
October 2023
by Miranda Hovemeyer
I’ll be honest. I haven’t felt at home in the field of interfaith work for quite a while. During one of the last interfaith conferences I spoke at, I was asked by an older white gentleman why I was there, then insisting…
Arts, October 2023
by Sable Manson
n the spring of 2020, I was working with my higher education colleagues to prepare for an interfaith retreat set on Catalina Island, off the coast of southern California. We had planned numerous…
October 2023, Emerging Interfaith Culture, Interfaith Relationships
by Najeeba Syeed
I’ve written about “casserole” hospitality, an ethic of care demonstrated in America’s Heartland found in communities of various traditions who welcome…
