Faith Crawl with the Bethlehem Interfaith Group

I have been the Meeting’s representative to the Bethlehem Interfaith Group for three years. Our “mission” is education, social justice and friendship. I have been part of the planning and participated in several public and zoom prayer events with a focus on social justice issues. I have been part of many meetings of the group which have given me a chance to meet and develop relationships with clergy and lay leaders from nearly 30 faith communities. And I have had the opportunity to share knowledge about us with them.

The Faith Crawl was a great example of the educational element. Here are some of things I found particularly interesting I as moved along with fifty others.

We started at the Wesley Methodist Church on Center Street. John Wesley trained as an Anglican priest at Oxford. He came to realize that living a good life was paramount. He and his brother Charles and some friends started the Holy Club which met to reinforce prayer and fasting, and also preaching out of doors and other “methods” to support their attempts. They were mockingly called Methodists, but then embraced the term. Charles became a prolific hymn writer including Hark the Heralds Angels Sing. Early Methodist believed in the importance of preaching outside, which impacted of the Great Revival in the US in the mid 18th century.

At Brith Shalom we were able to see several Torahs including one which survived the Holocaust and one that had a type of script that has become extinct–no one knows how to do it anymore. The social hall has a wall with a photo history of the congregation including the Bethlehem Jewish Community Center on Broadhead Street on the Southside. Jews were not allowed at social clubs and pools, so they needed their own activities and facilities, including a swimming pool.

Our hosts at the Respect Graduate School and Dialog Center explained the six essential beliefs of Islam: monotheism (belief in Allah as the one and only God, angels, the holy books (Torah, Bible, Quran) the Prophets (Adam, Ibrahim/ Abraham, Musa/Moses, Dawud/David, Isa/Jesus, and Muhammad as the final prophet), the Day of Judgement, Predestination (Allah has the knowledge of all that will happen, but this does not stop us from making free choices). We saw their extensive library which includes a ten-volume braille Quran.

We finished at the Lehigh Valley Quaker Meetinghouse. During my introduction to Quakerism, I tried to emphasize the basic message of how our belief in that of God in all of us leads to social justice action as well as continuing revelation and quiet, expectant waiting during worship. Friends who were there seemed to sense that our visitors had a real appreciation for what our worship is like. Of course, one man was overhead to mention to his wife, “This is crazy, I could never do this.” One woman with an infant in tow said she was definitely going to come back.

I really enjoyed this chance to see some other places of worship and to share our Meeting with others. Bethlehem Interfaith Group hopes to do another Faith Crawl next year and would like to include more faith communities. Everyone is welcome to join!