Click through the slideshow to look at photos from the Faith House Manhattan Tour Bus:
We are coming to a realization that religious zealots cannot be fought with indifference. Extremists of all nationalities and religious persuasion feeding on prejudice, legislating exclusion, and resorting to violence cannot be prevailed upon by people with less passion. Telling them to "cool down" and to "be moderate" will not do it. We must allow fires greater than theirs to arise. Our passion for a whole and interdependent word must rise above their passion for a segregated and zero-sum world.
In Faith House Manhattan, a non-profit inter-religious "community of communities," we believe that the time of isolated faith is over. We believe that to know who I am, I must also know who you are. For three years now we have hosted more than 60 Living Room gatherings where people can experiences the practices of another religion (or path, including atheism). We invite all to join our "co-laboratory" of interdependence: "Experience your neighbor's faith, deepen your own."
Our call is to get radical. Very radical. We hold that in today's world, religious people have to remap their reality to include -- in tension and in gratitude -- 'the other.' While our ancestors may have fought for independence, ours is the great struggle for interdependence. 'The other' is not over there, but all around us. While we have been conceiving of the world in vertical terms (whose party is better, whose institution is larger, whose nation is stronger, whose god is bigger), the world is becoming increasingly horizontal, and wonderfully so. Can we learn to be a part of the whole?
This past year, Faith House started a new program with four religious communities in Manhattan, who were part of a "Tour Bus" with reciprocal visits to each of our main religious gatherings. We brought people together to trespass imaginary boundaries while preserving the real ones. From an experience of worship at a Hindu temple, to a Jewish Shabbat service, to a Sufi Zikr, to midweek "Space for Grace" at a major Protestant church -- either as "Interfaith 101″ or an opportunity for seasoned pilgrims to be hosts or guests in their own setting -- this seven-week adventure was a unique New York City experience.
One of the participants, Bhakti Center monk and teacher, Chris Fici, summarized the experience this way:
Experience Your Neighbor's Faith, Deepen Your Own. This is a personal revelation a lot of us have shared recently on the Faith House Bus Tour, as the different sounds, colors, tastes and waves of devotion we have experienced together in our different houses of faith have made a deep communal resonance in our souls.
Too often (at least from my own perspective) our own practice can become caught in the mechanical. Living as a monk, in an intense and insulated environment, I often see how my consciousness during our morning meditation is directed towards how tired I am, or how I might be upset with this monk or that monk. The beautiful essence of our prayers and singing and dancing together remains lost to me.
As I was soaking up the whirling sanctity at our wonderful Bus Tour event at the Dergah of the Nur Ashki Jerrahi Sufi Order, the pain of my own disconnection in my own practice became manifest, and that void was quickly filled by the wonderful and mystical people I saw around me, deeply absorbed in the love and vision of the Divine. I came to realize that what they were experiencing was something I had access to every day, if I chose to. I saw very clearly how we were all pearls on the same thread of God's mercy. I returned to my own community and practice with a sense of renewal that has stayed with me ever since.
The interfaith experience is very important for me, and I think for all of us as a common human family. The turbulence of our age calls for a communication between peoples of faith that transcends our superficial differences and allows us to drink from the immense well of wisdom God has given us, to give solace and take profound action to help cure our shared ills.
This turbulence also calls from us a tremendous maturity from our humility, from a recognition that we cannot possibly have the exclusive answers, that the pieces of the puzzle we need come from our brothers and sisters in faith. In Thomas Merton's journals of his final and fateful journey to India and Indonesia, where he breathed deeply of the eastern faiths that had always intrigued and inspired him, he related a realization in this regard that has deeply touched me.
He says that those who are mature in their faith are able to enter into the experience, philosophy, and practice of another faith and gain a practical wisdom which they can take back into their own renewed and strengthened spiritual life. This is the essence of my own personal adventure in interfaith. To be able to see of and hear of and speak about and taste of and move within the common thread of our faiths together is one of the most profound experiences I have ever had in my life. It links me to the maturity needed to answer the spiritual call of our time, and I imagine it may do so for you as well.
I am always eager to point out to others that New York City is a deeply spiritual place. I want to encourage others to develop the vision of the great rivers of faith which run through this town, which are not always visible beyond the surface tumult and loosely organized chaos.
Read articles and reflections about each stop on the Faith House tour here.
Follow Samir Selmanovic on Twitter: www.twitter.com/SamirSelmanovic
Joe Winkler: A Jewish Guide to the New Testament: A Review of the 'Jewish Annotated New Testament'
Faith House Manhattan » Faith House Tour Bus 2011: 6 Stops in 7 ...
The Bhakti Center Welcomes Faith House as Tour Bus Begins
Faith House Manhattan » LIVING ROOM Tour Bus Wrap-Up & Party
Faith House Manhattan » Tour Bus Stop – Sufi Prayer, Sohbet, Zikr ...
(SMH in despair)
You'll end up hallucinating and confused.
As a person of christian faith, I tried to read other scripture other than the Bible, and I just got lost and fearful. But thank God that he brought me back.
* Christians, do not do this, just love the person and have nothing to do with their religions.
King Solomon warned you about this type of behavior, through experiences with his beloved pagan wives.
.....Even in the world when it comes to atheists, agnostics, etc. they only agree to disagree with believers. Once they come in contact with Jehovah's Witnesses they try to close ranks but even then....no unity. My question is...why the special attention paid to the Witnesses? Are we that threatening to their belief system? Must be. If they are sooo intellengent (which I fully believe many are) why not let go of the ridicule and "study" with a open mind the Bible with a Jehovah's Witnesses? Put their brain to good use and see for themselves.
...... Whether they believe it or not, JW only want to help. Help those who have legitimate questions recieve legitimate answers. Not intangables. Not hypotheticals.
.......When we defend our God it is done to fulfill this scriptual admonition...
1 PETER 3:15..." But sanctify the Christ as Lord in YOUR hearts, always ready to make a defense before everyone that demands of YOU a reason for the hope in YOU, but doing so together with a mild temper and deep respect."
~ I think you'd be hard pressed to find an atheist that DOESN'T accept others believing in anything they want. It's when supserstitious beliefs start to interfere with, and get preferential treatment from, the government that an atheist might protest.
Thanks for expressing your desires. I would be all for avoiding the degrading chatter.
We'll share a traditional dish of magic beans :)
F&F
If your faith is weakened by understanding the religion of another person, your faith was non-existent to begin with. Open your mind and heart to the view of others. You don't need to join their religion or change churches to listen, learn, and understand. It's one of the best ways to avoid bloodshed and overcome hatred, bigotry, and racism.
Isn't there enough war, hatred, and bloodshed in the world now without adding to it?
King James Version (KJV)
14Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness?
15And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel?
16And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? for ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.
17Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you.
18And will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty.
Revelation 3:20 Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me.
But he's a vengeful giant ... if you don't believe me, what do you have to say about this?!
"Fee-fi-fo-fum,
I smell the blood of an Englishman,
Be he alive, or be he dead
I'll grind his bones to make my bread." ~ JatBeanstalk pg 12 section 4
What more proof do you need? This is the day. Will you accept the everlasting magic bean? It's your only hope.
I live in fear of the terrible day when paisley bell-bottoms will come back into fashion.
And 1970s haircuts.
It's hard to tell which "church" He attends.