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The Daily Illini Online
published Monday, February 10, 2003
Sabrina Willmer
The Daily Illini
Attempting to build unity within the Champaign-Urbana community, people with Christian, Jewish and Muslim backgrounds participated in the community's third interfaith dialogue Thursday at Carle Foundation, 210 E. University Ave., in Urbana.
The dialogue was Parkland College's response to the events of Sept. 11, 2001, said Margot Williams, Parkland director of college and community relations and a planning committee member of the interfaith dialogue.
Williams said the event was successful, and people felt safe discussing their views.
"These settings give us a chance to get to know one another," said the Rev. Charles Nash. "It is all right if we disagree."
"We all have unique paths," said Alan Potash, director of Hillel Foundation and moderator of the dialogue. "The beauty of this is to hear each other."
But event organizers were disappointed with the event's approximately 40 attendees.
There is still a lot of work to be done, said Rizwan Uddin, a University professor. Leaders need to have better announcements and more encouragement so more people will attend, he said.
The discussion included sharing personal journeys in faith and expressing feelings about religious unity within the community.
During the dialogue, Nash, co-director of Religious Leaders for Community Care, said people first need to start unification within the community, then expand to the nation, and then to the world.
"I'm concerned about our country," Nash said. "I preach that we start at home, and we go next door and we keep moving."
The division between religious groups prevents people from addressing community issues that all people are concerned about, such as education, housing and employment, Nash said.
"Even though we are different, we are still able to communicate outside our denomination," Nash said. "My belief does not stop me from working with someone who doesn't believe what I believe."
The dialogue's purpose was to create discussion within religious groups and bring out the commonality in these groups, Uddin said.
Nash agreed the community tends to fight each other based on the few differences people have and ignore all that they share.
"We fight too much over the things we don't like," Nash said.
Building unity comes with knowledge of one another and people gain this knowledge by participating in activities that force a diverse group to interact with one another, said Chaplain Alice McLaughlin of Carle Foundation Hospital and planning committee member of the interfaith dialogue.
"The future is as open to growth as we attempt to make it," McLaughlin said.
Potash said the gathering for the dialogue was positive for the community. People should continue to build community by not only talking to each other, but interacting with each other by doing community service work, he said.
© 2003 Illini Media Company, all rights reserved.
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