The Faith Club: Three Women Search for Understanding

[Patricia Duffin]

The Faith Club: A Muslim, A Christian, A Jew- Three Women Search for Understanding is book about three woman who meet almost every week for 3 years on a children’s book project. They are all from New York City, and after the 9/11 attacks, they were coming to terms with their own faith while their children were asking them questions about other faiths. They decided to meet together and try to write a children’s book about the three major “Abraham” faiths to help their children understand their own religion and how they relate to the other religions. The women soon find that their own faith was in question and the book follows their thoughts through journal entries, and written out segments of taped conversation. Eventually the women realized that they too needed to learn more about each other and through dialogue they were able to become close friends and helpers in each others spiritual journeys. The book reads very quickly, and many times I found myself not being able to put it down. The women are dynamic and very different and their different opinions that they so forthrightly put on the page made for very interesting dialogue. I found myself many times setting the book aside and questioning my own thoughts on ideas they brought up to each other, questioning my own preconceptions and prejudices. This is the strength of the book, because the last section is help from the authors on how you can start your own faith club. This section lays out questions that you can ask each other to start out dialogues and has assignments that will get your mind rolling for each meeting. Their example will hopefully lead many others to meet and discuss their religions, and they hope to even branch it further into non-Judeo/Christian/Islamic faiths. I think this book should be read by anyone in search of understanding of any of the faiths and each other.

I think this book would greatly help facilitate anyone who is a member of Beyond War. It is hard to talk of these three religions without a discussion on the effects and problems of living in war. Their dialogue reinforces the guiding principle of We Are One on This Planet, by relating the similarities inherent in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The basis of the book looks at the stories that are similar, the ways the religions deal with crisis in their text and how they relate and depend on each other. The fact that they are continuing this dialogue and helping others to start their own reinforces that The Means Are the Ends in the Making. Their own exploration of their religions help put in perspective things that may hold us back in building communities that are beyond war.

Discussion Questions:
 What story/parable in your spiritual journey reflects your personal views of religion/faith?
 When you see a devout/ religious person who projects their religion to others, how does that make you feel?
 Do you think media has relationship with the misconceptions of the different religions? How?
 In what ways do you know of how your religion is alike with other religions?

[Elaine Hallmark]

What a great book review. It certainly makes me want to read this book. I wonder if Beyond War should be trying to encourage and/or facilitate "Faith Club" sessions? It sounds like a good idea to me. Maybe the Ecumenical Ministries groups in various states would help?