On July 5, 1852, Frederick Douglass stepped to a podium in Rochester, New York, and said something that stopped his audience cold. He had been invited to give a Fourth of July address. Instead, he turned the celebration itself into the subject of his remarks.

Douglass understood that rituals have meaning — and that when a ritual loses its integrity, something deeper than a ceremony is lost. He quoted the Israelites in Babylonian exile, who refused to sing their holiday songs in a strange land. He quoted Isaiah, who told a fasting people that God was not impressed by their observance: “Because on your fast day, you see to your business, and oppress all your laborers … No, this is the fast I desire: To unlock fetters of wickedness, and untie the cords of the yoke.” Then Douglass landed his blow. To celebrate liberty while tolerating slavery, he said, was “brass fronted impudence,” “hollow mockery” that did not just fail to honor American values, but actively corroded them.

His warning has never stopped being relevant. And as America approaches its 250th anniversary, it feels more urgent than ever.

What is a Ritual?

Before we continue, I need to explain how I am using the word ritual. It is not simply something repeated ritualistically, or done rote. It is also not just worship, although worship is a kind of ritual. Rather, ritual is when a group of leaders and participants enter into a defined period of imagination and suspended disbelief and open themselves to the possibility of being changed. Unlike a drama, when a group of spectators watch a group of actors play a role and then everyone departs and snaps back to their old ways of being, ritual is meant to be lived authentically, with a posture open to transformation.

Ritual uses all the various forms of human expression—poetry, prose, song—individual, collective, choral—instrumental music, archetecture, costuming (both for leaders and participants), lighting, social gathering, food, storytelling, and calendar—to communicate a message beyond mere words. By doing so it brings into existence possibility and imagination. Through symbolism, ritual asks us to consider how the world might be different, how we might be better, or how we might be part of something bigger than we can comprehend.

Democracy Needs Ritual. Here’s Why.

Because ritual has the power to bridge from experience to ideal, it serves a critical function in democracy, because democracy is hard to sustain emotionally. Somebody always loses an election. Policies you care about get reversed. Leaders you distrust take power. The question for any healthy democracy is whether the people on the losing side — this time, or this cycle — can hold on to their sense of belonging, their investment in the shared project, their willingness to stay at the table.

Laws and institutions help. But they are not enough on their own. What holds people together at the level of the heart is ritual.

The political theorist Danielle Allen puts it plainly. Democratic citizens, she writes, are “by definition empowered only to be disempowered.” Winning and losing are baked into the system. What makes that bearable — what keeps the losing side from walking away or tearing things down — is ritual. Shared ceremony creates shared meaning. It reminds people that they belong to something larger than any single election or leader.

This is why people fill sanctuaries after tragedies. After the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting in 2018, our congregation was packed the following Shabbat. The room held turbans and hijabs alongside kippot, elected officials alongside neighbors who had never been inside a synagogue before. No speech could have done what that gathering did. Only a ritual — with its layers of music, prayer, symbol, and presence — could hold the weight of that moment.

It’s also why even people who never set foot in a house of worship will seek out ritual at the hinge moments of their lives. Birth. Marriage. Death. Something in us knows that these moments require more than words. They require ceremony.

Nations are no different.

What We’ve Lost — and What’s at Stake This Year

The problem is that our national rituals have been hollowing out for a long time. Federal holidays have become long weekends. The national anthem gets performed at sporting events but rarely sung together. Jon Rauch, in his recent book Cross Purposes, talks about the “load-bearing walls” of democracy — the structures of shared life that hold the whole thing up. Civic ritual is one of those walls. When it crumbles, we do not always notice right away. But the foundation is weakening.

America’s 250th anniversary is one of the most significant civic moments in a generation. How we mark it will say something loud about who we are and what we value — whether we plan it to or not.

Why faith250 Is Asking Congregations to Lead

This is exactly why faith250 encourages its clusters of congregations to create public civic rituals in their communities. Not private worship services. Not internal programs. Public rituals — ones that open the doors, invite the neighbors, and say to the broader community: we are here, we belong to this place, and we believe this country’s story is worth telling together.

Congregations are uniquely positioned to do this. We have the space, the relationships, the trained leadership, and the tradition. Clergy are among the last professionals in American life who are specifically trained in how to create and conduct ritual. And faith communities are woven into the fabric of local life in ways that national organizations simply are not.

Which brings us to something faith250 is intentional about: we provide resources, but we do not create the rituals for our clusters. That’s not an accident or an oversight. It’s the whole point.

A ritual that lands — one that actually moves people, holds meaning, and builds community — has to be rooted in local soil. The needs of a congregation in rural Mississippi are not the same as those of one in suburban Virginia or urban Chicago. The history is different. The wounds are different. The hopes are different. A ritual designed somewhere else and handed down will always feel like it was designed somewhere else.

So faith250 offers frameworks, ideas, and support. But the people who know the community — who have sat with its grief, celebrated its milestones, and argued about its future — are the ones who need to shape the ceremony. That’s not a limitation. That’s what makes it real.

Taking on Douglass’s Challenge

Douglass did not just denounce the hypocrisy he saw around him. He called people to something better. He believed that American ideals were worth fighting for — worth insisting on, worth embodying in public, communal life.

faith250 makes that same claim. This anniversary year is not something to hand off to big, splashy, national events planned by politicians. It belongs to communities. It belongs to congregations. It belongs to the people who will still be here, doing the slow work of democracy, long after the speeches are over.

The ritual is ours to create. Let’s get to work.

On May 20, the faith250 team hosted a live general info session for interested faith leaders. We covered the basic components of the program and addressed a few frequently asked questions. The recording is now available HERE.

If you’re already part of a cluster, share this with a clergy colleague or friend who leads a congregation. And now is a great time to start planning for the fall.

If faith250 is new to you, learn more at faith250.org, subscribe to this Substack at joinfaith250.org, and follow us on Instagram and Facebook @joinfaith250.

On May 7, the National Day of Prayer, faith250 joined Braver Angels for an evening of reflection on the Gettysburg Address — and if you missed it, you can now watch the full recording on YouTube. faith250's Derrick Scott III, Rev. Becca Messman, and Rabbi Michael Holzman participated in the event along with leaders from Braver Faith, One America Movement, Interfaith America, and others for short reflections and thoughtful prayers inspired by one of America's most defining texts. It was exactly the kind of gathering we love the see — people of faith, across traditions and backgrounds, gathering around the words that have shaped this nation and asking what they mean for us today. Watch the recording here.

We first sent notice of this upcoming opportunity before the ICE operation in Minneapolis. Now we need this conversation more than ever.

On this Wednesday, January 28 at 1pm ET, we will talk with Rich Harwood, Founder and President of The Harwood Institute. Regardless of what you think of immigration policy or enforcement, this government action has done terrible harm not only to the lives lost, but also to the fabric of society. I can predict that at some point, when it is time to rebuild hope and civic faith in the Twin Cities, somebody will realize they need Rich’s help.

Rich is an old friend and wise voice with a proven track record. He is an innovator, author, and speaker. He has devoted his 35+ year career to revitalizing the nation’s hardest-hit communities, transforming the world’s largest organizations, and reconnecting institutions to society. He has been recruited to solve some of the most difficult problems of our time, including being called into Newtown, Connecticut, after the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School. He has appeared in numerous national media outlets, has written scores of articles and groundbreaking reports, and is a best-selling author of nine books, including his newest release, The New Civic Path: Restoring Our Belief in One Another and Our Nation. Over the last year, Rich has been traveling the country on his Campaign for the New Civic Path to reveal a practical and more hopeful way to transform our communities and the country.

In this conversation, we will look at what it will really take to heal our civic culture, how the power to create real change lies in our local communities, and the unique role that faith leaders and congregations can play. We’ll also have time for questions so you can join the discussion.

Register

faith250 is a program and an opportunity. Not only are we creating local multifaith clusters; connecting clergy and congregations in fellowship, meaningful conversation, and public civic rituals; and celebrating America’s 250^th birthday - we also want to introduce leaders and ideas from across the pro-democracy and civics field.

We want faith250 to be a gateway to future involvement with the ecosystem of worthy organizations making a difference in this space, as this exposure is not (yet) a standard part of seminary education. Therefore, in our Resource Library we will be sharing articles and open-Zoom conversations with thought leaders and practitioners. Through this material, we hope clergy and local community leaders will gain frameworks that help explain what is happening to our national civic culture and how to restore it.

About The Harwood Institute

The Harwood Institute for Public Innovation is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that equips people, organizations, communities, and networks with the tools to bridge divides, build capacity, and tackle shared challenges. The Harwood Institute’s work is rooted in a philosophy of Civic Faith and the practice of Turning Outward. Founded in 1988, the Institute’s approach has spread to all 50 states across the U.S. and 40 countries around the world.

Then my phone lit up. First came this, from Pastors Stephen Smith-Cobbs and and MaryAnn McKibben Dana:

Horrified and saddened by the news from Australia about the terrorist attack on a Hanukkah celebration. Know that your friends at Trinity stand with you and will be lifting you and all those affected by this act of anti-Semitic violence. God be with you. With much love and many prayers for peace.

My Cantor, Susan Caro, and I responded immediately with gratitude. About an hour later came this, from Imam Mohamed Magid of the All Dulles Area Muslim Society:

It is heartbreaking to see innocent people being killed in Australia. The attack on those who gathered to celebrate Hanukkah is a heinous crime against innocent lives. My heart goes out to my brothers and sisters in the Jewish community during this incredibly difficult time. I am praying for the victims and their families. We must commit ourselves always to stand against this hatred and intolerance, and against antisemitism and all forms of bigotry.

Now normally I do not put much stock in public statements. Absolutely, as a Jew and a rabbi, I appreciate the solidarity and support of messages that denounce antisemitism and violence against Jews. However, broad sentiments can feel performative and a little too easy. Also the proliferation of such statements creates an unfortunate social pressure for institutions to virtue signal on every issue.

But... and it is a big but... this morning these messages were like manna from heaven. And that is for a simple reason: these were sent by my neighbors. Not only are the words caring, but their appearance on my phone when I was feeling especially dismayed was intimate. It was spiritually reassuring. It was a reminder of a shared conviction for human dignity that towers above the vile hatred of the shooters. And that is a piece of Revelation.

This is why we build local clergy relationships. Yes, this is hard. The problem is not really doctrinal disagreement or even social awkwardness, although for beginners those anticipated feelings can suppress motivation. No, the problem is really logistics.

Every cleric knows this career is 24/7. Often the most valuable resource in a house of worship is the time of the clergy team. What makes pastoral work effective is the fundamental truth of presence. Giving up that time, energy, and attention to something or someone outside the church/synagogue/mosque can feel like a bridge too far. And who wants the calendar Tetris of two busy people?

But we overcome the logistics and apprehension because, very unfortunately, the world stinks sometimes, and people look to clergy for meaning in the darkness. As violence of all types proliferates, group violence continues its inexorable rise, and political violence now rips us apart, our wells of meaning can reach their murky bottoms. We prioritize these local, intimate connections because messages like the ones I received this morning pierce the dark and bring light. After another depressing act of antisemitism, I could write a message to my congregation from our clergy team, and that would bring some comfort on a cold morning. But we know that our words would be a compassionate light touch compared to the firm embrace delivered by words from our local partners.

If we look around the world today, evidence of hatred and intolerance can feel overwhelming. Precisely because we are so geographically close, because our institutions have such a long relationship, because we personally are connected whenever the need arises, and because we stay in relationship despite our profound religious differences, the messages I received this morning counteract despair. They deliver us maybe the only thing that heals after a violent, hateful attack: hope.

In 1863, America was many things to many people, but it was definitely not unified around any core premises. When Lincoln stood up to deliver “a few appropriate remarks” after the two-hour keynote at the Gettysburg cemetery dedication ceremony, he rewrote the American narrative. The battlefield itself gruesomely demonstrated the consequence of that disunity. And as Lincoln ran for his second term in the shadow of that Northern victory, his vision extended over the solemn graves to the post-war horizon.

I visited Gettysburg this year for the 162nd anniversary of the delivery of the Gettysburg Address with three multi-faith colleagues in a pilgrimage sponsored by Interfaith America. What we heard from the excellent speakers, and what we felt in the mostly rural Pennsylvania crowd, was a striking echo of our nation’s need for unity. From the dais and in the seats, the fear of our fractures was palpable.

faith250 is meant to help heal that disunity. To help spread the word about this program, we have created a sample session for any clergy to try out our core methodology—the spiritual study of a document we can unify around as American Scripture. The instructions and handout for this sampler can be accessed with the button below, and it can be used in any way you see fit. It is designed for flexibility, so that individual clerics and their communities can feel in our souls the way that we share powerful, inspiring civic words from our national history.

View & Download the Sampler

The purpose of studying American Scripture is for groups of people to see how our national story is bigger than our contemporary political divisions. To do that we need to encounter how that story has been shaped in the past and experience how we participate in shaping it in conversation today. The Gettysburg Address is an ideal way to try this out, because in only 272 words, Lincoln is creating a unifying narrative for a broken America. Starting with how the nation was “conceived” and ending with the open question that government of, by, and for the people “shall not perish from the earth,” he places listeners firmly inside the lifecycle of the country.

We remain in that lifecycle. The charge Lincoln presented in 1863 is still real and sits before us. We encourage you to try out the sampler, and feel the way this can open up meaningful conversations in all types of communities (red, blue, purple, bitterly divided, solidly in a bubble, totally avoidant, or all of the above). If you like it, head over to our guide for starting a faith250 cluster in your local community.

Why A More Perfect Union Is Proud to Partner with faith250

By Aaron Dorfman, Executive Director, A More Perfect Union

As we look toward America’s 250th birthday, our nation stands at an inflection point. Communities across the country are grappling with deep polarization, eroding trust, and a sense that the ties binding us together – across neighborhoods, traditions, and identities – are fraying. At A More Perfect Union, we believe deeply that faith communities can play a transformative role in repairing those ties and renewing the civic fabric of our country. That is why we are proud to be a core partner and supporter of faith250 and why A More Perfect Union is pleased to offer microgrant funding to faith250 clusters.

Why faith250 Matters

American religious and civic life have long been intertwined in ways that are both pragmatic and transcendent. Religion creates an institutional ecosystem that incubates pluralistic self-governance and structures the moral basis for nonviolent negotiation and compromise. This work is essential – especially now.

faith250 offers something rare: a hopeful, collaborative, community-driven model that brings clergy and congregants together across lines of faith, race, politics, and geography. Through shared study of core American texts, communal gatherings, and public celebrations, the initiative builds trust, deepens relationships, and helps communities articulate their own visions for an America rooted in dignity, justice, and belonging.

For us at A More Perfect Union, this is exactly the kind of civic renewal our multifaith, multiracial democracy needs.

Faith Leaders Are Essential Partners in a Healthy Democracy

As an organization devoted to strengthening American democracy through the Jewish community, we know firsthand that faith leaders are among the most trusted figures in American life. Clergy hold the moral authority, community reach, and relational power needed to:

• convene people who might not otherwise come together,

• bridge divides with empathy and curiosity,

• model the kind of compassionate, fact-based public discourse democracy depends on, and,

• cultivate a civic culture rooted in dignity, humility, and shared purpose.

faith250 creates the conditions for all of this – starting with clergy coming together across traditions to study America’s big ideas and narratives and extending into community-wide gatherings that bring neighbors into shared conversation and celebration.

This is the slow and sacred work of rebuilding trust and repairing the civic bonds that sustain a healthy, pluralistic democracy.

Building Interfaith Relationships in a Polarized Time

At A More Perfect Union, we are especially inspired by faith250’s commitment to interfaith collaboration.

Interreligious work is vital. When communities come together across faith lines – learning with one another, breaking bread together, sharing stories, and showing up for shared public celebrations – they build new networks of trust, solidarity, and belonging. These relationships form the connective tissue of a functioning democracy.

And they model the kind of civic courage we desperately need: the courage to see the divine image in people who may not think, vote, or worship like we do.

Why A More Perfect Union Is Supporting Participating Organizations

Groups of organizations participating in faith250, known as “clusters,” are doing important community-building work – and we want to help ensure these efforts are supported, sustainable, and successful.

That’s why A More Perfect Union is pleased to offer microgrant funding to faith250 clusters. This funding is designed to help communities cover program costs such as staff time, food, printing, venues, and other essentials.

We see this as an investment in:

• strengthening local civic life,

• expanding interfaith pro-democracy work,

• ensuring that financial barriers never prevent communities from joining this movement, and,

• supporting clergy as they take on the challenging, creative work of convening their communities for the semiquincentennial.

Our partnership with faith250 is not simply logistical or financial. It reflects our belief that democracy is strongest when communities show up for one another – and that faith communities have a vital role to play in building a more resilient, inclusive, and hopeful American future.

Looking Ahead to 2026—and Beyond

faith250 is a catalyst for something larger. The initiative doesn’t end on July 4, 2026; rather, it creates relationships, habits, and narratives that can continue to shape communities for years to come. A More Perfect Union commits to support ongoing collaboration through our national network of more than 200 Jewish social-impact organizations working across 30 states, and alongside our partners in other faith and pro-democracy communities.

Our hope is that faith250 becomes the seed of lasting interfaith alliances, shared civic projects, and new avenues for pro-democracy collaboration across religious traditions.

We’re Grateful to Be in This Work Together

As we move toward the semiquincentennial, we have an opportunity – and a responsibility – to renew the covenant at the heart of American democracy. Faith communities, working together in trust and partnership, can help lead the way.

A More Perfect Union is honored to stand alongside the American Scripture Project, clergy from across the nation, and communities of every faith tradition as part of faith250. We believe in this work. We believe in its power. And we believe that together, we can help build a democracy worthy of our highest hopes.

One of the hardest part of faith250 is going to be logistics. That might be the holiest way we serve democracy this year, simply by doing logistics. Calendars, doodle polls, scheduling, oh my!

I’m facing the same hurdles with my local cluster so I thought I’d share the email I sent to my colleagues for your adaptation. Please note, the recipients of this email are all people who heard me either speak about faith250 at our regular monthly interfaith breakfast, or people I called.

Friends,

I hope you are all doing well. I am writing to solidify our local faith250 cluster and help us start the process of finding dates to meet.

Introductions are in order. Included in this group are those who have verbally or electronically shared an interest in creating a local cluster for this program.

[list names and institutions here]

I think this is the right number of congregations for us to have a reasonable group size when we gather our communities. However we may add 2 more churches, both on the fence at the moment.

As for scheduling, the bigger hurdle will be reserving dates on our congregational calendars. To that end I took the liberty and privilege at looking out to the Winter/Spring and finding some dates. For us at NVHC Thursday nights are the freest for something like this, but that may not be true for everyone. How do these dates look for your congregational calendars? I’m envisioning some Spaghetti Dinners, 6:00-8:00 PM kind of thing.

1/22, 2/12, 4/16, 5/28

Please be honest if these won’t work and we will adjust.

Then we need to find some dates for all of us clerics to meet and start the conversations.

Please fill out this [doodle poll] so we can find a date for our first meeting. Hopefully one of these will work to get us going.

Thanks and Shabbat Shalom,

Michael

Editor’s Note: Some of the most common things we hear from clergy interested in faith250 are questions about how to get started. Colleagues seem interested in the concept, but turning that interest into momentum can be hard. Rabbi Malcolm Cohen offers some reflections in this short piece about his start-up story, which is ongoing. Rabbi Cohen was a participant in the American Scripture Project pilot group back in 2023-2024, so he knew the power in the spiritual study of America’s foundational texts. His story reflects the reality of clergy lives and his willingness to use faith250 materials in a way that suits his situation is exactly what we encourage.

In this friendly Arizona border town, we are a mixed bunch - fairly purple, politically, in a sea of red, like the Austin of AZ. I have been here just over three years and teaching my 8^th graders about other religions put me in contact with a bunch of clergy to kickstart faith250 where we are. I was looking for a variety of congregations, not necessarily all on the same page, with a mix of genders in the group.

I found, early on, that you need to give clergy plenty of notice and that many of us have different days off, so it’s sometimes like herding cats to get everyone in the same room, Zoom or in-person.

Stage one has been to leverage my personal network and send them the faith250 material before I do the hard sell. At the two meetings we’ve had so far, I felt it was important to just to get to know each other, although we have spent time discussing some of the core texts, which also feeds into the relational work. I need more clergy so I’m persevering to expand the group. Only once I feel we’re a tighter collective of clergy do I think we’ll be ready to open it out to congregants. July 4th seems far away but now that the High Holy Days are over, I want to kick into high gear so the process doesn’t seem rushed or forced. Good luck wherever you are!

Dear ____,

I am writing with gratitude for our relationship as clergy leaders in our local community, and with an invitation to join me in a multi-faith celebration of America’s semiquincentennial called faith250.

This is a once-in-a-generation opportunity for members of our national community to clarify and articulate the values that hold us together. We all know these are divisive and bitter times, and yet we all seek a healthier civic whole. This program is a way to leverage the 250^th to counter the bitterness, and increase the health.

I am asking you to join me and a handful of other local clergy for four conversations about America. We will keep our group small. We will talk about some key texts from American history. And if we feel our conversations are valuable, we will plan a way to repeat the process with four fellowship gatherings with our communities.

All of this will culminate in planning and hosting a public ritual to celebrate July 4, 2026. It all starts with our clergy friends meeting together. To read more about the program, click here [link to https://www.faith250.org].

Please be in touch and let’s set a date soon to create our version of faith250.

With Blessings,

[your name here]

Charlie Kirk’s murder is another milestone on America’s dark path of political violence. Political violence has been growing for decades, and the Kirk killing is only the most recent and greusome spectacle. This terrible act will contribute to the cloud of despair, rage, mistrust, and hatred that has fallen over the land. We should all be asking how to reverse course and prevent the next act of violence. The only answer is to restore hope.

Restoring hope is slow, hard work. Hearts hardened by repeated conflict, toxic rhetoric, and algorithms designed to polarize us will be resistant to change. Voices that call for civic virtues like trust, honesty, respect, patience, compassion, and dignity for one’s political opponents will be called naive. They will be maligned by those who seek a fight or say the moment is too urgent for civic virtues.

Conversely, calls for “civility” have already flooded our media. We swim in an awareness that our civil space has become uncivil. But the sea of civility cries is a micron deep. Civic virtues cannot be nourished by public statements. Instead, they are cultivated by experience and repeated exposure to fellow citizens willing to abide by them. Virtues must be practiced in community.

The most effective way to do this is through the civic institutions which transcend any particular political moment. Faith institutions are a key part of that civic infrastructure. America has 370,000 houses of worship, many of them small. To put that in perspective, America has around 131,000 K-12 schools, roughly a third of the churches, synagogues, masjids, and temples in every neighborhood and local community. These houses of worship have buildings, professionals, and traditions with the non-partisan roots to sustain our virtues and restore hope.

We started faith250 because we felt that next summer’s celebration of the Declaration of Independence was a once-in-a-generation opportunity we could not miss. We felt that picnics, bar-be-ques, and historical exhibitions were great, but not sufficient for our moment. How much more urgent is the moment with this latest act of terror, hatred, destruction, despair, and violence.

Our program is free and easy to adapt to any local community. Please, if you are clergy, contact a colleague and start a local cluster. If you are not clergy, find (or better yet, join) a local house of worship, contact the cleric, pastor, priest, reverend, imam, rabbi, cantor, sheikh, sister, brother, swami, guru, deacon or para-clergy leader and encourage them to check us out. Our upcoming info sessions are always listed here. Let’s use this year to push back the darkness and flood the zone with hope next summer.

We send prayers for courage and strength to the Kirk family and all who love them.

A note from Rabbi Michael Holzman: When I saw this email from our partner organization, Multi-Faith Neighbors Network, I immediately thought that we should share this with our faith250 network.

Why “multi-faith” instead of more traditional “interfaith”?

Why do we use the word multi-faith instead of the more traditional interfaith? We believe that there are some key distinctions that are at the heart of our organization. While interfaith is imagined and exercised in different ways in different contexts, we intentionally use the word multi-faith to illustrate a few key concepts that we believe are vital.

We respect and are honest about our theological differences.

Often, the popular impression of interfaith is that, to affirm commonalities, we have to minimize our theological distinctives that may be in contrast to other faiths. Instead, we ask everyone to speak honestly about their faith and practice. Theological distinctions don't mean that we have to be divided. We can build friendships without compromising our beliefs. We believe religions should maintain all of their unique theological tenets, respecting specific differences within religions, but should join together on the principles we share in common, like community, cooperation, and the common good.

We believe that each person has inherent worth, dignity, and value.

Our different beliefs do not diminish that worth, dignity, and value. Instead, we believe that at the core of our faiths is a commitment to love and honor others, particularly those who disagree with us. We believe that this is the foundation on which the most effective collaboration can be built. Many interfaith groups strive to rally around the idea that, fundamentally, we all share common beliefs. The problem with this is that when we get together, we often find stark theological differences exist, and conversations/relationships/collaboration are derailed because of our differences. By rallying together around dignity, we acknowledge up front that we have profound differences, and that we can still commit to each other in the face of those differences. Rallying around dignity allows us to each bring our whole selves – every part of us – into the room, and we can love each other and work together in the face of profound, even irreconcilable differences.

We believe that the practice of our own faith traditions, even though they are often very different from one another, is strengthened when we are in personal relationships with others who are different from who we are.

We are more committed as we learn to faithfully practice our faith in the midst of those who have other beliefs.

Multi-faith, then, is an effort to live out our distinct faith traditions in the public square, not diminishing our differences, but affirming each other's worth despite our differences. And believing that our faith is strengthened as we seek peace and endeavor to build relationships with others to serve and work together for the common good in our communities.

When groups gather, we naturally bring our assumptions about appropriate ways to speak with each other. However, when it comes to hard conversations about America, our political environment has been utterly corroded by a culture promoting conflict. Amanda Ripley coined the term “conflict entrepreneurs” for the cadre of operatives who find ways to polarize and toxify discourse for the sake of gaining attention and solidifying adherents.

We seek to create a different cultural container, one informed by the sacred values of our faith traditions. Within that space, a higher standard of appropriate behavior applies, one less vulnerable to the contempt for one’s opponent found in the current political ecosystem. To achieve this type of environment, we suggest using a Covenant for Conversation, and we have provided the language below as a template for your clergy group to adapt for your congregational sessions.

We commit to creating an environment where the community can discuss subjects that reflect diverse and potentially strongly held opinions. We shall:

• Seek to minimize harm and offense.

• Ensure that minority opinions are heard and respected.

• Model a way of community deliberation that contributes to healthy citizenship.

• Speak carefully from our own understandings using “I” statements.

• Avoid hyperbole, filibuster, gestures, and name-calling.

• Try our best to understand what others are saying and to understand why they are saying what they are saying.

• While being respectful of time, make sure that everyone’s opinion is heard, recognizing that an individual’s opinion may change during the discussion.

• Highlight, honor, and celebrate areas where we have common agreement and try to build on our agreement.

• Accept that our objective is not to change anyone’s opinions.

• Turn to God, our traditions, and our clergy for moral guidance, leadership, and pastoral care when needed.