Rami Nashashibi (Executive Director of the Inner-City Muslim Action Network) and Joshua Dubois (head of the Office of Faith Based and Neighborhood Partnerships) spoke to us today. Again, much of this will appear as stream-of-consciousness writing, with intermixing of paraphrasing and quotations. Nashashibi addressed us first, saying that our conference was aimed at rekindling the [...]
Posts Tagged ‘interfaith youth core’
From Obama’s Cairo Speech to Action
October 27th, 2009
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I attended a session with some officials from the White House. A few months ago, President Obama gave a speech in Cairo, his “address to the Muslim World”, where he affirmed America’s commitment not only to community service but interfaith dialogue and action. These officials came to the conference to explain a bit about what [...]
Bridge-Builders
October 26th, 2009
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Tonight we are honoring “bridge-builders”, people who are making the idea of inter and intra-religious cooperation a reality in the day-to-day life of American social/civic interaction and indeed the world. They are changing the conversation about religion. Here they are: Abraham’s Vision – An organization that is providing education and vision to young people on [...]
Just peacemaking
October 26th, 2009
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This might be a bit like stream-of-consciousness, but I don’t want to spend time re-editing this later. It’s a workshop on the just peacemaking paradigm. Susan Brooks-Thistlethwaite (Interfaith Youth Core board member and former seminary president) gave us a brief history of the transition of the United Church of Christ into a pacifist church. The [...]
Why faith? Part 2
October 23rd, 2009
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A previous post addressed the religious imperative against malaria from the standpoint of those of us in the US, UK, and Canada. So why is the Faiths Act campaign so explicit about the work of churches and mosques on the ground in sub-Saharan Africa? As it turns out, religious communities in the developing world are [...]
October Newsletter from Interfaith Youth Core
October 6th, 2009
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This post appeared in the “Movement in Action” section of the Interfaith Youth Core’s October email newsletter: For most ordinary jobs, training or orientation usually denotes a few hours, perhaps a day or two, devoted to learning the ins and outs of one’s new organization. The Faiths Act Fellows trained for six weeks on three [...]
Settling into San Jose
October 5th, 2009
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Hafsa and I have been settling into our office within the offices of the Islamic Networks Group for a few days. The Faiths Act Fellowship officially launched last Thursday, the first day of work for the Fellows. It’s an odd feeling to know that Hafsa and I aren’t only working by ourselves; in cities across [...]
Why faith? Part 1
September 16th, 2009
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Today I leave Chicago along with twenty-eight of the other Faiths Act Fellows (my site-partner Hafsa lives in the city). I’m not flying home since home for me is only 100-odd miles west of Chicago. Tonight I’ll meet up with some of my old professors, mentors, and friends from Aurora University to play catch-up on [...]
An evening with Tony Blair
September 11th, 2009
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Last night the Faiths Act Fellows attended a small reception with the Board of Directors and the staff of the Interfaith Youth Core here in Chicago. It was a nice opportunity for the board to meet with the staff who run their programs and the Fellows who will be out for the next eight months [...]
The last leg of the triangle
September 7th, 2009
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I’m back in Chicago after a nearly 6-month absence. Not only am I back in Chicago, I am staying for two weeks. This is both unheard of and very welcome. I like the Windy City. After two weeks in London and three weeks in Tanzania, coming “home” means a lot to me. Familiar streets, smells, [...]
