Skip to content
Search

Latest Stories

Top Stories

Faith leaders help heal divided communities

Faith leaders help heal divided communities
Getty Images

Reverend Jerad Morey serves as Director of Strategic Relationships with the Minnesota Council of Churches.

In times of crisis and chaos, faith communities regularly find ourselves on the front lines. We are often trusted peacemakers and mediators with our members, communities, and local officials. We are stakeholders in conversations on important and occasionally divisive political, social, and cultural debates.


In these divided and polarized times, many faith leaders can feel isolated and alone. Despite core values of peace and love, we sometimes lack formal resources and tools to support us in living out the calls of God and of our community. We may find ourselves challenged by our positions as spiritual leaders to congregants - themselves divided across political and social divides – and by our responsibility to serve as "Golden Rule Ambassadors" in the broader world.

It can be wearying. Yet there is a rising movement of faith-based and secular organizations who exist to support just this kind of peacebuilding.

In the midwest, Minnesota Council of Churches leads MCC Respectful Conversations for congregations, universities, municipalities and other groups who confront deep divides. 84% of participants say these conversations help them “empathize with others on polarizing topics” (social science shorthand for “love your enemy?”). We are one of many groups engaged in the National Week of Conversation.

The National Week of Conversation, April 17 -22, is an important opportunity for faith leaders and others to not only dialogue across lines of difference and bridge our current divides, but also to do so in a manner grounded in respect and belonging. Moreover, it is an opportunity to find like-minded individuals who are also working within and on behalf of their own faith communities.

The Week brings many opportunities to learn and practice together. Groups such as Resetting the Table will engage participants around their film Purple, the story of Americans with opposing viewpoints investigating their differences. The National Institute for Civil Discourse will host paired conversations built around the Golden Rule. Dialogue training opportunities will come from the Guibord Center with their Conversations from Your Spiritual Core and Ideos Institute with their Dialogue Lab to help cultivate empathy as a pathway toward peace and human flourishing. Find these and other events at https://conversation.us/.

Founded by the Listen First Project, the National Week of Conversation is supported by hundreds of organizations that bring Americans together to build bridges of understanding and empathy in our polarized country. Faith leaders who join will learn about engaging our differences respectfully and productively. To my eyes participation is an act of faith and hope: I am living out my core beliefs when I strengthen my own ability to be a blessed peacemaker; in so doing I also demonstrate my hope that there exists a path through the present crisis and chaos leading to a better future.

To shore up the torn and tattered social fabric that serves as a foundation for our democracy, faith leaders and representatives from across America’s religious communities have a unique and important role to play: We can bring the healing needed in our nation at this time.

Read More

Is Bombing Iran Deja Vu All Over Again?

The B-2 "Spirit" Stealth Bomber flys over the 136th Rose Parade Presented By Honda on Jan. 1, 2025, in Pasadena, California. (Jerod Harris/Getty Images/TNS)

Jerod Harris/Getty Images/TNS)

Is Bombing Iran Deja Vu All Over Again?

After a short and successful war with Iraq, President George H.W. Bush claimed in 1991 that “the ghosts of Vietnam have been laid to rest beneath the sands of the Arabian desert.” Bush was referring to what was commonly called the “Vietnam syndrome.” The idea was that the Vietnam War had so scarred the American psyche that we forever lost confidence in American power.

The elder President Bush was partially right. The first Iraq war was certainly popular. And his successor, President Clinton, used American power — in the former Yugoslavia and elsewhere — with the general approval of the media and the public.

Keep ReadingShow less
Conspiratorial Thinking Isn’t Growing–Its Consequences Are
a close up of a typewriter with the word conspiracy on it

Conspiratorial Thinking Isn’t Growing–Its Consequences Are

The Comet Ping Pong Pizzagate shooting, the plot to kidnap Governor Gretchen Whitmer, and a man’s livestreamed beheading of his father last year were all fueled by conspiracy theories. But while the headlines suggest that conspiratorial thinking is on the rise, this is not the case. Research points to no increase in conspiratorial thinking. Still, to a more dangerous reality: the conspiracies taking hold and being amplified by political ideologues are increasingly correlated with violence against particular groups. Fortunately, promising new research points to actions we can take to reduce conspiratorial thinking in communities across the US.

Some journalists claim that this is “a golden age of conspiracy theories,” and the public agrees. As of 2022, 59% of Americans think that people are more likely to believe in conspiracy theories today than 25 years ago, and 73% of Americans think conspiracy theories are “out of control.” Most blame this perceived increase on the role of social media and the internet.

Keep ReadingShow less
We Can Save Our Earth: Environment Opportunities 2025
a group of windmills in the sky above the clouds

We Can Save Our Earth: Environment Opportunities 2025

On May 8th, 2025, the Network for Responsible Public Policy (NFRPP) convened a session to discuss the future of the transition to clean energy in the face of some stiff headwinds caused by the new US administration led by Donald Trump. The panel included Dale Bryk, Director of State and Regional Policy at the Harvard Environmental and Energy Law Program and a Senior Fellow at the Regional Plan Association, and Dan Sosland, President of the Acadia Center. The discussion was moderated by Richard Eidlin, National Policy Director for Business for America.

 
 


Keep ReadingShow less