Weds Oct 15th 2008 Conference - "Faith
in our city - the role of faith communities in social
cohesion"
The chair of the Southampton Council of Faiths (SCOF), Jeff
Lynn, hailed their first conference as a great success, “The
conference clearly delivered the message to a broad range of
local authority, health and education leaders that faith
communities are a positive force for good in Southampton. It
was encouraging to hear speakers such as Chief
Superintendent Matthew Greening talk about faith matters in
such a constructive and fluent way.”
SCOF represents the seven major faiths in the City: Baha'i,
Buddhism, Christianity, Jewish, Hindu, Islam and Sikh and it
organised its first ever conference in the City on Wednesday
October 15th aimed at engaging leaders from the Council,
Local Authority, Education, Health and Business in issues
that relate to faith. Drawing on local knowledge and those
working in the City, such as Jonathon Chesire and also
bringing an external perspective with John Devine from the
North West of England, it highlighted the importance of
faith in the City and the role that it plays in social
cohesion. Those of faith work alongside those from no faith
in many areas with the emphasis on everyone working together
to build bridges and improve the lives of the most
disadvantaged in the City.
Frequent reference was made to the government's recent
report 'Face to face and side by side' about working with
faith groups and integrating them in all aspects of work
across the country. Dr Redwan El-Khayat introduced the work
of the Council of Faiths in relation to this report and set
the scene for the conference. Councillor Dr Parvin Damani
challenged the Council of Faiths and those across the City
to take equality seriously, not just in relation to faith
but to other areas such as gender and age.
Southampton is culturally a very diverse city but community
relations remain strong and many during the conference
referred to how that gives us a special perspective on
social cohesion matters. |
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Jeff reminded the audience of some of the successes
of the Council of Faiths, particularly the
cross-City response to the 2004 tsunami when £60,000
was raised and one of the members personally
delivered the aid to the region and the excellent
series produced by Meridian TV, “Faith in the City”
to which the Council had a significant input. |
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All photos courtesy
of Ben Harrison |
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