Red or blue tie
Evilforce - they gave you a choice of colours? You were lucky!
wtbs participating in city round table discussion of diversity.
by candidlynuts 11 Replies latest jw friends
-
Crumpet
-
candidlynuts
this was held last night..the follow up article was in the paper today but no mention of jws.
Diverse religions gather at round table
04/22/05
By Karen Owen
Messenger-InquirerThe challenge: To boil down complicated religious beliefs and centuries of church history into a four-minute presentation.
Seventeen brave souls accepted the challenge Thursday night at a round table on local religious diversity sponsored by the Owensboro Human Relations Commission.
"Not possible," was the way Bill Vowels, a Jehovah's Witness, described the task.
"It is going to be hard," said Naheed Murtaza, who represented Islam.
The program, held at Owensboro Community & Technical College's Blandford Hall, included a wide variety of Christian and non-Christian groups, ranging from those with several thousand followers here to mere handfuls.
"It is really my pleasure to participate," said Harakh Maru, who explained the Jain religion. "We got to know others and others got to know us."
"It is a very big honor to be recognized here at all," said Christopher Sauls, a representative of Wicca.
"This is the thing we should be doing -- talking together," said Ralph Kunze, who represented Zion United Church of Christ.
Maru said he was pleased to find out Seventh-Day Adventists, like Jains, are vegetarians. "It is a healthier, cheaper diet."
"We have a reputation of being sort of a churchy community," Ed L. Allen, the facilitator for the evening, said during his opening remarks.
Most people here claim affiliation with some religious group. The Yellow Pages show more than 100 churches in Daviess County, he said.
The round table was designed to make a historical record of religious diversity in Owensboro in 2005 and to educate local people, he told the 50 to 70 people in the audience, which included several Mormon missionaries, a Baptist preacher from Ohio County and several women in a Catholic religious order.
"We are sometimes thought of as a cult," said Wayne Austin, a member of the United Church of God, once known as the Worldwide Church of God. "Let me assure you, we are not a cult."
Dr. Veena Sallan spoke on Hinduism, but said it was a challenge because she has no training in theology.
She described reincarnation and the concept of karma. "Our actions in this life are carried forward into the next life. Simply speaking, you would say 'What goes around comes around,' " she said.
Other facts shared Thursday night included the following:
-- Researchers are studying 100,000 Seventh-Day Adventists to figure out why members live an average of seven to 10 years longer than the typical American.
-- Members of the United Church of God observe the seven holy days recorded in the Old Testament book of Leviticus.
-- The only minister to sign the Declaration of Independence was a Presbyterian.
-- Mormons believe family relationships exist beyond the grave.
-- German immigrants founded what is now Zion United Church of Christ in 1872 and continued to record the church minutes in German until 1910. Use of the language was unpopular during World War I.
-- Muslims do not believe in the concept of original sin. Once a person reaches the age of reason -- about the time of puberty -- he or she is considered accountable for his or her actions.
-- Seven out of 10 Anglicans around the world are "people of color."
-- The local Jewish synagogue, Temple Adath Israel, was one of the earliest Jewish congregations in Kentucky. At one time it had a school and a social club as well as a full-time rabbi.
If any of the panelists disagreed with what they heard from the others Thursday night, they didn't express that during the roundtable.
"That's not for me to question anybody," Vowels said during a break. "God gave us free will. That's their right, to believe what they believe."
"We believe in nonabsolutism," Maru said. No humans can fully comprehend all truth, he said. "We don't argue."