marry and parent. Are we minimalist brides? Helicopter parents? Frugal, organic families? Soccer moms or tailgate dads? Who are we? Two of the most important therapeutic questions we can ask ourselves are: “How am I feeling?” and “What do I need?”
How am I feeling? Am I overwhelmed? Hungry? Angry? Nervous? Entitled? Jealous? Confused? Concerned?
When I see a high school friend sharing pro-Islam ideas on Facebook, how am I feeling? Am I afraid? Impressed? Jealous? Angry? Uncomfortable? Confused?
What do I need? To be the right one? To delete and retreat? To pray or meditate? To reassure myself that there are good people in the world? To lash out? To try and convince? To unfriend? To mobilize politically? To shame her? To be reassured that I am safe?
When I see that one of my neighbors has a good university job, a newish car, frequent NBA tickets to see the local hometown team, a pretty wife, and a healthy child—and he wears some kind of head covering and has a beard, how am I feeling? Confused? Jealous? Worried? Surprised? Afraid? Nostalgic for another kind of neighborhood? Competitive?
What do I need? A better job? A happier marriage? Reassurance that my community isn’t changing? Reassurance that if my community changes, I’ll still play an important part? Health care and good schools for my own children? A sense of certainty? To be reassured that the things that are important won’t change?
When I see that my pastor is being attacked on Facebook by anti-Islam commenters, how am I feeling? Angry? Surprised? Embarrassed? Self-righteous? Certain? Smug? Afraid?
What do I need? To prove publicly that I am an ally? To console her? To teach her friends that they are wrong? To feel safe online? To know that diversity (even beliefs I don’t agree with) is still a good thing?
When I see that my coworker has been threatened by a so-called neighborhood watch group, how am I feeling? Outraged? Surprised? Confused? Disbelieving? Disappointed?
What do I need? To let him know not all white people or Christians believe like that? To mobilize politically? To apologize? To buy a gun? To be reassured that our community really is affirming?
For many of us, when we’re consuming digital media, we’re moving, acting, and reacting incredibly rapidly. Indeed, many digital platforms and tools (Twitter, Snapchat, e-courses, Pinterest) are designed to give us as many images and nuggets of information as quickly and seductively as possible. It’s soothing to, for example, scroll through images of homes decorated for a holiday on Pinterest: the images are endless, and they wash over us. It’s empowering (in a sense) to scroll through our newsfeed on Twitter, “liking” and retweeting, sharing with outrage and a sense of purpose.
Our emotions, hungers, hopes, and fears are being activated. The yawning sense of “I want/I need/I should” is activated, but not in a way that can lead to a healthy outcome: education, study, reflection, time for pause, time for connection, conversation, sustenance.
For these reasons, when we encounter something violent or disturbing online, we are not in the practice of pausing. Our choices seem to be: defriend or block the offending person, immediately type out a response that either solidifies our own position as expert or “the right one” or undermines the other person’s point of view or credibility, or ignore, delete, or retreat.
When we feel overwhelmed at the types of conversation we’re seeing, we may find that sharing humorous or inspiring quotes or videos is helpful, or we may vigorously “like” and re-share images and statements that take down the points of view of those with whom we disagree. All of this happens very rapidly: click, share, like, retweet, delete, block. In early 2017, in Los Angeles, March mid-term elections were held. Measures on the ballot included issues on raising or lowering taxes and addressing homelessness, roads, bicycle lanes, and health care. As local politicians and organizers pointed out, these issues arguably affect Angelenos’ lives to a greater degree than which president won national election. And yet, in Los Angeles County, only 11 percent of registered voters turned out to vote.
Why don’t we vote? Why isn’t the dialogue, debate, and wide array of stormy, inspiring, infuriating, seductive, and creative content with which we so constantly engage online indicative of actual political action? One answer: we don’t take time to pause, process, or reflect. Time for reflection has the capacity to transform us, body and mind, but we rarely access this resource. When “time is money” and we glorify “being busy” and multitasking, we suffer—but reflective practice is always available, and can be used immediately by anyone, anywhere. It’s our most immediate and underused ingredient for fostering interfaith grit.
Because encounter with difference can be discomfiting and transformative, it is likely that connecting reflective practice to grit will benefit us individually, and also benefit leaders who seek to develop and foster interfaith education and initiatives. This chapter is a starting point for considering how interfaith leaders can best facilitate spaces, methods, and encounters that lead to the kind of personal and community transformation interfaith work makes possible.
What does “interfaith” mean?
Interfaith: For me, religious education seeks to develop methods and techniques for participants to query questions of faith and spirituality, and which then leads to participants growing and becoming transformed.
Thus, it follows that inter-religious education seeks to allow for spaces where participants from different faith traditions (or religious traditions, or from ethical commitments) come together for learning, for dialogue, and for mutual enrichment. For interfaith education to work, it must allow for participants to share their perspectives and wisdom, co-creating meaning and purpose. An inter-religious educator will be a facilitator, shepherd, coach, or co-learner, but will not be teaching content . . . because the content of inter-religious education comes, by necessity, from and through those engaging in it. We are the content. Our lives are the content. Our fears, children, parents, tragedies, hopes, and similarities are the content.
It is also important to define key terms that I use throughout: “inter-religious,” “inter-religious education,” and “interfaith.” In this book, “inter-religious” refers to a conversation or space shared by multiple dialogue partners. That is, within the conversation, lesson, experience, or encounter, participants name and can be known by their religious or ethical tradition, and this religion or ethical tradition can inform their participation in the space.
Participation is key. This kind of learning cannot be passive. Imagine the difference between watching a cooking show and attempting to make ravioli from scratch the first time. Watching passively, you may appreciate both how beautiful and difficult it is to stretch, fill, and form the pasta. But when actually doing it—you are learning the texture of the dough, the nuanced difference between rolling just thin enough and the dough breaking, the scent and heat of the filling, the pleasing way the edges crimp with the fork, and the disappointment when poorly formed ones break in water. While making them, you might be experiencing memories about eating canned ravioli as a child with cousins, or fantasies you had about having parents who cooked, or new ideas about traveling to Italy with a lover. You may experience frustration with your thick, unyielding fingers, and embarrassment that you have never been able to afford good cookware, and impatience with your significant other who doesn’t want to help.
In passive learning, some parts of our brains, hearts, and bodies are activated.
In participatory learning, so many more parts of your brain, body, memory, emotions, and abilities to collaborate, problem solve, balance, and build up your capacity to make mistakes and keep trying.
In addition, when we partake of participatory learning with others, all of these capacities and strengths are magnified. It can be frightening—or
