Tree of Harmony: Interfaith Harmony Halifax (IHH) mosaic painting for Interfaith Harmony Halifax Youth project painted in February 2021,
compiled and designed by artist Calla Quist
This was the first year of the Youth Engagement Committee of IHH, and the program was held during pandemic lockdowns. I had tasked some youth to design a version of a tree with all of the participating religions as fruit. We purchased 3 inch square canvasses and young artist Calla Quist designed a coded system of creatively loose colour by numbers. Each community received a number of canvasses picked randomly, without knowing the whole. Each was painted as a unique miniature painting. Each group painted the canvasses during a program run within their own community while they did a class or session with the youth, asking the following question: how does our spiritual tradition connect us with the Earth? The youth of each community prepared one visual slide to explain their tradition's perspective on religion and the environment.
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As I drove around to pick up the completed canvasses, I was amazed by the stories of the youth group leaders and teachers. We had each chosen the age group and topic we felt would be the most appropriate for our communities, and most of us chose ages 10-15. The canvasses individually were beautiful. I asked each leader to send me photos of the kids painting the tiles. Young filmmaker, Boaz Wexler put together a short film of the photos as well as the footage of putting together the painting and having it framed.
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We held an hour long Zoom session, where the youth from each community were able to present their learning to each other, and then we were able to break out into smaller mixed groups to discuss the commonalties and differences they noticed. Parents were allowed to attend if they wished, as well as teachers and leaders, but it was not a public session, as we wanted the children to feel comfortable and safe to share whatever they wished. It was quite amazing to watch.
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The painting hung for about a year at one of the Halifax Public Libraries, along with a QR code beside it with a link to the short film. More than 100 youth from 9 different faith communities participated in the project.
Reflection:
Person to person connection
One of the key threads running through the eportfolio as well as my coursework is the transformational power of relationships. We all meet people all the time. Our networks are built one handshake, phone call, zoom call, meeting at a time. We are connected socially, professionally, digitally and much of this is at a relatively superficial level.
Relationships require more time and trust. It is often easier to develop closeness with someone who shares the same culture, values, views or interests. It can be challenging to connect with someone whose lens is very different from our own, perhaps difficult even to know where to begin.
When I think about these interfaith experiences, particularly on the organizational side where we need to work collaboratively, there are often unanticipated pitfalls. I might suggest, for example, that we examine a question as part of a faith tradition, and a group might object that their spiritual tradition is a practice rather than a faith, and a slip like this can make an entire community feel disrespected. Without intending to, one can easily misstep. Through interacting personally in pursuit of a common goal however, forgiveness is the default position, as we know we are all there to learn about one another.
The reward for taking this risk of possibly making a mistake is that this curiosity remains. When it comes time to ask hard questions, we are more easily able to ask when we have built this closeness. Trust is expanded through this connection and the groundwork for difficult conversations is laid.