For Congregations
Fellowship for Congregations
Is your congregation looking for a way to deepen its interreligious understanding and capacity for interreligious dialogue? Do you want to build relationships with other religious communities?
If so, consider the Fellowship for Congregations.
At a time of polarization and partisanship, we need to cross divides between communities—even our own religious communities. Now more than ever, we need religious leaders (both clergy and lay leaders) who are willing to engage and mobilize across religious divides.
The Fellowship for Congregations is a 6-month cohort experience for leaders from Muslim, Christian, and Jewish congregations to build understanding and relationships across those divides. Fellows learn about each other’s religious traditions, discuss the foundations of interreligious work, and collaborate on an intercongregational project.
The fellowship is directed by Christine Krieger with support and instruction provided by ICJS scholars.
The next fellowship cohort will begin January 28, 2025.
Commitments & Expectations
ICJS Commitments
- Create space for learning and dialogue among Jews, Christians, and Muslims
- Support fellows in strengthening interreligious understanding within your own religious community;
- Foster relationships between diverse religious communities;
- Provide a Congregational Stipend for completing all fellowship commitments.
Fellow Commitments
- Attend 8 out of 10 cohort gatherings
- Attend half-day retreat
- Attend 2 religious services with congregations of faiths other than your own
- Attend 1 correlated learning experience (e.g., ICJS courses or events, community events with other congregations, Interfaith webinars, field trips to religious sites)
- Write a reflection essay for ICJS “Voices” column
- Complete intercongregational, interreligious project and present summary to the cohort
Fellowship for Congregations Rosters
Congregational Leader Voices
I Didn’t Know What I Didn’t Know
When I signed up to be part of ICJS’s Congregational Leaders Fellowship (CLF), I thought I had a pretty good understanding of the core beliefs and practices of the Jewish and Muslim faiths. I had read articles and attended lectures, and I have a few Jewish friends, some more religious than others. I’ve come to…
Understanding Through Vulnerability
Growing up, I developed a friendship with a child playing on the playground. As we grew older, we continued to gravitate to each other, noticing that we shared similar values. We didn’t allow ourselves to be negatively influenced by others. We both were stable and firm enough in our values that when peers attempted to…
The Harmony of Interreligious Communication
My mother was a logophile, a lover of words, who understood nuance even when she spoke directly. She taught her children to speak without the preparatory steps of babble and baby talk. It was a “sink or swim” technique. We developed burgeoning vocabularies and fluency, but I’m not sure that we learned to communicate beyond…
When Interreligious Bonds Become Essential
As I wrap up the ICJS Congregational Leaders Fellowship, I reflect on experiences I had during one of the most difficult periods of my life that laid a strong foundation for my interreligious story and upon which the fellowship built years later. A journey of profound interreligious sharing began when my wife Jill was diagnosed…