by FaithHouseManhattan
A Letter from Samir Selmanovic, Faith House Founder
It was on the first anniversary of 9/11 that I made an announcement to my family and friends: “I will risk more and sooner.” I was done with my religion as usual. It dawned on me that religious zealotry cannot be fought with indifference. Extremists feeding on prejudice, legislating exclusion, and resorting to violence cannot be prevailed upon with less passion from people like you and me. Telling them to “cool down” will do nothing at all. We must allow fires greater than theirs to arise. It is our passion for a whole and interdependent world that must rise above their passion for a segregated and zero-sum world. So, when I get intimidated, despondent, or exhausted in this struggle for interdependence, I sing to myself quietly and prayerfully with a chorus of voices all over the world, “We shall overcome.”
This risk taking led me to start Faith House Manhattan, along with my wife, daughters, and many of you. Faith House is only a part of a larger movement towards interdependence; there are many visionary individuals and organizations we are learning from. Yet, Faith House is unique. It exists to make sure that people have an opportunity to experience “the other.” Inevitably, experience engenders compassion. And compassion is an uncontrollable force. It overturns our ways of thinking, it mobilizes, it changes, it sustains. And that’s what Faith House does, unleashes compassion.
When two young men, Moez, a Muslim, and David, an Orthodox Jew, strike up a friendship by engaging in serious thinking, good humor, and mutual support before, during, and after our Living Room Gatherings, Faith House happens. When our leaders talk to groups from all over the world who come to the city to learn the ways of interdependence, like a recent group of students from Denmark, Faith House happens (next year they are bringing the teachers from their entire school region). When we bring together GreenFaith, Bill McKibben, 350-dot-org and “green” Muslims to join together in a life-sustaining event in the largest cathedral in the USA, that’s Faith House too (September 18, 2010, full details coming soon!). When we direct people to our numerous and amazing allies such as the
Interfaith Youth Core in Chicago and Union Theological Seminary or Intersections International in New York, Faith House happens. When we stand for and consult with our Muslim friends in Cordoba Initiative in New York who are daring to open a new front against radicalism by building Park51, a Muslim Community Center in downtown Manhattan, serving all Americans, Faith House happens. And on and on it goes.
We bring people together and trespass imaginary boundaries while preserving the real ones, not only in New York City but nationally and internationally. But more than any programming, Faith House is you, people who understand the importance and urgency of this work. And now we need your support and call upon your vision and generosity.
We are all very busy in our own circles of belonging. We have our own people and our own affairs to take care of. Yet, the wellbeing of our own circles and our own affairs is now intertwined with the wellbeing of others. The time when we could leave issues of freedom, religion, and politics to those with the loudest voices is now over. We cannot live well if we know more about brands of consumer products than we know about the amazing treasures of history, stories, and spirituality of people who live across the street or work across the office or a members of our family. This must, can, and will change. In fact, investing in interdependence is not a risk but a safe investment into our future. A failure to invest in it would be a reckless course of action.
Please throw the indifference to the wind, like a fist of chaff. This is your world. Do so by helping visionary, persevering, effective, and resilient organizations like Faith House do the work of experimenting, discovering, learning, and teaching. Make an appropriate contribution now. By contributing, you will not only help make a material difference making sure Faith House continues to operate
effectively. By contributing, you will tell us that we are doing this for you and your children too. And that will sustain us more than you
will ever know.
We have set a modest goal that we have to meet in order to survive as an organization. We are one-third of the way there. Risk with us. Contribute generously now.
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House Manhattan”
In Faith,
Samir Selmanovic, Ph.D.
Founder and
President of the Board, Faith
House Manhattan
