Let’s Make Our Campuses Inclusive For All
Many students live in bubbles and silos on campus, unaware of the richness of the others’ religious and spiritual traditions. Muslims, including Sunni and Shi’i students, have a lot to offer to the table as well. Is your approach to interfaith inclusive or has a certain Protestant hegemony that may not be welcomed by all? Learn how to bring out the various faith practices in your students without alienating others.
Interfaith work is an indelible part of campus life that enriches chaplains’/spiritual life offices with interactions between Muslims and students of other faiths. Common principles of religion. Dialogue and other forms of interactions between students of various faiths. How do you measure efficacy? Example: religious literacy. Activities that improve the understanding of each others’ faiths from different backgrounds. Is there a Protestant hegemony in the way interfaith work operates? Do we choose topics that are mostly Abrahamic to the detriment of other faiths?
Multi-faith and interfaith work can be an educational opportunity for students to learn of other students’ faiths in a genuine way. Before COVID-19, I had a vision to combine the International Office and our office for a “religions around the world” experience with food, music and rituals that people could learn. I was hesitant in planning this from a voyeuristic experience, though, for others to see people “doing” a ritual in front of others. Nevertheless, I would want to introduce womanist and more intersectional lenses to interfaith work with an anti-racist, decolonial and liberatory perspective.