Shedding Light on 3 Major Monotheistic Religions

It was a Tuesday night in Rancho Palos Verdes, and 400 well-dressed men and women packed a parish hall atop a wind-swept hill to expand their knowledge of world’s three major monotheistic religions: Christianity, Judaism and Islam.

“These symposia are not debates. There is no right; there is no wrong. We’re here to learn a little about the traditions of our neighbors. In doing so, we will all go home winners,” said Bob Rothman, chairman of the Dawn Unity Group.

That organization of Palos Verdes Peninsula clergy and lay people has been sponsoring the “Interfaith Discovery Series” for nearly four years.

The recent night of learning got underway in earnest at St. John Fisher Catholic Church as Msgr. David Sork of that parish read from Psalm 63: “O God, you are my God, earnestly I seek you. My soul thirsts for you, my body longs for you in a dry and weary land where there is no water ... “

Then he prayed: “Continue to guide us and help us to be learners

In addition to Sork, six other panelists -- a rabbi, an Islamic leader and ministers representing Presbyterian, Unitarian Universalist and Swedenborgian churches -- spoke on “The Background of My Religion.” With just 10 minutes allotted for each, panelists could explain only key beliefs and values.

But afterward, many in the audience said their appetites had been whetted to study more.

Merrietta Fong, a member of Rolling Hills United Methodist Church who has attended the series since it began, said she has learned a lot about Judaism, Islam and other Christian denominations.

“It’s just been wonderful,” said Fong, a certified public accountant. “It’s an important process for people of different faiths to get together and share idea and learn about each other’s faith.”

The group began in November 2000, when more than 2,000 South Bay residents of various faiths walked in a mile-long candlelight ceremony from the Mary & Joseph Retreat House to Congregation Ner Tamid to remember Kristallnacht, or “The Night of Broken Glass” -- the attacks on Jews in Germany and Austria the night of Nov. 9, 1938, that left streets littered with glass from destroyed businesses and synagogues.

The march’s organizers commissioned an artwork of “unbreakable” crystal and gave it to the Jewish congregation. The sculpture was named “Dawn” as a symbolic counter to the “Night of Broken Glass,” and to symbolize the beginning of a new age of respect and tolerance. The Dawn Unity Group took its name from the artwork.

Since the march, from 300 to 500 people have packed churches, synagogues and a local mosque for each of the quarterly presentations, which feature local clerics addressing such topics as “Death and Afterlife, “Sin and Redemption” and “How We Relate to God.”

“No theme was taboo; no theme overlooked,” said Elizabeth Lukas, a founding member of the Dawn Unity group.

The next symposium, titled “Ritual -- Common Threads and Differences,” is scheduled for 7:30 p.m. Jan. 11 at Congregation Ner Tamid, 5712 Crestridge Road, Rancho Palos Verdes. There is no admission fee for the interfaith series, but contributions are accepted.

Congregations in the group also have worshipped together. St. Luke’s Presbyterian Church in Rolling Hills and Congregation Ner Tamid have had exchanges. Last Thanksgiving, Presbyterians, Methodists, Jews and Mormons held a service together at United Methodist Church in Rolling Hills.

For the Rev. Clayton Cobb, pastor of St. Peter’s By The Sea Presbyterian Church, a side benefit has been friendships forged with other clergy.

“God’s kingdom is so much bigger than our own denominations,” Cobb said. “So, to know the story of other clergy, to know their personal faith and to know that their struggles are just like mine, puts us in a wonderful place where can help each other.”

In addition to the interfaith series, the group last month launched a new project -- two 16-week university-level courses with religious themes -- at the St. Joseph & Mary Retreat Center in Rancho Palos Verdes. The courses, which cost $200, are taught by professors from Loyola Marymount University and Marymount College.

Dawn Unity has inspired a similar group to form recently in Long Beach, under the sponsorship of the South Coast Interfaith Council. The first Long Beach seminar, held Sunday at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in Long Beach, was attended by Buddhist, Jewish, Catholic, Protestant and Bahai representatives.

At the recent free seminar in Rancho Palos Verdes, Dr. Nazir Khaja, a Torrance internist who is chairman of Islamic Information Services for California, was among the speakers. He told the mostly Christian audience that Islam has been misunderstood as a threat to the West since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

But violence is “totally wrong and against the main teachings of Islam,” he said. “You can’t form a monolithic view of Islam,” he said, saying it embraces many cultures and nations -- from Morocco to Indonesia -- and that only 20% of the world’s 1.2 billion Muslims are Arabs.

“The misunderstandings, the walls that we have built among ourselves as religions are really not doing any justice to any religion,” Khaja said later in an interview. “These must come down. It can only happen when we sit together and respect each other’s point of view, don’t trash each other views.”

The Rev. Marlene Laughlin, pastor of Wayfarers Chapel, talked about the Swedenborgian Church, whose roots date to Emanuel Swedenborg, an 18th century Swedish scientist, politician and theologian. Swedenborgians, who number only about 50,000 worldwide, accept Jesus Christ as the Messiah but do not believe in the Trinity, she said. They view the goal of human life as facing God “in the center of our being.”

For Unitarians Paul and Julie Hernandez, who live near Lunada Bay on the peninsula, the value of the gathering was their exposure to different views. “The biggest thing for me is that it affirms for me that all religions are seeking that same thing: that is, the community of all to work together to be together for the common good of man,” said Paul Hernandez, a firefighter.

The Rev. Reinhard Krauss, co-pastor at St. Luke’s Presbyterian Church in Rolling Hills Estates and a member of the group’s clergy panel, agreed.

“Too often in the past we have talked at each other, and have not allowed us to explain to each other who we are,” Krauss said. “We allow each other the space to speak from our deepest commitments rather than compare our best with their worst.”