Beyond Belief
Commentary |Creating A Hub For Religious Fluency
Imagine a day when: Any Christian fifth-grader in Kansas City who meets a Muslim fifth-grader immediately says to the Islamic child, “salaam alaikum,” the traditional Muslim greeting that means “peace to you.” Any Buddhist adult here who encounters a Jew after sundown on Friday routinely greets the Jew with these words, “Shabbat Shalom,” meaning a…
Read MoreA Force for Refugees
It was during daily walks from her lecture hall to hospital rotations that Sophia Khan first experienced poverty. Born to a wealthy family in Karachi, Pakistan, Khan was a second-year medical student in her homeland when she discovered that the unsheltered groups waiting outside the hospital were poor people wanting to be near their loved…
Read MorePicnic for Area Refugees Helps Newcomers Assimilate
When Ahmad al-Abboud brought his wife and five children to the United States from war-torn Syria, he carried with him a vision of this country — of scantily clad people kissing in the streets — he feared would clash with his conservative Muslim culture. But what he found upon settling in Kansas City in April…
Read MoreMy, How the Garden Grows
Located among strip malls, office buildings and rows of uniform houses, The Temple, Congregation B’nai Jehudah in Overland Park is in the heart of suburbia. But park your car behind the temple, which sits on Nall Avenue a little south of 119th Street, wander up a winding dirt path, and you will find that you’ve…
Read MoreCommentary |Faith in KC’s Southeast High School
The last time I had seen Ke’Montay Smith was last spring at the final graduation of the soon-to-be-closed Southwest High, where she was a student. She was wearing her snappy ROTC uniform and was part of the color guard. But now here she was at Southeast High School’s orientation night in August. This lively, bright…
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