just returned from NYC where I attended the graduation and ordination of one of my friends who has completed her studies at the One Spirit Seminary, a seminary which trains Interfaith Ministers. The service took place in the beautiful Riverside Church, a house of worship to rival any of Europe's grand cathedrals.

The ocassion was somewhat of an anniversary for me. My own ordination and graduation from The New Seminary, another Interfaith Seminary in NYC, took place at the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine on June 19, 1994.

These two seminaries are small schools by comparison to many, yet for the last 20+ years they both have chosen to hold their graduation and ordination ceremonies in these most magnificent of New York's churches. Why? Size is certainly one answer. Though the seminaries are small, the graduating classes numbering less than 100, the families and friends of these students turn out in huge numbers to support them and fill the house.

But more than that, the people who come to these services are there because something within each of them resonates with the idea that each of us is connected in a deeper way to each other, than we are to our own individual religions.

The service opens with invocations and incantations from every faith as clergy and students chant prayers and calls to worship. Students come forth carrying the sacred texts of each of the major religions and places those texts upon the alter at the front of the sanctuary, acknowledging that God is One and has revealed truth to all faiths, regardless of the path chosen, and the form taken. As these sacred texts are placed on the alter we see God's word, not diminished, but expanded as we see the array of diversity. The curriculum of the first year of the seminary program is devoted to the study of these sacred texts and all the major religions of the world, and some of the mystical traditions of these.

So many of our conflicts seem to have arisen around what we have come to see as our differences, each claiming their own way, the need to be right. Yet, beneath those conflicts there is a place within each of us that recognizes that we are so much more the same than we are different. We all want the same things for ourselves and our children. We love our home, the place on the planet we feel connected to, and now, in this age of global connection through technology, we see that our home is really not separate but part of the whole.
Being back at the Seminary, seeing the shared commitment of these new graduates reminded me again of why I became an Interfaith Minister, and how blessed I am to be part of this global community of believers who share my commitment to finding a better way of relating with each other.