Abraham’s Tent

What an amazing experience tonight! The Standing Commission on Ecumenical and Interfaith Relations, meeting at a conference center near Omaha, Nebraska, heard from a group of local interfaith partners with an astounding dream.

An 800 family Reformed Jewish temple needed to relocate from an older city building to the growing suburbs. A visionary president of the synagogue reached out to a growing Islamic center to see if they might be thinking about building a mosque in the same area. Both of them then contacted the Roman Catholic Church (the largest Christian communion in Omaha) who turned them down flat.

Their next stop was the Episcopal Diocese of Nebraska which was looking to start a new mission congregation in this burgeoning area. The interest was immediate and converations began in earnest!

They are now looking for property on which to build three worship sites and a “middle building” tentatively called “Abraham’s tent” which can be a gathering space, coffee shop, educational and outreach center for the larger community. They are clear that each community needs to tend to its own internal needs of formation, nurture, “life cycle” issues like births and marriages and funerals and more.

So there is “enlightened self interest” driving a common effort. But engaging in that common effort has forged bonds of friendship and even love between people of different, but vibrant, faiths. And “dialogue” has happened — not in the sterile environment of the classroom or conference center — but in the context of a shared dream and hard, painstaking work!

I believe this is a vision for the future which could be duplicated in countless communities across our land. We are told that Abraham kept all four sides of his tent wide open, the better to see and welcome the stranger. These courageous children of Abraham are his worthy descendents. Join me in praying that Abraham’s God and ours may richly bless their endeavors!

For the sake of the world!