Rochester Students Shine at the Parliament

Today was another full and rich day of interfaithing!  I got over to the Convention Center at little before 10, having opted to sleep in and take the morning a little easier after yesterday’s marathon.  I met with Imam Bashar Arafat and his Egyptian students and enjoyed talking with them about interfaith work.  I then attended a very well done seminar by the KAIICID organization on interreligious dialogue and the processes for bringing people along the dialogue journey, particularly in a pluralistic cultural context where there is a dominant religious group in the culture.  KAIICID is an interesting NGO, started by the King of Saudi Arabia and joined by Austria, Spain and the Vatican as partners in this educational endeavor.  They do a lot of interfaith education all over the world, particularly with Muslim majority nations, training religious leaders in the techniques of interreligious dialogue and teaching conflict transformation skills.  The discussion was very lively and the folks attending the workshop were very diverse so it made for interesting conversation.

As I was arriving at the Convention Center I got a phone call from one of the vendors in the Exhibit Hall where I had stopped on Thursday to get some information on educational programs that they offer.  By having left my contact info with them I was automatically entered into a drawing for a mini iPad and lo and behold, I won the iPad!  So I stopped by their booth after the workshop to pick up my new toy!  I then stopped by to see how the Tibetan Buddhist monks were coming on the Mandala and was amazed at how much they had done since yesterday.  I then went out to the local grocery store for supplies and rushed back to get to an early afternoon session on Interreligious Studies, Religious Studies and Interfaith on college and university campuses.

After that I wandered into the cultural hall where there were lots of musical groups performing in 20 minute sets.  I particularly enjoyed Chinese Buddhist drummers (the place was really rocking while they were playing!) and the Sikh kirtan singing.  The Sikh community is here in full force, because of their volunteering to do the langar every day. Their booth in the exhibit hall was doing a booming business in giving out free turbans.  You could go up to the booth and they would show you how to tie a turban Sikh style.  They said they had over 500 turbans and they couldn’t give them out fast enough!  So there were lots of “Sikhs for a Day” walking around the Parliament today!

My students were on for their workshop at 5:15.   We all got there early so we could set up the chairs in circles for the case study conversations.  That workshop went unbelievably well.  The students who attended were completely engaged in the conversations and the wrap up session at the end was really gratifying for our students as those who attended said things like “ This is what I’ve been waiting for through this whole Parliament”, “this was so exciting, thank you for doing this”,  “I am so glad to have had a chance to see how interfaith affects all aspects of my life and future career and that I can be an ‘interfaither’ even in another professional life”,  “I hope you come back to the next Parliament and do more of this”  and on and on.  It was wonderful to see how thrilled our students were with that feedback. They had worked hard on their presentations and case studies and they did a great job of facilitating the conversations.  The URI Young Leaders Program director was very impressed with how our students handled the workshop too.  I think he wasn’t sure what to expect and he seemed impressed that they really knew what they were doing.   It was also fun to see how our students and the students at Nazareth really bonded and formed friendships and they were all planning collaborative projects we can do when we get back to our respective campuses.  All told, it was a great experience for them!

We went to dinner (all 17 of us!) at the Blue Iguana and I finally crawled back into my room at 9:30, quite tired.  Still recovering from my illness last week and I do not have my usual stamina!

Pics today are of the students presenting and a shot at the end with some of the students who attended the workshop, the Sikh singers and the mandala as it was by mid-day today.

Angels and Interfaith

Today was another marathon day.  I was tired so skipped the 7 AM spiritual session in favor of an extra hour of sleep, but was over at the Convention center by 8:15 for the first session in Democracy and Pluralism.  I was running a bit late as I entered the Convention Center but was delighted to walk into a procession of angels floating about the concourse!  I had to stop for photos, because it’s not every day you run into a flock (?) of angels!   They showed up again this evening before the evening plenary, processing through the plenary hall, wings aglow, delighting everyone!  My students and I went up to talk to them.  Turns out they are a group from Australia and one can train to become an angel, apparently, and they are starting to train angels in this country and some European countries! 

The sessions I attended today were excellent.  The one on democracy and pluralism was run by the United Religions Initiative and their methodology is not to do lecture style sessions, but rather to have dialogue circles where people talk to one another and actually dialogue on the topic.   So that session was all about how we manage differences of religious belief in the political arena in our “secular” separation of church and state country.  We had an interesting mix of folks in our group, Jewish, Muslim, Unitarian, secular humanist, and various Christians.

The second session was also led by URI, this time dialoguing about what we are doing in our various venues in terms of interfaith collaborations and partnerships.  Again, I had an interesting group with folks from South America, India, Texas, Alaska, California, Minnesota and Chicago, so we had lots of different perspectives and folks doing different kinds of interfaith work sharing stories.

Then it was time for my students to be part of a presentation on Women at the First Parliament and Women as Spiritual Mentors.  That session went extremely well, and the two students who presented did really polished and compelling presentations.  I was very proud of them.  Then the rest of them worked with the attendees facilitating interactive dialogue.  It was a great session! 

By the time that session was over, it was 1:30 and I had to go do battle with the Parliament powers that be to get a new room assignment for the session my students are leading tomorrow.  The room we had on Friday was sorely inadequate for our needs and we were scheduled in the same spot for tomorrow.  It took a lot of pushing (all the way to the President of the Parliament who finally agreed to let his staff change our room!) but we finally got a venue change, which also changed the time of our presentation from 10 AM to 5:15.  I’m not thrilled with that dinner hour time slot, but the venue is much improved, so we’re going to make the best of it!  I spent nearly an hour working that out and then went to Langar for my delicious Indian lunch.  Ran into Episcopal church colleagues while there.  This interfaith world is certainly a small one!  I also ran into the Imam with whom I travelled to Morocco last year, and he and I are trying to get our students together.  He has 10 Eygptian Muslim students here and he wants them to meet me and my students so they can dialogue with peers who are doing interfaith in this country.   We had hoped to rendez-vous today, but timing wasn’t good.

I went to a fantastic session about efforts on the ground in Israel and Palestine, called the Abrahamic Reunion, which is a large grass roots peace organization in Israel and Palestine including Jewish settlers, orthodox Jewish rabbis and their congregations, Druze clergy and congregations, Muslim imams and their people and Christian clergy who are working together to combat the violence that is so much a part of life in Israel and Palestine and working together to create space for peace.  It was really moving to hear their stories of how they come together when acts of violence break out and stand with each other and reach across the divide to respond with compassion and friendship rather than revenge.  The personal stories these folks shared were spell binding.  It was really wonderful to hear a narrative that the news media simply never reports out, about ways in which Israelis and Palestinians of all faiths are working together to bring about peace in the Holy Land.  It reminded me of my experience when I travelled there in 2008 and 2010 when it became clear to me that if the political leaders would get out of the way and let people at the grass roots level make peace, it would be possible.    That session was absolutely packed – not a seat in the room and people standing out in the hall to try to hear the speakers.

After that session it was time for the URI reception.  My students and I went to it so that we could mingle with and meet the leadership folks at URI, some of whom we’ve met in the course of the Parliament, particularly the Young Leaders Program director who has been working with us to prepare our sessions.  There was free food and beverages and we had a chance to do some dialogue work URI style.  Then after that was the evening plenary on the topic of Ending Religiously Motivated Violence and Hate Speech. That plenary was absolutely riveting in the beginning, although, as has been the case with all of them, it went on far too long.   But a number of the speakers were dynamite including Alan Boesek, Karen Armstrong, Tariq Ramadan and Jane Goodall.  We started the session with a song for peace, led by a musical group and joined in by a program for children that featured a large group of very young kids up on the stage singing the peace song along with the musicians.  They brought the house down!  We finally left the convention center at 9:50 and the plenary was still going on!  The organizers of this Parliament really need to learn something about people’s tolerance for sitting and listening to speeches!!

PIcs today include shots of my students doing their presentations and the angels!!

Meditation, Presentations, Service and Emerging Leaders

Today was an incredibly full day.  I got up and 6 and was over to the convention center by 7:00 for morning devotional practices.  I wound up going to a Hindu meditation session led by a woman named Prabha Duneja, a Vedic scholar and devotee of Lord Krishna and founder of the Geeta Society.   She led us through a chakra meditation for healing.  She introduced the concept and background of chakra meditation and then took us through a 35 minute session.  It was completely awesome!  I walked out of there so very centered and relaxed and refreshed that I was ready for anything.  That turned out to be a good thing!

Our first of two sessions being presented by our collection of colleges was this morning at 8:30.  Students from Nazareth College and their professors were doing the first half of the session and then our colleagues at the United Religions Initiative Young Leaders program led us through the second half of the session which was very experiential and dialogical.  We were dismayed, however, when we got to our assigned space, which is not in the convention center but in a contemporary are museum next door.  They put us in a very small studio that comfortably seats about 15-20 people max.  We had 65 people attending and about 10-15 more who tried to come but did not stay because there was nowhere for them to stand or sit in the room!  We were pretty furious with the Parliament about this room assignment and I am in the throes of some strenuous conversations with them about getting a change of venue for Sunday’s session.  The session went extremely well, notwithstanding the logistical nightmare! The Nazareth students did very well and the dialogue that URI leaders led us through for the second half of the session was very rich.  It was intentionally intergenerational, so they made sure that all of our small groups had young people and at least one of us who are dubbed “young at heart!”  We had conversation about what qualities we admire in young people who are leaders in interfaith and about how the younger and older generation of interfaith leaders can best complement one another and work together on our common mission.  I was very impressed with the young people in my group who had terrific insights and intelligent observations about the enterprise of interfaith and dialogue among people of different cultures and religions and how the older and younger generations differ in their approach to interfaith issues.  We left the session really energized by the interactions, even if we were furious with the Parliament program folks for the room assignment!

Today my students were able to work with the Sikh community as volunteers at the Langar. I had hoped to join them, but you had to commit to the full 3 ½ hours of the Langar and I had some obligations during that time such that I could not commit to the full time frame.  So I had lunch there, but could not volunteer. I did get pics of my students and Jessica as they did their work with the Sikh community and I know the students found the experience really meaningful. Just before the langar begins the Sikh community gathers outside the langar space for a brief ritual of chanting and praying for the success of the langar and as a way to bless the food and all those who eat and those who serve.  It was impressive to see all the Sikhs in their white robes gathered together singing and praying as they readied themselves for their service to the Parliament.

I stopped by the Tibetan mandala and took a picture of it as they were getting about midway through their first 24 hours on it.

I attended two sessions after that, one on women’s interpretations of sacred scripture in Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist and Christian traditions and then a session led by officials of the Parliament and leaders of URI about the future of interfaith.  Then I had to join Dr. Shafiq and Susan Nowak from Nazareth as we were on a panel talking about the Common Word document.  Our session was very well attended, and, to my surprise, the Q&A session was lively and animated.  In fact, we didn’t get to all the questions in the audience before our time ran out.  And after the session I had a number of folks coming up to ask more questions of us.  So we were quite pleased about the reception to our material.

After I left the ballroom where we had presented, I was heading back to the hotel so I could get something quick to eat, but got delayed by a group of folks in the lobby of the convention center who were singing and doing circle dances.  The songs were really chants of various Sanskrit prayers, put to modern, western chant tunes.  Drums, violin and guitar were the accompaniment and there were about 50 folks singing and dancing.  I could not resist joining the dancing circle, so I enjoyed that for about 15 minutes before leaving to get dinner.  On my way to the grocery store, I passed a sidewalk café where my Nazareth colleagues were eating so I joined them for dinner.  After dinner, we returned to the Parliament for the very rousing and inspirational Emerging Leaders plenary.  The plenary featured a number of young leaders, high school and college aged young people who are doing amazing work in the world.  A young 14 year old girl, Native American, stole the show.  She was incredibly articulate as she talked about why she works for social justice and environmental sustainability and she came back at the end of the night and sang a song about changing the world that was a real show stopper!  We all agreed she should run for President!  We were also treated to a performance by whirling dervishes, but these dervishes were children, not adults!  It was a wonderful performance.  There was also a performance by a group of young Chinese students on drums that was dazzling.  We also heard from the sister of the young Muslim dental student and his wife who were killed in Chapel Hill, North Carolina last February and from children of several of the Sikhs who were killed in Wisconsin in the Gurdwara shooting in 2012.   They are all doing work to end religiously motivated violence and forge peaceful relationships among people of diverse religions.  Their stories were heart rending and inspiring. 

The evening plenary didn’t end until 9:45 at which point I was about to keel over!  On our way out of the plenary hall, a young Sikh woman in spiky high heeled shoes, challenged my students to come with her to a late night food market to buy food and give it to the many homeless people who are living on the streets right here in downtown Salt Lake City.  So as I was returning to the hotel, my students were off for their second community service project of the day, this time a rather impromptu event!  So all in all, it was a very full day.   Truly, this gathering is a unique experience and a foretaste of heaven!

Pics today include my meditation guru, shots of my students doing their langar service, me at my presentation, and young Ta-Kaiya Blaney doing her final song at the plenary.

Women's Assembly, Langar, Tibetan Monks, Opening Plenary

Today the Parliament opened.  On the way into the Parliament, at the south end of the Convention Center where you must enter to register, there are two teepees set up just outside the center and the Native American tribes from Utah had a fire going and were offering blessings to people coming into the Parliament.  They had sticks of sage and other herbs, which they would light in the fire and then wave all over those who came for the blessings.  It smelled wonderful!

Today the Parliament proceedings began with the first inaugural Women’s Assembly, a full day of plenary sessions and breakout sessions featuring women religious leaders from every imaginable tradition and workshops led by women on topics ranging from the Divine Feminine, to Women Re-Imagining their Traditions, to Feminist Mormons speak out.  The Opening Plenary included a Maori Tribal Grandmother from New Zealand, scholar Diana Butler Bass,  women swamis from India, Native American women elders, and other women activists and religious leaders speaking and chanting and praying from their various traditions.  The prayers went on for nearly 45 minutes instead of the 15 planned for, but they were fascinating and in several cases included drumming, chanting and singing by all in the assembly, which was nearly 3000 people!  

After the opening plenary we made our way to the Langar, where the Sikh community hosted the entire Parliament for lunch.  One of the huge halls is dedicated to the Langar for the duration of the Parliament and the Sikhs are feeding everyone every day that we are here.  We filed into the Langar hall and put our shoes in the shoe racks.  Those who did not have head coverings were given white scarves to wear in the Langar hall and we were ushered to our spots on the floor, in rows.  The Sikh community fed us and the food was delicious.  Naan, rice, dal, and paneer in tomato gravy, and a yogurt with chick pea crisps.  They had chai tea and coffee on the way out.   The Langar hall was set up exactly as community kitchens are in Gurdwaras in India.    Part of Sikh spirituality is feeding everyone a common meal, where all eat together on the floor, and those who are served then later serve others.  Sikhs feed people as part of their religious practice and they know how to do hospitality better than any other group I know. 

After a very filling, free lunch at the Langar, we wandered through the Exhibit halls and the Cultural Hall, where there are booths from all kinds of interfaith and faith based organizations from all over the world.  I spent quite a lot of time walking around there, knowing this would be my only chance, given how much is going on the rest of the time we’re here.   I met Dr. Shafiq in the middle of the afternoon and we spent some time preparing the session we are doing tomorrow afternoon. 

The Tibetan monks from the Dalai Lama’s monastery in India are here, and they were preparing for the opening ceremony for their Sand Mandala project.  While they are here they will create a sand mandala, and then on the last day, they will do the ceremony where the mandala is destroyed.    At 5:15 the monks began the ceremony, which took about 20 minutes.  They chanted prayers in Sanskrit, and played instruments, all to prepare the space where they will be creating the mandala, in essence consecrating it for that purpose.  These are the monks who are able to chant in such a way that they create two tones at one time as they utter the chant.  It is a very distinctive sound and comes from years and years of chanting and deep meditative practice.  As soon as the monks were done consecrating the mandala space, the Jain community did an evening prayer service in the temple they have erected in the convention center right next to the Tibetan monks mandala space.  It was wonderful to have both of those ceremonies happening right next to each other, one after the other.

The evening concluded with the Opening Parliament Plenary, which began with a long procession of religious leaders of all religions, led in by a procession of flags from all the 80 countries that are represented at the Parliament.  The Native American tribes from Utah accompanied the procession with drumming and chanting.   It was very lively.  The opening plenary went on for 2 ½ hours, which was a bit much for most of us!  And, many of us were shocked to see a podium populated entirely by men, and this at a Parliament that is focusing on women as one of its issues of concern and that just earlier in the day held a Women’s Inaugural Assembly!  It seemed like they felt they had covered participation by women by segregating the women off in their own assembly and then didn’t need to include them in the line up for the plenary.  A few of the speakers sheepishly noted the absence of women on the platform and I am sure the Parliament planners are going to here about it from a lot of folks!  Notwithstanding that critique, some of the opening speakers were really inspiring.  Rabbi David Saperstein was truly energizing and exciting, and then a bit later, Rabbi Lynn Gottlieb, who led a prayer and spoke extemporaneously, brought the gathered crowd to their feet as well.  The Jewish speakers really stole the show this evening.   And we were all pleasantly surprised when the final prayer was offered by a Sikh woman.  So the Parliament is off to a rousing start, and it is very energizing to be around so many spiritual and religious people from all over the world, from all different world religious traditions, talking and dialoguing on issues of concern to everyone:  climate change, poverty, youth, women. 

Pics today include the teepee on the south side of the center, scenes from the langar, the Tibetan monks at the mandala ceremony and a shot of our U of R students with me and Jessica in our special U of R Parliament shirts after the opening plenary, with “Rocky” the school mascot!  It is now 11 PM and I have to be up before dawn to get to a Zoroastrian worship service at 7 AM tomorrow!  No rest for the weary at this gathering!

Arrived Salt Lake City!

I'm in Salt Lake City and ready to begin the amazing experience of the Parliament of the World's Religions, 2015.  I am here with Dr. Jessica Guzman-Rea, the Director of the Intercultural Center at U of R and we have brought 8 students with us who are taking the course we are teaching on the Parliament.  Our students will have the opportunity to present at two workshops during the Parliament while also attending many others and having the unparalleled opportunity to observe worship in a vast array of religious traditions.  There will be music, dance, chanting, drumming, singing, and art from 50 religious traditions in 80 countries.  This is the olympics of interfaith!  The students have been preparing for this experience all semester and they are ready to go!