Christians & Jews in Dialogue

Sara S. Lee, Mary C. Boys

Description

Discover the Power of Dialogue to Heal Religious Division

How can members of different faith traditions approach each other with openness and respect? How can they confront the painful conflicts in their history and overcome theological misconceptions? For more than twenty years, Professors Mary C. Boys and Sara S. Lee have explored ways that Catholics and Jews might overcome mistrust and misunderstandings in order to promote commitment to religious pluralism.

At its best, interreligious dialogue entails not simply learning about the other from the safety of one’s own faith community, but rather engaging in specific learning activities with members of the other faith—learning in the presence of the other. Drawing upon examples from their own experience, Boys and Lee lay out a framework for engaging the religious other in depth. With vision and insight, they discuss ways of fostering relationships among participants and with key texts, beliefs and practices of the other’s tradition.

In this groundbreaking resource, they offer a guide for members of any faith tradition who want to move beyond the rhetoric of interfaith dialogue and into the demanding yet richly rewarding work of developing new understandings of the religious other—and of one’s own tradition.

Sujets

• Philosophie et théologie
• Jews
• Judaism
• Christianity
• Religion

Informations

• Publié par: Turner Publishing Company
• Date de parution: 27 juin 2012
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781594734618
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

To those Jews and Christians who, in studying in the presence of the other, have also enriched us.
CONTENTS
Foreword
Acknowledgments
Introduction
1. Jews and Christians: A Complicated Relationship
2. Sara s Story
3. Mary s Story
4. Interreligious Teaching and Learning: The Experience
5. Toward a Theory of Interreligious Teaching and Learning
6. After Auschwitz: Conversations in a Krakow Park
7. Jews, Christians, and the Land of Israel
8. Participants Speak: Testimony to the Power of Interreligious Learning
Notes
Appendix 1 Dabru Emet : A Jewish Statement on Christians and Christianity (2000)
Appendix 2 A Sacred Obligation: Rethinking Christian Faith in Relation to Judaism and the Jewish People
Suggestions for Further Reading
Index

About the Authors
Copyright
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About SkyLight Paths
Foreword
The United States is today a country where many religious traditions flourish. Yet we, the people, have yet to determine how we shall come to terms with this exciting but potentially troubling reality. The question of how to be religious people in a pluralistic context is not only a constitutional and political one, after all. Our responses to this question also shape our sense of who we are as individuals, families, and communities.
In a pluralistic context where particularist religious commitments sometimes reflect past grievances or erupt in presentday conflict, it is not surprising that some people respond by toning down their religious identity and seeking refuge in relatively bland and private spiritualities. On the other hand, those who have experienced God s presence in the practices of an enduring tradition find that response deeply unsatisfying. These more observant and believing ones sense how impoverished they, and humanity as a whole, would be without the rich and complex wisdom these traditions bear. And so, hoping to sustain them, some retreat into enclaves of the like-minded. Often they show tolerance toward those of different faith, but they never really get to know them or to appreciate their approach to the sacred. This ignorance can even keep them from recognizing some of the rich and distinctive gifts they receive from their own tradition.
Christians and Jews in Dialogue: Learning in the Presence of the Other offers a third alternative. In this important book, a knowledgeable and committed Jew and a knowledgeable and committed Catholic demonstrate that it is possible to approach one another s tradition with understanding and respect. Indeed, they show that in doing so one may find one s own particularity both expanded and enriched. Beyond this, moreover, they argue that the mature and ethical embrace of each tradition requires such mutual understanding and respect. These do not result simply from good will but rather from serious study undertaken in the context of honest and persistent interpersonal relationships.
Sara Lee and Mary Boys demonstrate here the transformative potential of excellent religious education. In an age when many educated people fear that religious difference will be the undoing of the world, these authors argue that religious education holds the key to reconciliation among those of different religious traditions. And at a time when many religious leaders seek to build fortresses of communal identity as defenses against religious pluralism, these authors see religious education as the surest path to a just, secure, and even joyful pluralism.
The textured particularism advocated by these two compassionate and committed women is, appropriately, particular to them and to their traditions. This book and the other work Sara and Mary have done together focus intently on Judaism and Catholicism and the painful history of the relationship between these two traditions. Early in the book, both women share moving religious autobiographies that offer powerful insights into the impact of early misconceptions of the other and the healing effects of growing knowledge of the other later in life. I deeply admire the commitment of both women to persevere in the path of interreligious learning in spite of the legacy of oppression and suspicion carried by Jewish heirs of their shared history and the legacy of shame inherited by Catholics. Their compassionate persistence even in the face of pain-their own and that of their students-has enabled them to invite many colearners into a more truthful understanding of the other and a more mature appropriation of their own religious legacy.
The dialogue between this Catholic and this Jew, then, is a particular one involving two traditions that have a specific, complex, and formative relationship with one another. Thus the book does not and cannot address how interreligious learning might serve the many other alienated traditions and communities that exist all over the world. This refusal to generalize is appropriate to Mary and Sara s emphasis on the interpersonal and traditionspecific demands of interreligious learning. However, their account does make me long to see religious educators from other families of faith explore the potential of this approach. It also makes me long to see dialogue that takes seriously and addresses the deep antagonisms that exist within each tradition, including the Protestant Christianity where I make my religious home. But that is a task for another day and other educators.
I have had the privilege of participating in Sara and Mary s work at several points along the way. In 1995, I attended a session of the Catholic-Jewish Colloquium, which gathered an impressive and committed group of Jewish and Catholic educators for sustained learning in the presence of the other, as this book s subtitle puts it. What I saw there was educational teamwork of the highest order. The qualities that make Mary Boys and Sara Lee exceptionally gifted teachers were evident at every turn: both are deeply grounded in and knowledgeable of their own traditions, passionate about the well-being of the other s religious community, and personally strong enough to listen with patience and discernment. Calling attention to their gifts, however, may deflect attention from the painstaking work they put into each educational encounter. The guidance on teaching they offer in chapter 5, which includes a summary of the kinds of questions they asked as they prepared for each colloquium meeting or other class or workshop, not only reports on their own practice but also provides immensely helpful advice for other educators. Those inspired by Sara and Mary s example to attempt interreligious teaching and learning in their own context must take this seriously: to do this, you must commit yourself to very careful planning and preparation. Those who teach other subjects of deep personal and social importance should also heed this advice.
My second opportunity to participate in interreligious learning with Mary and Sara, as they report in chapter 7, came during our 1997 trip to Israel. Memories of the places we visited and the conversations we shared continue to shape how I hear certain biblical narratives and how I understand the historical significance of the Shoah. These memories also deepen the sorrow I feel each time I hear of violence in Jerusalem. I am immensely grateful to these two wise and generous women for welcoming me into their journey on that occasion and across the years.
Now this book also welcomes you, dear readers, into their remarkable journey. I commend it to you with confidence that the stories, methods, and challenges it conveys will deepen your understanding of what is at stake in efforts to address the hostility and ignorance that have too often divided Christians and Jews. More important, I commend it to you with hope that it will strengthen your commitment and enlarge your capacity to contribute to the healing of the world.
Dorothy C. Bass
Valparaiso, Indiana
Acknowledgments
The process of writing brought to mind the many wonderful persons who have participated in our projects, and it is to them we dedicate this book.
We acknowledge grants from the Lilly Endowment and the Valparaiso Project on the Education and Formation of People in Faith that funded several of our projects. We are grateful also for support from the Center for Christian-Jewish Learning at Boston College, and for Mary s sabbatical leave as a Henry Luce III Fellow in Theology, granted by the Henry Luce Foundation, Inc., and the Association of Theological Schools.
We thank colleagues who provided helpful comments on various chapters: Eva Fleischner; Jill Morehouse Lum; Michael McGarry, C.S.P.; Stephanie Ruskay; Michelle Lynn-Sachs; Lesley A. Sacouman, S.N.J.M.; and Kathleen Talvacchia. We also thank Beth Nichols for interviewing selected participants in our various projects and Rachel A. Bundang for helping to ready the manuscript for the publisher. We are indebted to the generosity of Dorothy Bass in writing the foreword.
The professional editing skills of Barbara King Lord were invaluable in blending and refining our voices. Her care and expertise have contributed immeasurably to this book, and we are most grateful.
Finally, we thank our families, friends, and colleagues for their support.
INTRODUCTION
This is the story of two educators, one a Jew (Sara Lee) and the other a Catholic nun (Mary Boys), who for twenty years have designed and led projects in interreligious learning as a means of reconciliation between their traditions. This is a story of friendship that enabled candid conversations across boundaries of religious difference and sustained mutual trust even when confronting painful issues. And this is the story of the power of education in healing religious division.
The story begins with our conviction that religions must become a catalyst in reducing the world s conflicts. We focus especially on our own Jewish and Catholic Christian traditions in which the tragic relationship of the past now enjoy