Focusing on ‘collaboration’ in an interfaith publication may seem redundant. All interfaith activity is collaborative, you might say. Collaboration is ‘who we are’! True enough. But we need to notice how we practice what we preach. We live in the midst of siloed interfaith organizations, many of whom don’t know each other and have weak relations with faith organizations as well. Institutionally we lack the connective tissue that will give the interfaith movement its real identity and voice(s). We’re badly in need of seeing the larger picture.
Transforming the Religious Impulse Gone Bad
Eric Schmitt’s recent New York Times story, “In Battle to Defang ISIS, U.S. Targets Its Psychology,” was startling. You might, at first glance, call it 2014’s most hopeful story about the nightmare called the “Islamic State” and its echoes around the world. Schmitt profiles Maj. Gen. Michael Nagata, commander of American Special Operations forces in the Middle East. Nagata has organized a military/academic/private-sector think-tank to ask: “What makes the Islamic State so dangerous?”
Review: Spiritual Guidance across Religions
As a health care chaplain for 15 years and now director of a large and wonderfully diverse health system chaplaincy department, I was delighted to be asked to review Spiritual Guidance Across Religions: A Sourcebook for Spiritual Directors and Other Professionals Providing Counsel to People of Differing Faith Traditions (2014). The book is a 400-page tome edited by John Mabry, who invited 23 highly qualified practitioners of spiritual care from different religious, spiritual traditions to contribute.
A Child Vows Silence for the Climate's Sake
As noted in last month’s TIO, communities around the world gathered for prayer vigils for the climate discussion going on in Lima,Peru. They were the #LightforLima, asking for strong climate action from the world’s leaders. The Our Voices campaign, a global multifaith campaign for a strong UN Climate treaty, is gearing up for 2015. But the work we do in 2015 depends on sharing the successes of our previous work. Light for Lima has been our best and brightest action.
From Collaboration to Co-Creation
What’s the most exciting experience you’ve had collaborating across differences in faith, culture, and ideology? Have you ever entered into collaborative relationships and been truly surprised by the result? What enabled those experiences to happen?
Duane Elgin – Profile of a Visionary
Duane Elgin, who might be deemed the most important visionary alive if more people knew about him, is a man who defies attempts at ‘categorization.’ But if you are involved with multicultural, interfaith work and care about humankind’s future, you need to know about this joyfully complex thinker who is offering a vision and tools for achieving our highest goals.
Len Swidler– the Quest for a Deeper Dialogue
The indefatigable Leonard Swidler, now in his 87th year and best known for founding the Journal of Ecumenical Studies, is renewing two of his Interreligious Dialogue (IRD) initiatives. This good news coincides with the publication of a lively biography, There Must Be You (2014) by River Adams, and Swidler’s own Dialogue for Interreligious Understanding (2014), which summarises much of his thinking.
Religion Inside Out: The Story of One Person Collaborating
“Religion Inside Out” – that was the tag line the Rev. Dr. Gwynne Guibord, an Episcopal priest, attached to The Guibord Center (TGC), a unique non-profit organization. Less than four years old, it is making its mark on the interfaith landscape in Southern California and beyond.
Youth Interfaith Activists
Six years ago, in January 2009, I sat on a train thinking about where the year ahead would take me. Nearing the end of my undergraduate degree, I was starting to think more seriously about what to do next. I had ideas, but nothing quite seemed to fit until I came across an international, interfaith, social action-oriented program called the Faiths Act Fellowship.
Mapping Social Services and Identifying Collaborators
How much do social outreach programs of religious congregations contribute to their communities? What is the overall contribution of congregational services and the quiet heroes who work for them?
Building Jewish-Muslim Friendship One Woman at a Time
Five years ago, Atiya Aftab, a Muslim woman, and I, a Jewish woman, invited a group of 12 women – six Muslim women and six Jewish women – to meet together once a month. Other Muslim and Jewish women heard about our effort and asked to join our group and/or help them start their own group in another geographic area. In response to these requests, Atiya and I formed a national non-profit organization at the end of 2013 – the Sisterhood of Salaam Shalom (SOSS).
Interfaith Collaboration – Walking the Talk
Principle 11 of the United Religions Initiative (URI) Charter says that “we seek and offer cooperation with other interfaith efforts.” The diverse community that met during URI’s formation in the late nineties envisioned that URI would be a different kind of organization in many respects.
Colaboration, Cooperation, Coopetition
In 2014 the Compassion Games grew 120 percent to more than 158 teams. They are organically organized into “Leagues” according to the constituencies they represent. Sixteen sectors have been identified, including Interfaith, Education, Health Care, Families, Women/Girls, Youth/Elderly, Cities, and Arts/Culture.
Required Reading for Interspirituality 101
When Swami Vivekananda spoke to the opening plenary of the first World’s Parliament of Religions on September 11, 1893, he quoted lines from an ancient Hindu spiritual hymn:
As the different streams having there sources in different places all mingle their water in the sea, so, O Lord, the different paths which men take through different tendencies, various though they appear, crooked or straight, all lead to thee.
Jainism – “Jain Teachings at an Interfaith Center”
With a vast diversity of member communities, Religions for Peace USA has a wealth of knowledge and experience to share about working for peace. These communities meditate, pray, advocate for justice, and work for a better world in many ways. Sometimes, simply hearing these stories can be inspiring for our own work. In this month’s issue, we profile a Jain community in Michigan, as Nirmala Hanke, M.D. leads us through some of the core tenets of Jainism and its applicability to our world today.
Turning to Joy
“The beating heart of the universe is holy joy.” – Martin Buber
When religion and violence are endlessly discussed, analyzed, and carelessly conflated, it behooves us to take time to notice how joy tends to be a defining element in interfaith and interspiritual relationships. Not just a kum-by-ya sense of shared well being and friendship, but deeper, a ‘holy joy,’ to use Buber’s language, on entering a world where the ‘other’ is treasured rather than feared. Here is a world where you and the other can appreciate the gifts and wisdom in each other and be mutually enriched, an unexpected banquet to enjoy.
Joy at the Grassroots
The faces … it is the faces of people from communities around the world that I remember most from this past year, visiting global grassroots interfaith groups. A year ago, I began my work as executive director of United Religions Initiative (URI), a rare opportunity to contribute to an extraordinary movement dedicated to building peace among the peoples of the planet. [Photo: URI]
International Interfaith Festival in Guadalajara, May 3-9, 2015
As excitement builds for the Parliament of the World’s Religions next year in Salt Lake City (October 15-19), a second major international interfaith gathering has been announced, this one in Guadalajara, Mexico, set for May 3-9, 2015.
Dalai Lama and Karen Armstrong to Keynote 2015 Parliament of the World’s Religions
His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Dr. Karen Armstrong will be keynoters at the Parliament of the Worlds Religions, to be held October 15-19, 2015 in Salt Lake City. The theme of the Parliament is “Reclaiming the Heart of Our Humanity: Working Together for a World of Compassion, Peace, Justice, and Sustainability.”
Celebrating Thanksgiving in Jerusalem
Thanksgiving comes to Jerusalem, and I am beside myself with preparations for the feast. Onions sizzle, garlic roasts, chickens brine, and cranberries boil. The windows steam with contented warmth, and aromas crowd around the doorframes. A pan sizzles with crisping chicken skin, a soup bubbles slowly as vegetables melt into the broth. I am in heaven.