On Sunday afternoon February 4 about 100 people gathered at 12 tables for the first in person Celebration of Abraham event since 2019. The Celebration of Abraham is an interfaith group in Yolo County, California that has members from the Christian, Jewish and Muslim faiths as well as people from other faiths and those who don’t identify with a religious faith. This year’s event took place at a Lutheran Church in Davis, California.
At this year’s event participants heard from three speakers from each of the three faiths reflect on this year’s theme “Generous Listening.” Anne Kjemtrup and Vera Sandronsky, both members of the Sisterhood of Salaam Shalom and also on the Board of the Celebration of Abraham, introduced the structured listening exercise, which offered each participant at the table the opportunity to practice the first step in deep listening. Listeners at the table were asked to reflect back to each person at the table as they responded to a prompt, “Think about a time in your life when you felt hesitant or uncomfortable to express yourself. Describe what happened, what that felt like.” Listeners shared what strong points or emotions they heard and did not offer interpretations or judgments.
Anne recognized that this practice of sharing and listening is hard and can be uncomfortable, but that does not mean being unsafe. The listening approach was based on training Anne and Vera received through the Sisterhood’s facilitation training program with NewGround (https://mjnewground.org/), an organization that offers training to facilitate Muslim and Jewish conversations. The Celebration of Abraham Board believed the listening exercise would
challenge our community during these difficult times and wondered if people would hesitate to share. As Anne and Vera observed at the event, people were engaged in active conversations and some table groups asked for more time. At the end of the exercise, participants were asked to write down, “How do you see using this listening tool in your life today?” One of the reflections captured what so many of us feel: “The world is in need of more people who listen well. Need to keep on working on these tools so that they become a natural part of one’s listening.” After the event, our Celebration of Abraham Board met and reflected on what we had learned. We had trained volunteer table facilitators in advance of February 5 and the feedback we received during the training really helped us refine the program. The training we gave included explaining the tools and taking the volunteers through the structured listening exercise, which offered an immediate experience of deep sharing and listening. Our post-event reflections included meeting with our volunteer facilitators and discussing our community’s need for dialogue and what the Celebration of Abraham might provide to address this need. We provided the space to practice listening skills, and in participant evaluations, there was motivation to keep on practicing!
- Anne Kjemtrup and Vera Sandronsky