Interfaith Leadership A Primer

A guide for students, groups, and organizations seeking to foster interfaith dialogue and promote understanding across religious lines

In this book, renowned interfaith leader Eboo Patel offers a clear, detailed, and practical guide to interfaith leadership, illustrated with compelling examples. Patel explains what interfaith leadership is and explores the core competencies and skills of interfaith leadership, before turning to the issues interfaith leaders face and how they can prepare to solve them. Interfaith leaders seek points of connection and commonality—in their neighborhoods, schools, college campuses, companies, organizations, hospitals, and other spaces where people of different faiths interact with one another. While it can be challenging to navigate the differences and disagreements that can arise from these interactions, skilled interfaith leaders are vital if we are to have a strong, religiously diverse democracy. This primer presents readers with the philosophical underpinnings of interfaith theory and outlines the skills necessary to practice interfaith leadership today.

Eboo Patel is the founder and president of Interfaith Youth Core and the author of Acts of Faith and Sacred Ground. He was a member of President Obama’s inaugural faith council, is a regular contributor to the Washington Post, Huffington Post, CNN, and public radio, and speaks frequently about interfaith cooperation on college campuses. He lives in Chicago with his wife and two boys.

Introduction

IDENTITY
1 The Identity of an Interfaith Leader

THEORY
2 The “Inter” in Interfaith
3 The “Faith” in Interfaith

VISION
4 The Vision of Interfaith Leadership

KNOWLEDGE BASE
5 The Knowledge Base of Interfaith Leadership

SKILL SET
6 The Skill Set of Interfaith Leadership

QUALITIES
7 The Qualities of Interfaith Leadership

Conclusion

Appendix: Summary of Frameworks

Acknowledgments

Notes

Works Cited

Index