Ecumenical & Interfaith
News Network - PCUSA

 

Interfaith Events

October 31-November 12: Steadfast Hope Holy Land trip

The PC(USA)'s Israel-Palestine Mission Network has announced what it describes as a "model trip to Israel/Palestine." The October 31-November 12 travel experience, "Steadfast Hope: People and Places of the Holy Land," will be led by Marthame Sanders, Don Mead, and Peter Mann. The network is looking for small groups from presbyteries who can together ahead of time, debrief together, and interpret after returning home. A brochure will be posted on the network's web site.

Stony Point Conference Center has multifaith residency program

Applications are now being accepted for residency in a multifaith, multicultural, intergenerational community, the Community of Living Traditions, a program of the Stony Point Conference Center in New York's lower Hudson River Valley. A fall residency will extend from September 19 to December 19, for which application is due by July 1. A spring residency will be from January 30 to May 1, and applications for this period are due October 15, 2010. For a one year commitment, there is rolling admission. Residents will serve as volunteers assigned to one or two areas of conference center work in exchange for room and board: web design, administrative support, gardening, kitchen duty, hospitality, or programming. Muslim applicants are requested to contact Rabia Terri Harris; Jewish applicants contact Lynn Gottlieb; Christian applicants contact Kitty Ufford-Chase.

Multifaith Doctor of Ministry Program pioneered by Auburn Seminary

PC(USA)-related Auburn Seminary in New York City has been collaborating for four years with New York Theological Seminary to offer an intensive doctor of ministry program open to working religious leaders of any faith. Candidates explore ministry in a multifaith context across faith lines through both residential and online components. For additional information contact Rabbi Justus Baird at Auburn or Dr. Keith Russell at NYTS.

"Building an Interfaith Community" available yearly at Bossey Institute

The Bossey Institute is now offering yearly a month-long program on "Building an Interfaith Community." It gathers some 25 Christians, Jews, and Muslims from around the world for spiritual and academic exercises as well as sports, recreation, everyday living together, and participation in Geneva religious activities. The question around which they will work is "How can we affirm our religious identity not in separation or against each other but in relation to one another?"  A significant report on the 2007 event brings promise for good things to come, especially because the encounter is not only of different faiths but of different lived experiences around the world. After one presentation, a Muslim Kenyan spoke about fear of being proselytized while a Christian Pakistani asked how dialogue can happen when "partners are not equal in any sense." The young adults were surprised by their common experience of finding that their religious institutions are so enmeshed with tradition that they cannot meet today's experience. See news of the 2008 event, as well.

 

Upcoming Events in Brief

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