Words from an attendee: World Interfaith Harmony Week was celebrated at our Interfaith Community Sanctuary Service on Sunday, February 2, 2020 "Love of the Good & Love of the Neighbor," with special guest speakers Cherag Michael Douglas, Imam Jamal Rahman, Christian spiritual leaders John and Silvana Hale, and Rabbi Anson Laytner, each sharing about crucial topics of our time; homelessness, immigration, refugees, interfaith harmony and interfaith dialogue. This topic spoke deeply to me because I think it is very important to honor and discuss topics of relevance to our everyday lives and our immediate communities when we engage in Interfaith worship.  It is not enough to promote loving harmony on a theoretical level.  Anyone can do that.  But how many of us engage in the conversation about what we can do right here, right now, in our own neighborhoods, with our own neighbors, to make the world a more congenial and loving place?  "Who is our neighbor?" is a timeless and urgent question.  "How can we serve our neighbors in need?" This question requires deep soul-searching and the preparation of fertile ground for creative ideas to spring forth.  All this happens best in loving community. Sally Jo Educator, Climate Change Activist, Spiritual Seeker, Interfaith Advocate Interfaith Community Sanctuary has celebrated World Interfaith Harmony Week since 2010 on each first Sunday in February. We happily celebrate this 10 year anniversary with the world offering this special worship service. Here we looked at important issues. We gathered the wider community together to look with clear vision at these heartbreaking realities that are all our responsibility. Collectively we seek to find the goodness and love in our hearts to move forward toward solutions and new kind caring from a depth as yet untapped. Presenters offered words of wisdom each addressing an issue and followed their sharing with a spiritual practice. A sentence or two about the presenters appears below. Sincerely, Reverend Karen Lindquist co-founder Interfaith Community Sanctuary www.interfaithcommunitysanctuary.org BIOs for Presenters Michael Bodhi Douglas is an initiated teacher and musician in the Mevlevi Sufi tradition. As a Cherag of the Universal Worship in the Inayati Sufi Order, he leads interfaith worship, guides spiritual practice, and teaches world religions. John Hale, Treasurer, Northwest Interfaith, a 501(c)3 corporation has strong business development professional skill and has built upon his engineering and MBA education and began his transition into nonprofit interfaith leadership after 9/11, when the country began to overreact against Muslims for the crimes of a few extremists. He co-founded an ecumenical/interfaith organization, NW Interfaith, a 501(c)3 corporation, committed to promoting understanding, trust, and collaboration among all religious and spiritual traditions. John also serves as Executive Director of Call of Compassion NW (CCNW), also a 501(c)3 corporation. Imam Jamal Rahman is a popular speaker on Islam, Sufi spirituality and interfaith relations. Along with his Interfaith Amigos, he has been featured in the New York Times, on CBS News, the BBC and various NPR programs. Co-founder and Muslim Sufi minister at Interfaith Community Sanctuary and adjunct faculty at Seattle University, he is a former host of Interfaith Talk Radio and travels nationally and internationally, presenting at conferences, retreats and workshops. Since 9/11/2001 Jamal has been collaborating regularly and actively with Rabbi Ted Falcon and Pastor Don Mackenzie. Affectionately known as The Interfaith Amigos, they travel the country sharing a message of inclusive spirituality. Anson Laytner is a retired liberal rabbbi. As a volunteer, he serves as president of the Sino-Judaic Institute (www.sino-judaic.org) and edits its journal, Points East. He is also president of Northwest Interfaith. During his career, he served as program manager for Seattle University School of Theology and Ministry's Interreligious Initiative, as a hospice chaplain at the Kline Galland Home and a grant-writer for the Jewish Family Service of Seattle, as interim rabbi at Congregation Kol HaNeshamah, and as executive director of the Seattle Chapter of the American Jewish Committee and of Multifaith Works, a Seattle non-profit agency that served people with AIDS. He also directed the Seattle Jewish Federation's Community Relations Council when it was in existence.       About Welcome to our all-volunteer spiritual community! As a community,  we endeavor to live in the openness of heart and compassionate understanding that embraces all life. As a spiritual organization, we are collectively organized to thrive through listening, sharing, and caring for one another. As individuals in awe of the Divine,  we support and respect one another’s personal spiritual path and spiritual practices.

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