The Multifaith Alliance is a weekly group that meets on Wednesdays at 6:00pm. We come together to share our spiritualities, religions, journeys, and questions in an informal, friendly setting. In addition to our weekly meetings, we also host interfaith discussions about principles that span many religions and spiritualies.
Discussion Series - Weekly Group Meetings - Resources
Multifaith Alliance is let by April Palo and Maggie Nancarrow.
Please email us with any questions.
Throughout each semester, Multifaith hosts interfaith discussions about principles across religions and spiritualities. There are four or five of these discussions in a semester, and everyone is always welcome to join us.
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Spring 2009 Discussion Series
Wednesdays, 6:00pm
Student Center Chapel
Dinner Provided
Wednesday, February 11
Faces of Judaism: Many Ways to be One Faith
A Collaboration with Jewish Student Life
Join us for a panel discussion with professors Earl Schwartz and Carolyn Levy, in addition to student panelists, as we examine the many different avenues that exist even within one faith.
Wednesday, March 11
Finding Empowerment in Our Traditions: Feminism from Sacred Texts
Organized religion has been criticized for keeping women out--but some feminists have found the basis and calling for their feminism from their sacred texts. How are they doing this? Join us as we look at ways to read ancient texts in an empowering way for women.
Wednesday, April 1
Seer or Madman?: Exploring Religion and Mental Illness
Delusional or inspired? Possessed or depressed? Are these dichotomies reflective of relationship between religious experience and mental illness, or are they mutually exclusive?
Wednesday April 22
Earth Day: The Spirituality of Water
Water is used as a metaphor across traditions as a symbol of rebirth, cleansing, and even primordial chaos. As our society becomes more environmentally conscious, our faiths may inspire us to look at these metaphors as inspiring stewardship for creation. Join us this Earth Day, as we invite the Hamline University Chaplain, Rev. Nancy Victorin-Vangerud, to lead our discussion about water in our religious traditions.
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Previous Semester Schedules
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Fall 2008 Discussion Series
Wednesdays, 6:00pm
Student Center Chapel
Dinner Provided
WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 3
Spirituality Through Art:
Can you capture the divine?
Or should we even try? What makes an image spiritually inspiring?
Dinner served after sunset.
WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 24
Relating to Saints: Human, or something more?
What do exemplary people teach us about our traditions, or
the traditions of others? What do we gain from these examples?
Dinner served after sunset.
WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 15
Leaps of Faith: Extreme Physical Acts of Devotion
What does it mean to jump off a cliff to prove your faith? Who does this and why?
WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 29
Heaven and Hell: Eternal Flames or States of Being?
How are descriptions of the afterlife used today? How to we apply them to our modern lives?
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 19
Divine Sex: Transcendence and Connection
Religious traditions have been attacked for being restrictive to sexuality—but what other things do our traditions have to say about sexuality?
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Weekly Group Meetings
Multifaith Alliance meets each week to get to the "nitty gritty" aspects of living a spiritual life in college. Although we may not share religious traditions, or spiritual directions, or even a belief in a higher power, we do share a common desire to learn, grow, and seek together, so that individually, we may have a better understanding of the world around us.
We learn a lot from each other, from the ways we live our lives to the random knowledge we possess and (sometimes accidentally) impart on each other. These meetings are informal, with a loosely planned discussion topic, or perhaps an excursion to a local interfaith event.
Here are some examples of what we did with our weekly meetings in the past: exploring music of religious traditions, attending "Peace and Violence in Our Religious Traditions", a series put on by the Twin Cities Interfaith Initiative, and cooking dinner together.
Each Week, April and Maggie send out a weekly update email (through the RSLO) to keep the group up to date on all we have been talking about, and the questions that arise at Multifaith. Please send the RSLO a message if you would like to be added to that email list.
Resources
Each week, April and Maggie put together a small set of resources for group members to look at before and after the meeting. These links are compiled here on the website based on the meeting that they are relevant to. In addition, we attempt to include a link to a current event in each weekly email. That event is also linked here.
Spirituality Through Art: Can you Capture the Divine?
September 3
Michelangelo: God Touching Adam
This is another image--the hand of God touching Adam, as painted on the Sistine Chapel. In light of our discussion last week, some important questions are: Is it acceptable for Michelangelo to have painted such a divine event? To personalize something so sacred as the unknowable hand of God? What about Adam's nudity? Does it fully elucidate the momentous quality of the event?
September 10
First Weekly Meeting
We talked about our faiths and non-faiths, our directions, and our questions. We also talked about where we want the group to go.
College Interfaith Directory
This is a directory put together by Religions for Peace for Interfaith Councils at colleges with links to their webpages.
Current Event: Church and State in France
September 17
Weekly Meeting: Conversion
What is conversion? Can you convert without bringing your old ideas to your new religion? This was a good, in-depth discussion and we touched on everything from sincerity, reasoning, and totality when conversion is the question.
Times of India: Orissa to enforce law to check conversions
By making laws about legal and illegal conversions, this area of India has tried to stop religious violence.
International Herald Tribune: Violence in India Spurred by Christian Mission Activities
Can the motivations behind conversion cause violence?
BBC Africa: The White Priestess of "Black Magic"
This Austrian woman, 94, left her husband and her life many years ago, to move to Nigeria and become fluent in the religious practices of the Yoruba. Can an outsider truly become a part of a tradition like this?
Relating to Saints: Human or something more?
September 24
Time World: Mother Teresa's Crisis of Faith
When we talk of saints--are they perfect in all matters? Religious matters? How does this affect the way that devoted Christians relate to Mother Teresa?
