THE PULPIT: Springs rabbi aims to foster interfaith understanding
Can’t we all just get along?
Apparently not, judging from the animosity people sometimes show toward others whose religious beliefs differ from theirs.
But in recent years there’s been progress in interfaith dialogue, and in Colorado Springs, some of the credit goes to Rabbi Howard Hirsch.
For 20 years, Hirsch has built bridges between Christians, Jews and Muslims. On Tuesday, Hirsch’s nonprofit, The Center for Christian-Jewish Dialogue, will present an interfaith dialogue at the Doubletree Hotel World Arena. The event, which is sold out, features Catholic priest John Pawlikowski, a professor of ethics at the Catholic Theological Union in Chicago; Will Stoller-Lee, director of the Fuller Seminary in the Springs; and Rabbi Bruce Dollin of the Hebrew Educational Alliance Congregation in Denver.
Hirsch’s approach to interfaith dialogue is to highlight what the faiths have in common, rather than what sets them apart.
“There is colossal ignorance about each other,” Hirsch told me, “but there is also a lot that we share.”
Hirsch said similarities among the Abrahamic faiths – Christianity, Judaism and Islam – include worshiping the same God and drawing from the same biblical texts of ancient Israel.
But what, I ask, about Jews who reject the New Testament and Jesus’ divinity; Christians who dismiss the Koran as false revelation and claim the Jewish canon was superseded by the gospels; and Muslims who view Christ as prophet but not the final authority? How can these differences be reconciled?
“The best way is through conversation,” Hirsch said. “We learn how to respect our differences while searching for commonalities. Most think dialogue is debate, but it’s informed conversation.”
Of the Christian-Jewish relationship, marred by periods of anti-Semitism over the centuries, Hirsch said both sides have much to understand.
“Jesus, of course, was Jewish,” Hirsch said. “All his disciples were Jewish. Christianity originally was a movement by Jews for Jews.
“At the same time,” he continued, “Jews never read the New Testament, and that is a mistake.”
From 1989 till 1997, Hirsch was rabbi of Temple Shalom. He resigned because he wanted more time to run The Center for Christian-Jewish Dialogue, 3485 N. Academy Blvd., founded in 1995 to organize public lectures in churches and synagogues. Since 1989, Hirsch has been on the faculty of Regis University in the religious studies department.
Hirsch’s goal for the center is simple, yet ambitious.
“I want to eliminate conflict and distrust through dialogue,” he said.
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