Multifaithful

On this week's episode of Multifaithful, we are excited to welcome Shaykh Hamza Yusuf, co-founder of Zaytuna College in California and one of the most important Muslim scholars in the world. Shaykh Hamza discusses the intersections between religious and secular education in the United States and the ways in which both religious and secular identities can coexist in this arena. For more information on this topic, listen to the lecture that Shaykh Hamza gave along with Dr. John Sexton and Reverend Dr. Serene Jones in our previous episode.

In case you missed the incredible event last night (9/27), you can now listen to the full audio from The Secular and the Sacred in Higher Education: A Conversation with Shaykh Hamza Yusuf and Dr. John Sexton, moderated by Rev. Dv. Serene Jones. This lecture was the annual Fritzi Weitzmann Owens Memorial Lecture at the Of Many Institute for Multifaith Leadership at NYU and was cosponsored by the Islamic Center at NYU and the New York Community Trust.

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Shaykh Hamza Yusuf is an American-Muslim Scholar and President of Zaytuna College, the first accredited Muslim undergraduate college in the United States. The New Yorker Magazine called him "perhaps the most influential Islamic scholar in the Western World." He has authored several encyclopedia articles, research articles and published books, including "Purification of the Heart: Signs, Symptoms, and Cures of the Spiritual Diseases of the Heart" (Starlatch, 2004).

Dr. John Sexton is an American scholar of Law and Religion and served as the15th President of New York University from 2002-2015. During his presidency, NYU was named the "number one dream school" four times by the Princeton Review. As president, Sexton taught a seminar on the Supreme Court's church and state cases, and a popular course called "Baseball as a Road to God," which is also the title of his book (Gotham, 2013). Moderator Rev. Dr. Serene Jones is a highly respected scholar and public intellectual.

Rev. Dr. Jones is the 16th President of the historic Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York. The first woman to head the 180-year-old institution, Jones occupies the Johnston Family Chair for Religion and Democracy. She is also currently the President of the American Academy of Religion, which annually hosts the world’s largest gathering of scholars of religion. Rev. Dr. Jones is the author of several books, including Trauma and Grace (Westminster, 2009).

Joining us on the podcast this week are Sensei Chodo Campbell and Sensei Koshin Ellison, founders and executive directors of the New York Zen Center for Contemplative Care. We delve into a new topic for this podcast and begin to explore the ways in which we can approach death, and especially caring for those who are dying, with compassion, awareness, and even happiness. For more information on Koshin's book, check out the Amazon page here: https://www.amazon.com/Awake-Bedside-Contemplative-End---Life/dp/1614291195/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8

Welcome to a new season of Multifaithful! Joining us on this first episode is executive director of the Sikh Coalition Sapreet Kaur and Sikh activist Vishavjit Singh. We consider the history of Sikhism in America, explore Singh’s Captain Sikh America persona, and discuss The Sikh Project, an upcoming art exhibit sponsored by the Sikh Coalition (http://www.sikhcoalition.org/get-involved/sikhproject).

On this week's episode of Multifaithful, Reka talks to Lodro Rinzler, a Shambhala Buddhist teacher, author and founder of M N D F L and the Institute for Compassionate Leadership. They discuss the spread of mindfulness into organizations as different as NYU and Google and ways to bring mindfulness into any environment. You can find more information about Lodro here: http://www.lodrorinzler.com/about/

On this weeks episode of Multifaithful, Reka talks to Lama Rod Owens, renowned Dharma teacher and activist based in Boston. We discuss how mindfulness has inspired his involvement in various activist causes and how it can pave the way for a different kind of liberation.

On this week's episode, we begin a series of three mindful Multifaithful episodes hosted by the amazing Reka Prasad. In this episode she sits down with Buddhist teacher Qalvy Grainzvolt to discuss his journey to and through Buddhism and his approach to sharing the practice of meditation and mindfulness with others in today's ever-changing world.

On this weeks episode, we talk to Sarab Al-Jijakli, a well known Arab-American community organizer who has been at the forefront of organizing efforts in the United States on behalf of Syrian Refugees. We discuss various organizations working on this issue and ways for Americans to get involved and show support.

In this episode, we highlight the following organizations (in order of mention):

Network of Arab American Professionals (http://www.naaponline.org/)

International Rescue Committee (http://www.rescue.org/)

Sarab's Blog (https://sarabiany.wordpress.com/about-sarabiany/)

Islamic Relief (http://irusa.org/)

Karam Foundation (http://www.karamfoundation.org/)

Arab American Association of New York (http://www.arabamericanny.org/)

Arab American Family Support Center (http://www.aafscny.org/)

Muslim Consultative Network (http://mcnny.org/)

Muslims Giving Back (http://www.muslimsgivingback.org/)

Syrian American Medical Society (https://www.sams-usa.net/foundation/)

This week's episode features Dr. Jerusha Lamptey, Assistant Professor of Islam and Ministry at Union Theological Seminary in New York. We discuss Islam as a field of academic study, how to teach a multifaith course, as well as her personal work in synthesizing feminism with comparative religious studies.

We are joined this week by the ever-wise and incredible Dr. Linda Mills, Vice Chancellor for Global Programs and University Life at New York University and one of the key founders of the Of Many Institute. Our conversation centers around the Of Many Institute, as well as the ways in which multifaith dialogue and understanding can be approached in a variety of global contexts.