Houses of Worship Made from Ammunition

http://thisiscolossal.com/2011/05/al-farrow-new-reliquaries-religious-sites-built-from-ammunition-and-firearms/

What do you all think?

Concluding the Better Together Campaign...

            Last Sunday I attended a first communion party for my cousin Jack who is in second grade. In the Catholic tradition, the first communion is one of the seven sacraments, along with baptism, first reconciliation, and marriage. It is a rite of passage for children to receive the Eucharist at church. At the party after the ceremony, I started remembering my experience attending a Catholic school and my first communion. If I think about my experience with the Fellows Alliance this year, it is just the same as my first communion: a rite of passage, a mark of a new chapter and an opportunity to grow. This year, I grew both as an interfaith leader and as an activist.            

            USC is a unique campus in that it is situated in the heart of one of the most multicultural, religiously diverse cities in the world. We have so many opportunities to learn about a myriad of cultures and traditions, and yet, sometimes we tend to stay clustered in our campus bubble. This year as part of the Better Together campaign, we committed to educating both our campus and the community about religious pluralism and the opportunities available to us to learn about different faith traditions. Our social issue focused on educating high school students about religious pluralism and what interfaith work means. We engaged three different high schools and spoke to over 100 students over the course of the spring semester. We have decided to continue the project next year as part of the Obama Interfaith Initiative so that we may expand our reach even further. 

            During the fall semester, our campaign culminated in an Interfaith Speak-In and Open House that brought over 50 students and staff members together for interfaith dialogue and some fun ice breaker activities. Each member of the Steering Committee and Interfaith Council brought 3 of their friends, and everyone felt enriched by the deep learning and fun environment.

            Recently, we culminated our year of launching the Better Together Campaign with our Better Together Bash, which we held in front of a campus landmark, Tommy Trojan. Over 250 students, faculty, staff, and administration members passed by and noticed the celebration. We had 10 religious and spiritual groups perform songs, recite sacred poetry, and perform a call to prayer. This was an opportunity to both celebrate the religious diversity on our campus and our successful campaign both on campus and in our community.

            What’s next? In conjunction with the Obama Interfaith Initiative, we will continue to expand the Better Together Campaign to educate our campus and our community about the urgency of multifaith cooperation in our neighborhood. We hope to create more cohesion between our campus and community initiatives by bringing more students into local schools and hopefully holding a one-day conference for high school students on USC’s campus. The conference will focus on developing interfaith leaders by empowering them to form interfaith groups in their schools.

            For me, this year has specifically helped me develop as a leader in a couple of areas. First, I have improved my ability to delegate tasks and trust others to complete their work (Better Together!). I also feel more comfortable asking for help and asking for participation. I still hope to improve these areas, as well as making an impact with social media and my story bank, in the coming year. I want to thank the Steering Committee, the Office of Religious Life, and IFYC for my amazing experience this year, and I can't wait to continue our success next year. Fight On!