Article About WISDOM in the Jewish News

Sharing Wisdom
Interfaith outreach group compare religions.

Diana Lieberman
Special to the Jewish News

As told in Pirkei Avot (Ethics of the Fathers), a man once asked Hillel to teach him the entire Torah while he stood on one foot.
"That which is despicable to you, do not do to your fellow:' Hillel replied. "This is the whole Torah, and the rest is commentary, go and learn if'
The five speakers at the Birmingham Temple in Farmington Hills June 6 were faced with a similar quandary. Each woman - all members of the mul¬ticultural group WISDOM (Women's Interfaith Solutions for Dialogue and Outreach in Metro Detroit) - was asked probing questions about her religion. Each had about five minutes to answer.
Among the questions: What is the place of women in their religion? What is most misunderstood about your reli¬gion? How would you summarize your own religious experience?
WISDOM came together soon after 9-11 to work to build bridges between different faith communities.
"Detroit is one of the most segregated communities in the United States:' said WISDOM president Gail Katz of West Bloomfield, who moderated for the event. "We want to set up opportunities for peo¬ple who, under everyday circumstances, would never get together and give them an opportunity to meet each other:'
WISDOM member Judy Satterthwaite of Rochester Hills said, "We have more in common than the media would have us think:'
The Birmingham Temple event,
titled "Five Women, Five Journeys: How Different Are We" began with a potluck dinner attended by more than 100 peo¬ple. The menu was vegetarian to accom-
modate the broadest possible religious and cultural laws and preferences.
Panelists were the Rev. Sharon Buttry, an ordained American Baptist min¬ister; Paula Drewek, retired professor and author of interfaith teaching aids, representing the Baha'i faith; Padma Kuppa, founder of the Troy Interfaith Group, who is Hindu; Sofia Begg Latif,
a co-author of the Children of Abraham play, who is Muslim; and Rabbi
Tamara Kolton of the Birmingham Temple, the first person ordained by
the International Institute for Secular Humanistic Judaism.
As they fielded questions, several speakers cautioned that their opinions and their life journeys as women were not necessarily typical of everyone who practices their religion.
"Islam is a religion of about 1.2 billion people" Latif said when asked about the position of women in her religion. "Islam itself doesn't put women down. It's the culture that puts women down."
Similarly, Kolton explained the first woman rabbi was ordained in 1972 in Judaism's Reform movement. It took until 1985 for the Conservative Movement to ordain its first rabbi.
"Half the students at seminaries that
are ordained today are women" she said. "But most are not hired as pulpit rabbis. The image of the person on the pulpit is not a woman."
The case is similar in most Christian denominations, Buttry said. "Being ordained is one thing; finding a pulpit is another."
Kuppa differentiated between Hindu culture and religion. "Hindu women may be putdown culturally; but from the scripture, women are very powerful" she said. ''A lot of Hindus do not know about the faith traditions."
There are roughly 5.5 million Baha'i spread across the globe, Drewek said. She found the religion a good fit with feminist beliefs. "Because we feel all religions come from god, we take a little from here, a little from there."
Kolton said the evening was very much ion the spirit of the Birmingham Temple. "This congregation believes not only in creating bridges, but in walking across them."
For more information about WISDOM, go to the Web site www.interfaithwisdom.org.