Christians & Jews in Dialogue
Learning in the Presence of the Other
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- $18.99
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- $18.99
Publisher 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.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
No one could find fault with the subject of this book, a story of two educators a Catholic nun and a Jew who have spent the past 20 years creating and leading projects in "interreligious learning" as a means of reconciling their traditions. Backed by their conviction that "religion must become a catalyst in reducing the world's conflicts," Boys and Lee tell their personal stories, detail projects that stress study and dialogue "in the presence of the other" and describe trips they took together to Auschwitz and Israel. As they confront issues like history and theology, their underlying concept of "textured particularism" denotes "a keen sense of the beliefs and practices of one's own religious tradition" as well as making space for other traditions. As inspiring as their journey is, however, their retelling of it reads more like a paper delivered at an academic conference than an engaging give-and-take. Those interested in learning about other traditions will find hope in Lee's words: that dialogue has served as a mirror through which she sees herself in a new light, a perspective which would be inaccessible without the "reflection in the image and faith of the other."
