NEWS STORY: Alabama lays claim to longest Christian-Jewish dialogue

c. 1997 Religion News Service MOBILE, Ala. _ It’s not at all unusual in this age of religious pluralism for clergy members of various faiths to get together and hash our their differences while looking for points of agreement. It is uncommon, however, for laity to do so, especially when such dialogue extends beyond a […]

c. 1997 Religion News Service

MOBILE, Ala. _ It’s not at all unusual in this age of religious pluralism for clergy members of various faiths to get together and hash our their differences while looking for points of agreement.

It is uncommon, however, for laity to do so, especially when such dialogue extends beyond a few brief encounters. But in what may be one of the longest-running U.S. interfaith dialogues, a group of Christians and Jews in Mobile have been meeting to talk about faith and religious intolerance for more than 20 years.”It’s the longest-functioning, consistently meeting lay group in the country,”said Mary Filben, who with her husband founded the group in 1975.


Filben’s claim may be true, according to the National Conference _ formerly known as the National Conference of Christians and Jews _ a group that combats religious, ethnic and cultural bigotry and promotes such grassroots dialogues.

Even if the Mobile dialogue is not the longest-running, one national interfaith expert is impressed by its longevity.”This is unusual, there’s no question,”said Gunther Lawrence, executive director of the Interreligious Information Center in New York. There are numerous interfaith groups formed between clergy members, he added, but a successful interfaith dialogue that combines clergy and lay people is hard to find.”One of the biggest problems is that too much interreligious dialogue, whether on the international or national level, never filters into the grassroots,”Lawrence added.”That’s where we’re failing in interreligious relations.” Filben’s group could serve as a national model for a successful interfaith dialogue, he said.

The dialogue began as an offshoot of the Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs Commission of the Roman Catholic diocese. Initially, the Filbens invited local rabbis and their congregants to join Catholics in watching and discussing a filmstrip on the sometimes troubled relations between Christians and Jews.”At first I think we were all a little fearful because we didn’t know where we were going, but we wanted and we needed to go somewhere,”Filben said.

One local synagogue _ the Springhill Avenue Temple _ already had a discussion group,”Dessert and Dialogue,”which they opened up to the interfaith group. Soon, a steering committee was formed, and”almost 200 Jews and Catholics (evenly split) signed up to participate,”according to temple records.

Later, home group meetings, or”havurot,”were formed for Jews and Catholics to meet and get to know one another. Soon they invited Protestant laity and clergy to participate.

At first, the home groups met monthly, but after a number of years the members decided the discussions needed to go to a deeper level.”There was a real danger of it being a tea-and-cookie group because we were getting so comfortable, just patting each other on the back,”said Filben.”We knew we had to get beyond that.” To go deeper, the interfaith dialogue began inviting experts on Jewish and Christian theology, and moved the meetings out of homes and into various houses of worship.

At one recent meeting, for example, the discussion centered on a talk by Clark M. Williamson, a professor of theology at Christian Theological Seminary in Indianapolis, on whether Christians should seek to convert Jews. He examined recent denominational statements on proselytizing Jews, including the Southern Baptist Convention’s 1996 resolution reiterating its commitment to evangelizing Jews.


While such resolutions may still spark interreligious tensions, Filben said she believes relations between Christians and Jews in Mobile have improved as a result of the talks.”They are better. I don’t know that we’ve seen any miraculous changes, but when people begin to open their minds to each other and respect each others’ differences, that’s a big change,”she said.

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The dialogue’s success may be the result of relatively cordial relations between Jews and Christians in Mobile for over a century.”I think we seem to coexist very harmoniously with respect for each others’ views and in general, an ability to talk and discuss things,”said Richard Frank, president of the Springhill Avenue Temple.

Norman Berger, president of Ahavas Chesed synagogue, said he has never experienced anti-Semitism in Mobile.”Having run for elective office and being elected, I can tell you, if it’s there _ and I’m sure it might be there _ I’ve never felt any consequences of it,”said Berger, who once served on the school board.

While there are some recorded incidents of anti-Semitism in the city’s history, there has not been any large-scale effort to evangelize Jews that Berger can remember.

But on occasion, Berger, who is also a dentist, has had patients bring him Gospel tracts or try to tell him about Jesus. He answers such efforts with a bit of humor and some reverse proselytizing _ at pliers-point.”I just tell ’em they’re going to convert to Judaism while they’re in the chair or I’ll pull a tooth _ `you have a choice, convert or an extraction,'”he laughed.

(For more information, check out the Mobile Jewish-Christian Dialogue’s home page at http://www.webspawner.com/users/jcdialogue.)

MJP END DEA

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