ICOSA News Items
ICOSA Celebrates 10 years!
Group celebrating first decade of interfaithAbe Levy EXPRESS-NEWS STAFF WRITER
Publication Date : November 11, 2006
About five years before the 9-11 terrorist attacks, a Christian professor of religion and a Jewish community leader founded a group to promote religious understanding.
They drew about a dozen people from various faith backgrounds to the first meeting and named the group: the Interreligious Council of San Antonio.
It became a safe forum to talk about sensitive religious issues, emphasizing respect while learning about one another's differences.
Most members agree that such interfaith work has intensified since the 9-11 attacks and so has the need for their council. The group will mark its 10th anniversary on Monday, a time set aside to reflect on how its job as a community peacemaker continues to grow.
"It's critical that everybody understand each other if we are to get rid of prejudice," said Peggy Starkey, the council's chairwoman. "If a religion is unknown to people, they tend to be negative about it or afraid of it when there is a richness to all the religions."
Starkey is an adjunct religion professor at the University of the Incarnate Word who co-founded the group with Maxine Cohen, director of San Antonio's Holocaust Memorial.
The council, one of at least three interfaith organizations in San Antonio, draws about 15 to 20 people for monthly meetings.
The religions represented at first were branches of Judaism and Christianity but soon they expanded to Islam, Buddhism and Hinduism and other minority faiths.
They have tried to rotate meeting places to maintain neutrality, gathering at first at the Jewish Community Center, then the peaceCENTER, a Quaker facility and its current location at the Baha'i Center.
Among the council's accomplishments has been to provide advocacy to people of minority faiths, including a woman affiliating with paganism who claimed she was fired because of her religion. The council has sent letters of protest to businesses, the media and government agencies denouncing such things as the use of American Indians in advertising and as sports mascots.
Interfaith work has proven in many cases to be more difficult than before 9-11. The council generally tries to avoid politics and hot button topics, especially the emotionally charged Middle East conflict. Instead, they try to promote learning about differences with cultural exchange programs and periodic speakers.
"Occasionally, there were those left feeling (the council) wasn't as activist as they wished. We all have our agendas," said Meredith Norwood, a Baha'i member of the council. "I think it's a fine line to walk as an interfaith group. We've tried to keep the focus on education. It's our way of keeping ourselves unified and not so much on the topics that would be divisive."
alevy@express-news.net
United by their differences
Interreligious Council of San Antonio
Founded: Fall 1996
Mission: Unify members of the San Antonio religious community by sharing 'information about the similarities and differences among their respective traditions' among other goals
Membership: Baha'i, Buddhist, Christian, Ethical Culture, Hindu, Jewish, Muslim, American Indians, Quaker, Sikh, Unitarian Universalist and Wicca
Next meeting: 6:15-7:45 p.m., Monday, at the Baha'i Center, 735 W. Magnolia Ave.
Contact info: (210) 651-9287, thereligionfactor@msn.com, www.interreligiouscouncil.org
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