Tag: Formation
On Irreconcilable Differences: My Interreligious Dialogue with Mormon Missionaries
Since I’m conducting field research on interfaith dialogue in Rome, I thought it would be an important part of my participant-observation to embark upon a dialogue. I met some Mormon sisters conduct... Read More
Pluralismo Vivo: The Interfaith Roads of Rome
It’s not easy to find clear examples of “interreligious violence” in Rome. The closest thing Rome suffers to religious violence are distant shrieks from ISIS across the Mediterranean Sea... Read More
What Can Interfaith Dialogue Really Do? Part 3 of 3
Read Part I here, and Part II here. When I ate lunch with the rabbi he inveighed against interfaith dialogue and its inability to reach or transform the minds of those who are closed to dialogue. He s... Read More
What Can Interfaith Dialogue Really Do? Part 2 of 3
Read Part I here. At lunch after Purim, I heard the rabbi criticize interfaith projects for being “just another religious group.” I reflected on the irony of a religious clergy person dismissing t... Read More
What Can Interfaith Dialogue Really Do? Part 1 of 3
After the most recent Purim morning service at my synagogue, I ate lunch with the rabbi. He told me he thinks interreligious dialogue is an in-group hobby, that interfaith groups become cliques. He fe... Read More
How Do We Tolerate the Intolerant?
What do tolerant people do with the intolerant? We tolerate them. We ignore them. We insult them. We try to change them: By explaining. By demonstrating. By oppressin... Read More
An Audience with Pope Francis—Dispatch from Rome
We were on our way to meet Pope Francis. We—the participants in the 50th anniversary meeting of the Pontifical Institute of Arabic and Islamic Studies—departed together from the Urbaniana campus a... Read More
“There is no such thing as Palestine!”–Dispatch from Palestine
“You can’t teach me anything about Europeans,” once commented the deputy mayor of Jerusalem. Europeans had killed his father. “You can’t teach me anything about Palestinians.” Palestinians... Read More