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Educating Leaders for a Multi-Religious World

Nancy Fuchs-Kreimer — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 15:15:09 +0000

Last week, I had the privilege of attending a wonderful conference, “Educating Jewish, Christian, and Muslim Leaders for Service in a Multi-Religious World: The American Seminary Context.” The college was hosted by Andover Newton Theological School, Boston Theological Institute, and Hebrew College. To read an overview of the conference written by Joshua Stanton, editor of the Journal of Inter-religious Dialogue, click HERE. To read Samir Selmonovic’s comments, click here.

The conference was extraordinarily rich: two and a half days filled with panels and programs from breakast till late in the evening. A wide range of speakers presented on a rich variety of topics, all related to the question of training the next generation of religious leaders. Certain themes recurred. Here is a brief list of the ones I noted:

1)Radical pluralism—Professor Diana Eck, founder of the Harvard Pluralism Project, was honored with an award at the conference and was quoted often, sometimes merely to note the title of her 2001 book, “A New Religious America: How a “Christian Country” Has Become the World’s Most Religiously Diverse Nation

2)The Need for Community Based/Experiential Learning–Rabbi Justus Baird reported on a national study Auburn Seminary conducted of multifaith education in seminaries. One surprising finding: at most, 15% of the courses involved anything beyond classroom learning. It was widely agreed that the field should make more use of community based learning, focusing more on hands-on education, including service, travel and experiential opportunities of all kinds.

3)Wild Hybridity– Several speakers, especially those working on college campuses, referenced the emerging reality of interfaith work: the boundaries between groups are less clear; sometimes the multifaith dialogue takes place within a single individual. What does it mean to be advocating conversation across groups, when the tribal ties themselves are fraying and identities are increasingly complex, faith stances increasingly syncretistic? No one thought this meant there was less need for the work of interfaith education, just that it had to take into account the changing landscape.

4)Israel/palestine–This topic arose as a central concern in a panel devoted to international issues. It also came up at other times in conversations regarding issues in Jewish-Christian and Jewish-Muslim dialogue, in discussions of funding sources and in the all-important conversations over coffee and late at night. Clearly, much more attention needs to be paid to bringing this issue into the world of interfaith in a fruitful way.

5)American Muslim Religious Leadership–Throughout the conference, we were aware of the growing presence of a second and third generation Muslim American community eager to join the multifaith conversation. That community is beginning to figure out how to train religious leaders in and for this country. On a panel devoted to this topic, Professor Ingrid Mattson, the president of the Islamic Society of North America, spoke of the need for American Muslims to commit resources to training a new generation of leaders. An Americanized version of the “imam” role may emerge(as the role of “rabbi” also adapted to a Christian context). A huge question that lingers: how will American Muslims find a common platform in the midst of religious diversity? Will we see Reform, Conservative and Orthodox versions of Islam emerge?

6)Inclusion of Evangelical Christians– Association of Theological Schools reported that the accrediting institution he works with has as its constituency Christian seminaries–21% Roman Catholic and Orthodox and the rest evenly divided between Evangelical Protestant schools and Main Line(liberal)Protestant schools. However, he pointed out, when you look at the number of students, a different picture emerges. 10% Roman Catholic/Orthodox, 60% Evangelical and 30% Mainline Protestant. Many speakers expressed their desire for interfaith work to not be limited to the progressive religious community.Panels included evangelical representatives. The modern version of interfaith left less room for evangelicals than the post-modern version does. This area holds exciting possibilities.

7)”Shacking Up”— The campus on which we met, shared by Hebrew College and Andover Newton, clearly reflects a trend that many agreed will be more important as the years go by. Funders want to know that money is used wisely, that individual institutions are not “reinventing the wheel.” Particularly when the subject is interfaith, collaboration seems often to be the best choice.

Curriculum Infusion– Many speakers agreed that adding extra courses, as if multifaith was an added on bonus/elective, was not the best way to transform seminary education. Rather, we need to think about how the formation of our clergy in all its aspects might reflect an awareness of the multifaith world they will confront.

“Praying with Your Feet” at RRC

Nancy Fuchs-Kreimer — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 02:00:28 +0000

This week, I am at a conference sponsored by Andover Newton Seminary and Hebrew College Rabbinical School. The conference is entitled “Educating Jewish, Christian, and Muslim Leaders for Service in a Multi-Religious World: The American Seminary Context.” I can’t wait to hear about all the exciting programs being created by my counterparts throughout the country who are involved in clergy training for multifaith contexts.

I will be speaking on a panel on educational opportunities “beyond the classroom.” Although we have several major initiatives outside the classroom, including student internships with multifaith organizations, I have chosen to present our co-curricular guest speaker series, “Praying with Your Feet: Conversations with Faith Based Activists.”

. Multifaith education is about imparting information and teaching skills , but it is also about formation and inspiration. One of the values we want to impart to our rabbis is the willingness to dream big, to expand their imaginations as they envision how their rabbinates might make a difference in the world.

How do people translate their faith into action?

2008-2009

*Sheikh Ghassan Manasra — director of Anwar il-Salaam, a Muslim peace and dialogue centre based in Nazareth, Israel

*Richard Taylor – Raised in the Quaker faith, joined the Catholic Church in 1982 at the age of 49. Coordinator of Development for St. Vincent de Paul’s Peace Ministry in Philadelphia. Author, A Peace Ministry in Practice, and Why I am Still a Catholic . Read about his visit here.

*Krystin Komarnicki –Editor, Prism Magazine, published by Evangelicals for Social Action, Philadelphia. Read about her visit here.

*Samir Selmanovic — founder of Faith House Manhattan and author, It’s Really all about God. Read about his visit here.

*Rabbi Lynn Gottlieb — founder of Shomer Shalom, a network of Jewish individuals committed to the Torah of Nonviolence. ordained in the Jewish Renewal movement in 1981. Author, She Who Dwells Within: A Feminist Vision of a Renewed Judaism.(Currently Lynn is helping to launch the Community of Living Traditions — an interfaith intentional community dedicated to nonviolence at Stony Point Center(Presbyterian Church USA)Read about her visit here.

2009-2010

* Professor Mohja Kahf — Poet, Novelist and Professor of Comparative Literature, University of Arkansas, author, The Girl in the Tangerine Scarf. Activist on gender issues in Islam.

*Professor Theodore Friend — former president of Swarthmore College, Senior Fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute and a member of Bryn Mawr Presbyterian Church. Newest book-in-progress, Toward an Open Islam: Woman, Man, and God in Five Muslim Cultures. Read about his visit here.

*Rabbi Sheila Weinberg — co-founder and Director of Outreach at the Institute for Jewish Spirituality. author, Surprisingly Happy: an Atypical Religious Memoir(2010) Active in Rabbis for Human Rights among other justice and peace initiatives.

*Reverend Susan Teegan Case — Founding Director, Arts and Spirituality Center, Philadelphia, a not-for-profit organization comprised of artists and spiritual leaders working with multi-faith constituencies who see the interplay of artistic and spiritual expression as an avenue for social and personal healing,

Young American Muslims Tell Their Story on YouTube

Nancy Fuchs-Kreimer — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 19:44:02 +0000

Recently, I came across two videos on YouTube, each designed to let young American Muslims have their chance to tell their truths—to present images different from the ones that too often fill the popular imagination.

Are these videos needed? According to a Gallup Center for Muslim Studies report released in February, indeed they are. More than 4 in 10 Americans (43%) admit to feeling at least “a little” prejudice toward Muslims — more than twice the number who say the same about Christians (18%), Jews (15%) and Buddhists (14%).

These two examples are not the same in their method, although both address some of the key prejudices Americans typically hold about Muslims.

The first was created by the Center for American Progress.

The second was by Kareem Salama, a “Muslim cowboy.”

Please check them out and let us know here what you like and why.

The Radical Path of Nondual Judaism: Interfaith Implications

Nancy Fuchs-Kreimer — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 21:43:51 +0000

I took advantage of the blizzard(when “everything was snow”) to read Jay Michaelson’s new book, Everything is God: The Radical Path of Nondual Judaism, published last year by Shambala Press. Michaelson is completing a PhD in Jewish Thought at Hebrew University and has written extensively for The Forward, Huffington Post, Tikkun and many other publications. His writing style is clear and compelling, filled with evocative stories and quotations, remarkably free of jargon and overwritten prose. He appears to follow Mark Twain’s excellent advice to an author, “When you catch an adjective, kill it.”

For Michaelson, Jewish nondualism is not better or worse than other nondual traditions, and he freely uses examples from other traditions: Zen, TibetanBuddhism, Vedanta. He does not make the mistake, however, of blending them together as if to make them all say precisely the same thing. In fact, he does a nice job of showing how the Jewish tradition of nondualism is both similar and different from other traditions, and indeed, points outs some of the tensions between different Jewish versions of nondualism. He also does a wonderful job of setting the Jewish tradition within the larger picture of Jewish religious thought, including its contemporary manifestations.

Of the many stories Michaelson tells, one of my favorites comes from the Sufi tradition:

There was once a prisoner who yearned for freedom. One day, the prophet Muhammad appeared to thim, gave him a set of keys to his cell, saying, “Allah has set you free.” The prisoner took the keys, mounted them on the wall, and prayed to them five times a day.

The book grapples with the question of what it means to share fundamental beliefs with other traditions and yet love ones own path. Even for nondualists, particular communities and practices can be the triggers(Michaelson’s word) that “bring us closer to what matters most.” He loves the Jewish path and the powerful ways it leads him in his spiritual life. He says, “I don’t want to fetishize the trigger, but I do want to pull it.”

That said, our 21st century reality is that those pulling the trigger most passionately, at least in the Abrahamic traditions often (although by no means always) are the ones most inclined to support pulling triggers of another kind as well. Michaelson grapples with this situation and with the increasingly complex identities, dual and even more, that we find among seekers. Why is it so important that insist on our particularities, especially in light of their shadow side of ethnocentricity? Has the value of maintaining those boundaries run its course, and would not people who see ultimate reality as nondualist be among the first to advocate less divisions and more synergy?

I especially appreciated Michaelson’s pragmatist streak because it corresponds with my own. He believes, as I do, that “by their fruits you shall know them.” And this is where I run into trouble with nondualism. He writes, “When the spiritual work is being done, the good heart emerges on its own,” and “the contemplative practice of seeing clearly…leads effortlessly to more justice and more peace.”

That is, indeed, the final test of any religious system. In this case, I am more drawn to traditions within Judaism that speak to the power of the evil impulse; I read claims like those above with a jaundiced eye. But I would be more than happy to be proved wrong. I do believe Michaelson’s testimony that meditation and other practices of nondualist Judaism have led him to live, as he puts it “gently and justly.” This is a moving and powerful personal testimony, as well as an excellent introduction to an important dimension of contemporary Jewish thought.

Hanukkah at MacDonald’s

Nancy Fuchs-Kreimer — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 00:50:06 +0000

“Celebrating Hanukkah in a McDonald’s with Muslim and Christian high school students in North Philadelphia must be a first”, says Reconstructionist Rabbinical College student Ari Hendin, who is also an intern with the Interfaith Center of Greater Philadelphia. Hendin had been asked to lead a brief teaching on the meaning of Hanukkah on Sunday, December 13th, and to light the menorah with the North Philadelphia cohort of the Center’s Walking the Walk program, an interfaith youth service learning program designed to break down barriers between youth from different faith traditions by building relationships and understanding.

The North Philly cohort, which includes students from Al Aqsa Islamic Society School of Philadelphia and St. Michael’s Lutheran Church of Germantown, lacks Jewish students, unlike most of the other Walking the Walk cohorts in the greater Philadelphia area. The students had planned to prepare meals for the needy at Project Share as their community service activity, but when that did not work out they met at a nearby McDonalds instead.

“When I asked for volunteers to help light the menorah, the students were eager to participate. They were genuinely curious and asked respectful, serious questions about Hanukkah in particular, and Jews and Judaism in general,” Hendin said.

“Few of them have an opportunity to interact with Jews, and they were glad to have the chance to do so in a most unlikely place! This is what Walking the Walk and interfaith youth programs are about,” she continued, “shattering stereotypes through meeting real people from other faiths, and seeing the light of divinity in each human being, just as it is reflected in the lights of the candles of the menorah.”

Minarets in Switzerland

Nancy Fuchs-Kreimer — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 23:34:25 +0000

While following the conversation regarding minarets in Switzerland, I found particularly helpful two opinion pieces by young Muslim Leaders who have been involved with RRC.

Asma Uddin, one of the participants in our retreat for Muslim and Jewish Emerging Leaders this summer, is now an attorney at the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty. She published a piece on the Swiss minaret ban stating: “This sign in particular — a ban on minarets in a county possessing a mere four of them — eloquently testifies to a society ill-equipped to deal with Islam, by virtue of being ill-equipped to deal with faith.” For the entire article, click here.

Another of our retreat participants, Mona Eltahawy, was on NPR discussing the issue. You can listen to the interview here.

Abrahamic Interfaith Dialogue that “Gets to the Point”

melissaheller — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 14:06:37 +0000

An article in the New York Times today introduces the reader to three clergy- and to three friends- who are working to “increase interfaith understanding” not just through seeking out commonalities, but through respecting difference- even as they broach difficult issues, such as Israel.

18th Century German Drama Performed for a 21st Century Audience

Nancy Fuchs-Kreimer — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 21:31:38 +0000

My friend Renate recalls having to study “Nathan der Weise,” in her high school in Germany. Gotthold Lessing’s drama, set in 12th century Jerusalem, was considered part of the canon, what every well educated German in the late 20th century would know of their literary tradition.

When she heard that the People’s Light and Theater Company in suburban Philadelphia was mounting a production of the now infrequently performed play, “Nathan the Wise,” she was curious what Americans in the 21st century would make of it.

As was I. So off we went, along with about 15 other friends—a multifaith crowd–to see this unusual production that asked the question: what does it mean to live in a multifaith world?

Or, to put it another way, what was the Enlightenment idea of what it should mean to live in a world with three faiths: Judaism, Christianity and Islam.(They did not know about the others yet.)

The crux of the play is Lessing’s reworking of a much older set of legends regarding a father who has three sons whom he loves, but only one precious ring to pass down.

The good Muslim ruler Saladin asks his friend the Jew Nathan to answer a question: which religion is the true one? In response, Nathan tells him the story of a father who, has three sons and one precious ring that he has (oops!) promised to all three. The father’s solution is to have identical copies made and, upon his deathbed, to give a ring to each son.

After the father’s death, the brothers quarreled over who has the original and thus can lord it over the others. A wise judge points out that the father deliberately made the rings indistinguishable.

Let each believe
His own to be the true and genuine ring.
Perhaps you father wished to terminate
The tyranny of that special ring
‘Mid his posterity. Of this be sure,
He loved you all, and loved you all alike,
Since he was loath to injure two of you
That he might favor one alone; well, then,
Let each now rival his unbiased love,
His love so free from every prejudice;
Vie with each other in the generous strife
To prove the virtues of the rings you wear.

This was a fascinating play to see performed today, a period piece of the 18th century, complete with Orientalism that would have Edward Said spinning in his grave and a rather quaint and, I think, no longer so relevant understanding of “tolerance.” How sobering to realize that this view, simplistic and obvious as it might seem, was radical in Lessing’s day. The play was never performed in his lifetime. It would also be interesting to consider how a post modernist would rework that parable today.

So Many Stories, So Many Versions….

Nancy Fuchs-Kreimer — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 22:01:36 +0000

During the week this summer in which both Elul and Ramadan began, as the moon grew thinner and the temperature in the Hudson Valley grew warmer, 18 invited emerging leaders — Jewish and Muslim — gathered at the Garrison Institute in Garrison, New York, convened by the Multifaith Studies Department of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College through the generosity of the Henry Luce Foundation.

Four scholars(Professors Or Rose, Mahmoud Ayoub, Sherman Jackson and Raquel Ukeles) provided the core of the program: the study of the narrative of Joseph/Yusuf in Torah, Qur ‘an and the Jewish and Muslim exegetical traditions. Some formal and much informal conversation ensued, not only about the many versions of the life of Joseph and his family, but also about the participants’ own lives and their families’ stories and, toward the end of our time together, about the different narratives we each hold of our faith families’ interactions with each other, especially in the recent past.

We studied our respective versions of Joseph, learning about the “narrative migrations between Judaism and Islam,” as Marc Bernstein called them in his book chronicling how the two communities have shared this prophet/leader over the centuries. As we filled our heads with new texts and information, we found ourselves juggling what we learned, trying to balance a celebration of our commonalities with celebration of our differences.

Inspired by the candor of our faculty, we acknowledged the interplay of light and shadow in each of our traditions, especially in the way they understand of the “other.” We talked about how we talk about the “tough questions,” sharing what we had seen work well. We prayed at our respective prayer times in separate spaces, but we blessed our meals together. We even spent some time grappling with the intra-faith dynamics that emerged amongst the diverse spectrum of Jews and of Muslims.

At our best, we modeled for each other respect, humility, and optimism. Through shared work, we built new friendships and the glimmerings of a new community. By the last night, we were able to create our own entertainment, a coffeehouse in which some participants were brave enough to read their own poetry aloud and others risked performing in improvised skits in which, inevitably, Potiphar’s wife/Zuleikah would make an appearance.

We arrived curious and went away confused, a state of mind our participant Mona Eltahawy commended to us. We had some of our assumptions challenged and we learned that there were many questions we did not even know how to ask.

We also came away motivated, committed to listening for the many stories –and many versions –out there. Stay tuned to hear about next steps.

LEARNING ABOUT “BLOGISTAN”

Nancy Fuchs-Kreimer — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 20:49:20 +0000

This past weekend I had the privilege of attending the 46th Annual Convention of the Islamic Society of North America in Washington, D.C.’s Convention Center. This is a huge community gathering, part conference/part celebration that attracts tens of thousands of Muslim Americans from illustrious scholars of Islam to national and local communal leaders, from singles interested in matrimonial meeting to families with young children in tow.

The mood in the hallways was friendlier and less chaotic than I am used to at a convention. Only after I got home did I read in the program bulletin a page of “Guidelines for Participants” that included “Go out of your way to greet others with Assalamu Alaykum” and “Be kind, polite and patient with hotel and convention staff.” Hmm…

There were many wonderful learning opportunities. I found particularly valuable a session entitled Blogistan: Muslim Americans on the Web. The four speakers and the moderator were all bloggers with a following that includes non-Muslims. (There is another, much larger, network of Muslim blogs written for Muslims themselves.) They explained how their presence on the web serves both to create virtual community for far flung Muslims and also to impact the way stories about Islam are understood by others, including how the stories are handled by the main stream media.

These relatively young, highly educated and exceptionally smart individuals are making a difference far beyond what was possible before the internet. What struck me was the gentleness and humility with which they presented their work, stressing their efforts to support one another and to empower new bloggers. I was impressed by the lack of ego and competitiveness on display; the relationships felt genuine. These are men and women on a mission. Evidently, they trust that there is enough work to go around.

If you are new to this world, a good place to begin is with the writings of Hussein Rashid who not only spoke on this panel but also will be teaching for RRC during the spring, 2010 semester. He has his own blog called Islamicate , contributes to Altmuslimah and also is a regular contributor and editor at a blog created at Emory University called Religion Dispatches.

I was particularly charmed by Wajahat Ali who says he blogs on a “lap top that is on life support” at Goatmilk: An Intellectual Playground. He encouraged the young people in the audience, saying “If I can do this, you can too.” Wajahat, in addition to his day job as an attorney and his blogging, has written a play about a Pakistani-American family that will be opening in New York City on September 11, 2001. The combination of humor and depth that Wajahat brought to his presentation led me to believe we will be hearing more about him soon.