The Pluralism Project at Harvard University

Interfaith Forum Columbus (IFFC) is a regionally-based group located in Columbus, Indiana, a small city of 38,000 people located about 40 miles south of the state's capital, Indianapolis. The group consists of Baha'is, Buddhists, Christians, Hindus, Jews, Muslims, Sikhs and Unitarians, working together to promote interreligious understanding in the community through a variety of initiatives, from monthly meetings to sponsoring public events. In 2003, the Council for a Parliament of the World's Religions chose Columbus as a Partner City, under the auspices of the Goldin Institute for International Partnership and Peace. Columbus is one of six U.S. cities (the others are Honolulu, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Phoenix and Philadelphia) in a larger network of 21 international partner cities, representing six continents.

Meetings and Structure

Interfaith Forum Columbus meets on the third Tuesday of every month at the Columbus City Hall, from 7-9 p.m. There is no official "membership" in the organization; meetings are open to all interested persons in the community. Leadership is cooperative and dialogical, not hierarchical in nature. The group also does not have a budget; any funds involved with the group are handled through the First Presbyterian Church in Columbus.

Meetings--Learning, Community Building

Meetings of Interfaith Forum Columbus often consist of presentations of personal perspectives on one's own religion and a dialogue around points raised in these presentations. Members make clear that they are speaking from their own perspective, not attempting to represent the theology of any institution or group. When a religious festival or holiday is approaching, members of that tradition will speak to the group about the significance of the holiday, and the group shares in food typically associated with that particular celebration.

Outreach--Bringing Interfaith Awareness to the Larger Community

In addition to their monthly meetings, members of Interfaith Forum Columbus sponsor larger, city-wide events that reach a wider audience. For example, the group has sponsored various academic lectures, including one on "Hindu Perspectives on Ecology" by an eco-theologian from Indiana University-Bloomington. The event, which was held at the city hall in Columbus, opened with a Hindu nature dance.

In addition to its own initiatives, Interfaith Forum Columbus works with other community organizations to plan these large-scale events. In November 2004 the group will partner in their city with: Indiana University-Purdue University at Columbus (IUPUC), Columbus Visitors Center and Columbus Area Arts Council as part of the 8th annual Spirit & Place Festival created and sponsored by IUPU Indianapolis/Polis Institute. The festival is a "major civic festival of the arts, humanities, and religion," and seeks to promote reflection about spirituality and place within one's community. Columbus is known for its contemporary architecture, and the Spirit & Place festival's theme for 2004--"Building and Belonging"--brings attention to this strong point of the city.

On November 20, IFFC and the aforementioned community partners will sponsor an event entitled, "Exploring and Experiencing Sacred Spaces," which will include a free, public self-guided tour of sites outside the traditional notion of "sacred space." Rather than touring houses of worship, participants will visit a library, workplace, home, school, forest, monument, public gathering place, and gardens. Participants will be invited to consider how these spaces resonate with them and how they feel or experience a connection with "Source" in those spaces. That evening, the project group will host a dialogue about "sacred space" between an architect, a neuroscientist, an entrepreneur and a person of faith. The panel, which will be interactive with the audience, will be moderated by Madhu Vedak, one of the founding members of Interfaith Forum Columbus.

Engagement--Empowering the Community to Address Religious Diversity

In addition to its strong focus on education about religions, Interfaith Forum Columbus has some initiatives in place to help members of the community at large to engage with existing religious diversity.  The group offers their methods for engaging creatively in dialogue to community leaders and to small groups in churches as well as with other organizations. IFFC is collaborating with Columbus Regional Hosptial Departments of Chaplaincy and Diversity to offer educational awareness about religious diversity, using the Pluralism Project's  CD-ROM, On Common Ground. The CD-ROM presentation will be used as a starting point for dialogue circles within each department of the hosptial. Another Columbus Regional Hospital Chaplaincy and IFFC project is to help the ecumenical Christian chapel grow into an interfaith space.

The group also sponsored a $2,000 scholarship to send a member of the Columbus community (over the age of 18) to the 2004 Parliament of the World's Religions in Barcelona, Spain. The group received applications from women and men ages 19 to 64, with a wide range of backgrounds from homemaker to eco-designer. The recipient of the scholarship contest was Rev. Lisa Marchal of the First United Methodist Church in Columbus. In addition to Rev. Marchal, seven members from Interfaith Forum Columbus attended the 2004 Parliament.

History

Interfaith Forum Columbus was born out of the experiences of Columbus residents Sharon Karr, Christine Lemley and Quinn Lemley, who attended the 1999 Parliament of the World's Religions in Cape Town, South Africa. At the close of the Parliament, Executive Director Rev. Dirk Ficca challenged everyone to return to their home communities and to take one action toward promoting interfaith dialogue and engagement there. They were all asked to report back to the Parliament in Chicago within three months with the specifics of the action they had taken.

Karr, Lemley and Lemley took Ficca's challenge to heart. They returned to Columbus and initiated the city's first interreligious dialogue, held on October 16, 2000. The Columbus Peace Fellowship agreed to their request to sponsor the daylong event, entitled "Faces of Faith and Spirit," held from 8:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. at the First Presbyterian Church. The event was followed by an evening lecture by Rev. Dirk Ficca, the very man whose "challenge" had inspired the event. The event was attended by 114 people, representing a variety of religious traditions: the Baha'i faith, Buddhism, Christianity (many denominations, including Mormons), Hinduism, Islam (including one Sufi), Native American spirituality, Sikhism, Unitarian Universalism, and Wicca. There were also several agnostics and atheists in attendance.

At the end of the event, Madhu Vedak, a member of the Hindu community, issused an invitation to the crowd to sign a contact information list if they were interested in participating in further dialogue. Under her leadership and vision, Interfaith Forum Columbus was created, sponsoring its first dialogue at Columbus' city hall in January 2001. Sixty people attended the first meeting, which received large coverage in the local media.