An Interfaith perspective provides a roadmap for navigating the boundaries between people, religions, and cultures. It is a force for bridging and healing the religious schisms of our polarized and troubled world.
The Chaplaincy Institute community is inspired by an interfaith perspective of mutual respect and harmonious living among people of all faith traditions. We celebrate and support, as an intrinsic human right, the dignity and unique spiritual path of each individual.
What is Interfaith Ministry?
The following is a composite definition of interfaith ministry that evolved out of The Chaplaincy Institute's student and faculty meditations on the nature of interfaith ministry.
The committed life of an ordained interfaith minister is one of constant study of religions and cultures, ceremonies, rituals, liturgies and spiritual paths.
The ordained interfaith minister strives to live a life of compassion, not condemnation. We look to our diversity as the composite, and yet never full revealed, image of the sacred and divine. We open to receive the many gifts and blessings of the wisdom teachings and truths of other faith traditions, while also fully embracing our own traditions. We maintain a sense of wonder and curiosity about it All.
Our mission is to empower all and overpower none. We strive to dissolve prejudice and injustice. To do this we must be vigilant observers of human nature, starting with ourselves.
What does an Interfaith Minister do?
• Interfaith ministers provide compassionate, respectful spiritual care to people of all faiths and people of no faith.
• An Interfaith minister seeks to honor both the diversity and the unity of all beings, cultures and faith traditions.
• As Interfaith clergy, we delight in the rich gifts and lessons of the wisdom teachings and truths of other faith traditions, while also fully embracing our own respective traditions.
• Interfaith ministers provide spiritual support, using pastoral care skills such as listening, presence, and compassion.
• We are celebrants for rituals, such as weddings and memorials, that honor the cycles of life.
• We serve the unnamed and named God, and are open to engaging new faith traditions that are not familiar.
• The interfaith minister recognizes that the Holy is everywhere: hospital, jail, nature, the streets.
• We support people in their process of sorting out their relationship to the Divine / to Spirit / to the Source of All.
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As ordained interfaith ministers, we hold that Spirit is fully present as an inspired energy in all beings and all things. We see beauty, and we respect and are connected to the Divine nature expressed in both male and female, in the body, and in creation itself. We seek and work with the loving thread that flows through all faiths, that connects all faiths and has always connected faith traditions. We believe that forgiveness and gratitude are two of the most powerful tools of our calling, and that dedicated spiritual practice and prayer can bring about transformation and healing.