Reading for understanding
And I'm not talking about those horrible comprehension exercises we used to do at school.
No, this is the story of a group of women in the States who responded to September 11 by starting an inter-faith reading group. Around a dozen Jewish, Christian and Muslim women have been meeting for three years to select, read and discuss a mixture of novels, history, poetry, memoirs and religious philosophy from their different (and shared) cultural backgrounds.
"I wanted the benefit of how to guide my reading on this," says Rona Fischman, a real estate agent active in a local synagogue. "In light of what's going on in the world, it just wasn't acceptable for me to be ignorant of Islam. It's not acceptable for Muslims to have little idea of what Jews are about. Or for Christians, either."
The effect of the new understanding created by this collaborative reading has 'spilled over' into the group members' lives so that they share in one another's celebrations.
This makes me think of Azar Nafisi's Reading Lolita in Tehran. I'm wondering whether there are other similar groups out there - perhaps with secular members too?
Thanks to Moorishgirl for the link.
No, this is the story of a group of women in the States who responded to September 11 by starting an inter-faith reading group. Around a dozen Jewish, Christian and Muslim women have been meeting for three years to select, read and discuss a mixture of novels, history, poetry, memoirs and religious philosophy from their different (and shared) cultural backgrounds.
"I wanted the benefit of how to guide my reading on this," says Rona Fischman, a real estate agent active in a local synagogue. "In light of what's going on in the world, it just wasn't acceptable for me to be ignorant of Islam. It's not acceptable for Muslims to have little idea of what Jews are about. Or for Christians, either."
The effect of the new understanding created by this collaborative reading has 'spilled over' into the group members' lives so that they share in one another's celebrations.
This makes me think of Azar Nafisi's Reading Lolita in Tehran. I'm wondering whether there are other similar groups out there - perhaps with secular members too?
Thanks to Moorishgirl for the link.
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on Wednesday, November 30, 2005 at 2:31 pm.
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posted byWhat a wonderful blog.
Let me introduce myself, my name is Sophie Nicholls, I live in Australia and I must say I was drawn to your blog because of your name, but I quickly became involved in its content. I enjoyed reading it. So thank you. I have ablog too if you want to see:
www.inspiredwandering.blogspot.com
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