Split the Plate is one of UUCW’s programs of outreach and generosity. Each month we give half of all undesignated offering monies to a non-profit organization as a way to help us live our Unitarian Universalist values and serve our community.
Our Split the Plate partner for September is the Interfaith Conference of Greater Milwaukee. Interfaith was founded in a tiny storefront on Vilet Street in 1970 and is now celebrating its monumental 50th anniversary. Its new Executive Director, Pardeep Singh Kaleka takes his new post in an organization founded by members of the Christian and Jewish communities working together for civil rights.
Today’s mission and membership have expanded this former mission and membership. Today’s focus has added promoting interfaith dialogue and support in the Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, Sikh, and other faith communities including Unitarian Universalist. Twenty faiths and denominations are represented and Interfaith also works closely with several nonmember faiths.
Interfaith has addressed the United States becoming increasingly religiously diverse and has chosen to be at the forefront of efforts to counter hate while fostering interfaith, intercultural, and interracial understanding, tolerance, and friendships across our county and city-suburban lines.
Our Interfaith Conference of Greater Milwaukee will:
* Dialogue to build personal relationships
* Conduct public programing to counter hate and fear while fostering interfaith, intercultural and interracial understanding, tolerance, and friendship.
* Work together on hunger, unemployment, environmental challenges, and other social issues to create a better society for everyone.
As the newly retired prior executive director, Tom Heinen has observed, “We have grown and the world has changed. The community is much more diverse than it has been. There are growing concerns about immigrants and refugees, and there is increased polarization on a host of issues. When you don’t have contact with people, it’s easier to fall prey to misinformation. It’s easier to demonize people. It’s important to ensure that no one faith is demonized and to ensure that groups of people who are different, for whatever reason, are not feared and discriminated against.”
And so please stay tuned and do check back each week of September for more knowledge about the integrity of, the caring of, and the human activities of our Interfaith Conference of Greater Milwaukee.
To donate to the Interfaith Conference of Greater Milwaukee, go to the UUCW website’s donate tab. The shepherd for the Interfaith Conference of Greater Milwaukee is Pat Rierson.
