Past CRT Events
September 11, 2010, Sarasota Community Takes a Stand for Tolerance .
On September 11th, almost 800 people gathered in the First Presbyterian Church in Sarasota to participate in an interfaith religious service and to take a stand for tolerance and understanding. The event was organized by an ad hoc committee of religious groups and organizations in response to a national wave of anti-Islamicism, including a threatened Koran-burning in Gainesville (which was ultimately called off). The service opened with the Muslim call to prayer, the blowing of the Jewish Shofar, and a Christian invocation, and included prayers and readings from the sacred scriptures of the three faiths. The overflow crowd – many of whom had never before participated in an interfaith event - showed that religious intolerance has no place in the Sarasota/Bradenton community. “It was beautiful, it brought together people of all faiths. We have more in common than we do differences,” said Gloria Schnier, 75, who is Jewish. Follow up events are being planned.
July 8-9, 2010, USIP Symposium on Women, Religion and Peace Building.
CRT Director Andrea Blanch participated in an invitational meeting on Women, Religion and Peace Building sponsored by the United States Institute on Peace (USIP) and Georgetown University. The meeting brought together scholars, practitioners and policymakers to discuss why women of faith are often invisible in discussions of peace building. Women from Asia, Africa, Middle East, South America, Europe and the United States spent two days identifying ways in which women are using faith and religion to bring peace to troubled regions of the world and developing an action plan for increasing research, training and policy attention to these issues.
May 22, 2010. Civil Rights Fair in Tampa.
CRT participated in a Civil Rights Fair hosted by the Committee on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) and over a dozen other groups, including the ACLU, ForThePeople, and CRT. About 300 people gathered at USF to share information and strategies for promoting social justice and tolerance. Speakers addressed issues of job discrimination, immigrant rights, religious tolerance, and social change in Tampa Bay area. Young people performed between the speeches.
April 25, 2010, Yale Peace Rally.
CRT Director Andrea Blanch spoke at a Yale Campus Rally for Middle East Peace. The event was organized by Peace by Peace, an interfaith group of Yale medical students. Other speakers included the Mayor of New Haven, Imam Jim Jones; Rabbi Jim Ponet; Dr. Norbert Goldfield, Director of Healing across the Divide; and several ex-combatants from the Israel Defense Force and Hamas. Performing groups included the Yale Belly Dance Society, the Afro-Semitic Experience; the Duke’s Men of Yale; the Opera Theatre of Yale College; the Ice Brothers; and the Yale Bhangra Team. CRT photographer Pat Westwater also displayed her photographs from a recent exhibit entitled “Courage and Compassion in the Holy Land.” Despite a cold, rainy day on the Green, several hundred people turned out to show their support for Jews, Christians and Muslims joining in a non-violent resolution to the Middle East conflict
February 27, 2010, Shlomit Lir Event in Sarasota.
In Sarasota, Florida, Shlomit Lir read from her memoir “Roots of Sand and Air” and shared her personal experiences as a feminist activist in Israel. She spoke of the pervasive but hidden discrimination against Mizrahi Jews (from Islamic countries) in a country settled primarily by Askenazi Jews (from Eastern Europe), and highlighted the importance of this issue in developing peaceful coexistence with Palestinians. Shlomit is a third-generation Israeli of Iranian descent, editor of an anthology of Mizrahi feminist writings, and a peace activist. Read an interview at: http://www.c-r-t.org/content/research/shlomit.pdf
November 13, 2009, Yale International Conference Panel.
CRT Director Andrea Blanch chaired a panel on Women, Religion and Peacebuilding at an international conference at Yale University as part of the Women Religion and Globalization program. In addition to Dr. Blanch, the peace building panel (from left) included Dr. Ayse-Kadayifici, from Turkey, an expert on the Koranic teachings of nonviolence; Dr. Ester Herzog, from Israel, a feminist scholar and author; Jacki Ogega, from Kenya, the director of the women’s program in Religions for World Peace; Perin Gurel, from Turkey, a graduate assistant; and a participant. The panel explored ways in which women are building bridges across faiths and nationalities in areas of world conflict and explored some of the barriers encountered in this work.
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