Secular Students in Interfaith Settings

Interfaith is a hot trend on college campuses right now. Universities, colleges and even high schools are focusing more and more on multiculturalism, diversity and inclusiveness, and this idea of bringing together individuals of differing worldviews to participate in everything from dialogues to massive service projects is catching on like wildfire. Many of these programs have extended an invitation to secular students - and secular students are figuring out how best to respond and/or engage with this new trend.

Whether you are enthusiastic about interfaith projects and looking for ways to get involved, need to convince other members of your group to get on board, or have serious reservations about participating, we hope we can provide assistance and guidance through this page. It's a work in progress, so check back often as we're adding new resources!

Why Secular Students Should Get Involved

Why We Should Get Involved in Interfaith

SSA Director of Campus Organizing Lyz Liddell provides a purely pragmatic explanation of the material and political benefits of secular students getting involved with interfaith programs. You won't find high-minded ideological reasoning here - just compelling, practical reasons.

Should the Nonreligious Join in Interfaith Work?

Chris Stedman is author of the blog NonProphet Status and Managing Director of State of Formation for The Journal of Inter-Religious Dialogue, with experience with the Interfaith Youth Core and the Humanist Chaplaincy at Harvard University,. In this article, he provides a more ideologically-based call to interfaith action. A longer read, but if you need reasons that you can feel good about, this is the place.

Bridging the Divide: Cooperating on Service Projects with Religious Organizations on Your Campus

Nate Mauger, 2010 Assistant Campus Organizer at the SSA, delivers a compelling presentation on the benefits his campus group gained from cooperating with a religious campus group for a week-long spring break service trip in New Orleans.

Why Interfaith Is Not Enough

Frank Bellamy, SSA board member, cautions secularists to avoid the trap of thinking of interfaith service as a cure-all for either our image problem or the real problems in the world, and provides alternate (or additional) ways students can work to improve our society.

Ways Your Group Can Get Involved

The 10th Anniversary of 9/11

The Interfaith Youth Core is gearing up for the 10th anniversary of 9/11 by organizing a day of service projects across the country! This is a great chance to have an impact in your community and to show your neighbors that atheists are here to help. The SSA is excited to be a co-sponsor of this event.

The cause of secularism is not only a marketplace of ideas, it's about encouraging dialogue and service; it's about making it clear that we denounce violence in all forms; and it's about banding with others to do the same. If you want to see the whole program, you can download the 9/11 project toolkit here.

Working with the White House

The White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships has been working to encourage interfaith community service for several months. In March of 2011, they announced the President's Interfaith and Community Service Campus Challenge: a drive to engage college campuses from the top administration down in to participate in a year-long interfaith community service project. The White House has been very specific about their desire to include secular students in these projects, and so we've been encouraging our affiliates to approach their administrations and get involved with the programs that show up on their campuses.

Greg Epstein, the Humanist Chaplain at Harvard University, wrote a great article on why non-believers shoulc be involved. You can check that out here. Although the deadline has passed for new groups to get involved, any interested students should contact Lyz Liddell on ways they can still help with this project.

Interfaith Youth Core

The Interfaith Youth Core (IFYC) is an organization dedicated to promoting interfaith cooperation among college students. In the past year, they have become increasingly welcoming to secular students and have included us in several of their more recent projects.

IFYC has a program called "Better Together" which encourages the formation of campus campaigns dedicated to interfaith service projects. You can download a toolkit or get connected with a campaign near you. "Like" their Facebook page to receive ongoing updates to the Better Together Campaign.

IFYC provides additional resources for interfaith programming, including the Interfaith Leadership Institute (a training program for student leaders - there will be two s and programs for campus faculty and staff. They currently have a special section dedicated to the President's Challenge.

Best Practices for Interfaith Work

A follow-up to his article on why the nonreligious should get involved in interfaith work, Chris Stedman provides a resource that aims to address potential problems that could come up for nonreligious individuals engaging in interfaith work, offer some best practices, lay out some special recommendations for nonreligious interfaith practitioners, and provide some examples of nonreligious interfaith work.

Service Projects and Trips: Guides and Advice

The Secular Student Alliance has an activity packet on how to recreate a week-long spring break service trip. An event like this, partnering with one or more religious organizations, offers an opportunity for dialogue, understanding and cooperation between groups of differing worldviews. Nate Mauger, former campus organizer at the SSA, gave a great presentation on his experiences on service trips with advice and recommendations for doing your own - watch it on YouTube!

Special Considerations

Preventing Misunderstandings of Atheism in Interfaith Settings

Lewis Marshall is the president of AHA! @ Stanford University. In the spring of 2009, Lewis and his group applied to become a member of the Stanford Associated Religions (SAR). As one might expect, his group's membership had some reservations about being defined as a religion. This article explains how the group handled the potential for serious misunderstanding. Lewis also has a guest post on NonProphet Status explaining the situation. You can also read the group's Memorandum of Understanding, which they provided as part of the SAR application.