From the Intern Files: What's the Point of Living Without Trying to Understand Life?

By Lizzy McCue, Project Interfaith Intern

I grew up in a United Methodist home. Actually, I was baptized on the stage of my high school, before the church my parents went to broke ground for some office space, a few classrooms and the worship area we affectionately called the “gymtuary” or “sanctionasium.” Isn’t it ironic that the place where I was baptized was also the place that turned me away from organized religion?

My majors are Journalism and Political Science. You might ask why a girl with more secular interests would apply for an internship at an interfaith organization. I ask, have you ever noticed there has never been a non-Christian President of the United States? Or, do you remember the media coverage of Mitt Romney in the 2008 Presidential Elections? I don’t contest the United States in its secularity, but religion has played its hand in every day of American politics. And politics has played its hand in religion, too.

There is that Marxist quote, “Religion is the opiate of the masses.” I agree; religion is addictive. Although my interpretation is the study of religion, not practice, is the addiction. In classes such as “Comparative Governments,” “A History of the Islamic World” and “Medieval Europe,” I have studied the relationships of religion and government throughout continents and centuries. But that interest developed in the past few years.

In high school, the United Methodist church my family attended experienced a change in authority. It became dictated by the demands of the dollar bill. The resulting feud on how to ease construction debt (and a few other issues) split the congregation and left me with a rancid taste for organized religion. The “contemporary” services went sour for me, as well. I would rather not waste my time in a service built around badly composed, campy songs and short readings from the Bible.

Call me a cynic, but I would rather see analysis of how the lessons of the Bible can be illustrated and interpreted with a modern focus and understanding. Or, if you can’t guess from the classes previously mentioned, how Christianity has interacted with history. “To get where you’re going, you have to know where you’ve been” is the proper cliché, I believe. Either way, I want to know there is more than a little creative thought going into the sermons I hear, but substantive research and a figurative approach to reading scripture.

Project Interfaith fits my interest because what I want is more resources, more interpretations, more education, so that I can decide for myself what I want to believe, and be able to back those beliefs, maybe to other people, but mostly to myself. What is the point of living without trying to understand life?

This is the third in a series of posts by the Project Interfaith summer interns. They're reflecting on what drew them to interfaith work and to decide to work in the tiny work space with a big heart that is Project Interfaith as well as sharing their adventures in interfaith work. You can learn more about Lizzy by visiting the Project Interfaith website and by finding her on Facebook and Twitter (@dandelionspider).

From the Intern Files: An Atheist Interning in an Interfaith Land

By Sierra Pirigyi, Project Interfaith Intern

A love of nonprofit work brought me to Project Interfaith. A fascination with the possibilities of interfaith relations has made me stay.

When I moved to Omaha for school, I was hoping I could land a job with a nonprofit. I previously held a work study position with Project WISE, a nonprofit in Denver dedicated to helping low-income women. I was a Music Industry Studies major, and wanting to run my own business, I figured an office job would give me the type of skills and experiences I would need. I worked as an Administrative Assistant for Project WISE and was fortunate enough to be surrounded by the most amazing group of women. During my time there, I fell in love with idea of working in nonprofit. I’ve always wanted to help people. I wanted to help people make their dreams of stardom come true. Now I wanted to help them with something more important.

Last fall, on my first day of philosophy class, I mentioned that I wanted to work in nonprofit. My professor, Dr. Rayka Rush, told me that she serves on the Advisory Council for a nonprofit in Omaha that may be looking for an intern. She told me about Project Interfaith, showed me the blog, and eventually introduced me to Beth. Interfaith, I thought. Hmm…

At first I wasn’t sure that it was right for me. I’m an atheist. I haven’t always been an atheist (a topic for another post, perhaps), but I am now, and I definitely never pictured myself working in anything that involves religion. I’ve always been interested in religion and learning about different religious beliefs, but I thought of it as just an interest. I considered majoring in Religious Studies, but I thought that would be weird, not being religious myself. I guess I just counted myself out. If I don’t believe in God, why would I study Him?

So when Project Interfaith came up, I had to think about it. But I knew that even though I don’t have any religious beliefs, I don’t hate religion itself. I may have some personal qualms with religious institutions and some of the actions made “in the name of God,” but I don’t take issue with people’s personal beliefs. In fact, I often find them beautiful. I just don’t happen to believe any of it.

I decided Project Interfaith would provide me with a great opportunity to learn more about nonprofit work, as well as introduce me to a field of work that, although I recognized as important, in reality I knew nothing about. I started my internship in February, and I don’t think I really understood what interfaith relations were when I first started. Yes, of course everybody should try to get along. But what exactly do religious beliefs have to do with it? Obviously, there are places in the world that are embroiled in religious conflict, and growing understanding and respect in those areas is important. But beyond Kashmir and Palestine, there’s a fundamental reason I see for growing understanding between those of different faiths, beliefs and cultures—because it’s such an important part of people’s lives and identities.

Religion has never been a big part of my life, so it never really occurred to me to consider the fact that it is the biggest part of life for billions of people throughout the world. There’s such a personal connection to these beliefs, and they play such a large part in people’s lives, dictating their behavior and worldview, that I think it’s impossible to dismiss the importance of it when it comes to relationship-building. If I can recognize someone else’s beliefs as important to them as mine are to me, only then can I begin to understand and build relationships with them. When you are able to connect on such a fundamental level, understanding each other when it comes to the big things in life, the little things that separate us seem trivial in comparison.

I am here to help Project Interfaith continue to grow relationships, respect and understanding between those of every faith, belief and culture. I feel this is an often overlooked aspect of relations, because we don’t want to talk religion, because we might offend somebody. Before coming to Project Interfaith, I thought that interfaith relations were about basic agreement—taking another life is wrong, for example—but I now realize that it’s not about agreeing. It’s about understanding. And it’s hard to offend somebody if all you’re trying to do is understand.

This is the second in a series of posts by the Project Interfaith summer interns. They're reflecting on what drew them to interfaith work and to decide to work in the tiny work space with a big heart that is Project Interfaith as well as sharing their adventures in interfaith work. You can learn more about Sierra by visiting the Project Interfaith website, finding her on Facebook and Twitter (@spirigyi), or emailing her at sierra@projectinterfaithusa.org.

Interfaith Intersections: Communicating Your Child’s Religious Needs at School

Project Interfaith Executive Director Beth Katz in the August 2010 post for her monthly blog "Interfaith Intersections" for Metro Neighborhood News offers tips and resources to communicating your child's religious and cultural needs to his or her teachers.

The next school year is only a few weeks away (or less for some of you). An important consideration to starting the school year off on a good note is to have a plan for how you will communicate your child's religious and/or cultural needs with her teachers and school administrators. Appropriate subjects to communicate with your child's educator include:

• Holidays for which a child might need to miss school or the observance of which might affect his or her performance or school work such as the fasting that Muslim students may do during Ramadan. (Click here to learn what Ramadan is and why Muslims fast during this time.)
• Religious or cultural dietary requirements or restrictions. For example, Jewish students who keep kosher will not eat foods with pork or shellfish in them and may refrain from mixing dairy and meat products. (Click here to learn why)
• Accommodating a child's daily prayers. Click here to learn more about what types of student prayer are permissible in a public school setting.
• Opting out of school activities, programs or celebrations that conflict with a student's religion or culture. Most schools have an opt-out policy in place that allows for children to receive an alternate assignment or class as long as the assignment, activity or course being opted out of is not essential to the educational mission of the school.

From my work at Project Interfaith with educators, I know many educators are... (click here to read the full article)