To be offered during 2009-2010

 

Overview The Awareness Foundation is an educational, international, ecumenical institution that seeks to foster community harmony through education with a difference—teaching Christians about their own faith, and that of their neighbors, so that they can live in a diverse society without fear and without compromising their faith—while respecting difference.

 

There are many existing interfaith organizations whose goal is to promote dialogue and understanding between different religions. There are also many existing Christian educational courses seeking to teach Christians the fundamental principles underlying other world religions. What makes the Awareness Foundation different is that its educational program, the Awareness Course™ seeks to impart this understanding from a Christian perspective and within the context of a modern, changing, and diverse society. It helps Christians develop an informed response to the religious and cultural diversity around them by being centered in their faith and secure in their identity. The Awareness Foundation was founded and developed by Bishop Michael Marshall (Assistant Bishop of London and former Rector of Holy Trinity, Sloane Square) and The Reverend Nadim Nassar (the only Syrian priest in the Anglican Church). The Awareness Foundation was inaugurated by the Archbishop of Canterbury on September 14, 2003.

 

The Awareness Foundation is a worldwide network comprising churches and educational institutions that span multiple Christian denominations. The network today includes representatives of the Episcopal Church of the U.S.A., the Anglican Church of Canada, the Church of England, the Roman Catholic Church, the Greek and Russian Orthodox Churches, the Methodist, Lutheran, Presbyterian, and the Congregational and Armenian Protestant Churches. The Awareness Foundation’s regional reach currently extends to North America (Washington D.C., New York, Maryland, South Carolina, Louisiana, Canada, Puerto Rico, and Antigua), Europe (U.K., Germany, and Spain), the Middle East (Jordan, Lebanon, and Syria), and Australia. The Awareness Foundation's ordained and lay consultants from the United Kingdom and these other regions met together in London in September 2004 for the first time to plan the way forward. In December 2004, the Middle Eastern Consultants held a Regional Conference in Beirut; the North American Conference took place in Charleston, S.C., in May 2005. The most recent International Consultants Conference was held in Aleppo, Syria in June, 2007. St. Paul’s has a special relationship with the Awareness Foundation as Fr. Sloane is Chairman of the Board of The Awareness Foundation America and Linda Wilkinson is the North American Coordinator.

 

Awareness Course In 2009-2010, St. Paul’s will offer a an eight-week module of the Awareness Course (schedule to be announced). he Awareness Course provides participants with the opportunity to explore Christianity in the context of today's reality. It brings Islam and Judaism into this process so that participants can understand and apply their own faith in a diverse world, free from fear and prejudice. Written from a Western as well as a Middle Eastern perspective, the course reflects Christianity's original culture.  This year’s course, “The Diversity Code”, takes passages from the Old and New Testaments to show how God has always intended a diverse world and how we can follow the risen Lord to live abundantly in even the most diverse of societies.  Passages such as Jesus’ encounter with the Samaritan woman, Jesus’ encounter with the Syro-Phoenician woman, and the Call to Abraham show how God's message is universal. Christianity is not something to be shared with only a select group of friends—our faith belongs in a world of diversity! 

 

For more information about the Awareness Course, contact Linda Wilkinson: ljwilkinson2@gmail.com or 703-266-8721.