Why My Interfaith Story Can Change the World
When I first set foot into the offices of Interfaith Youth Core (IFYC) in Greek town on my first day as intern in May, 2010, I wasn’t sure what to expect. I remembered reading a book titled ‘Acts of Faith,’ by Eboo Patel and read about their mission to ‘build mutual respect and pluralism among young people from different religious traditions by empowering them to work together to serve others,’ but I soon found out whatever I thought I knew about interfaith cooperation and dialogue was only part of the bigger picture.
My placement was with the One Chicago, One Nation initiative, a pilot year program designed to train people from all over the city of Chicago, from 18-88 years of age, to host Community Conversations about interfaith dialogue and cooperation around issues in their community. Through the trainings, nearly 100 Chicagoans from all over the city and suburbs came together to learn about how their story can be used to change the conversation around an issue (such as anti-violence, for example) and move together in service.
Throughout my time at IFYC, I got to interact with Community Ambassadors who were trained through the program and came from all sectors, college and university campuses and organizations as well as program officers from the Chicago Community Trust and high level corporate officials who attended the reception and induction for the trained ambassadors. I sat in on the trainings, created demographics to analyze the numbers from the pilot year and also engaged with the Community Ambassadors who were from all spiritual and religious backgrounds from Secular Humanist to Christian, Islam and others.
I remember sitting with the summer interns at a meeting with Eboo Patel as he explained how to frame our stories and be effective leaders from our lived experiences. I was struck by how the varied backgrounds and passions of the young people from campuses all across the United States, and how they were being cultivated through leadership development. The most important thing Eboo said was that we must engage others. Engage them in conversation and create a space with your story. Knowing who you are and owning that experience will resonate with others in a way nothing else can.
As a direct result of working with IFYC, I became stronger as a communicator, a thinker, a leader, and a social justice activist. I have grown stronger in my passion and desire to work in immigration and refugee rights and international justice. I never expected when I started at IFYC to be challenged at such a personal level that it would change the core of who I was. To me, that is what IFYC does. It took me into a relationship with the staff and those I interacted with and shaped those experiences to better define my purpose. It also broke apart my weaknesses and strengthened them.
When I first started, I thought I knew what interfaith cooperation was. Now I can see that it isn’t a nebulous concept that lives out in the world, it lives inside of me and now I must take what I learned and become a leader in both my local and faith community to bridge a divide with dialogue, conversation, and movement towards interfaith service. The power of IFYC gave me a new direction and renewed hope for a changed world. The core of IFYC starts with me, and my story, and now I want to take part in the movement to challenge others to do the same.