Eric Michael Mazur is a religion professor at Virginia Wesleyan College in Norfolk, where he teaches courses on religion and popular culture and Judaism and film. He is the editor of the Encyclopedia of Religion and Film. He is also co-editor of Religion and Outer Space, a volume exploring religion in and on the final […]

John Lyden became editor of the University of Nebraska-Omaha’s Journal of Religion and Film in 2011. He was professor of religion at Dana College from 1991-2010 and is now director of the Liberal Arts Core at Grand View University in Des Moines, Iowa. Lyden is the author of Film as Religion: Myths, Morals and Rituals and editor of The Routledge Companion […]

Rabbi James L. Mirel is chair of the Washington Coalition of Rabbis. He co-authored, with local Muslim and Christian leaders, a Seattle Times column urging moderate Jews, Christians and Muslims to persuade the American government to engage actively in pursuing peace between Israelis and Palestinians. He is rabbi of Temple B’nai Torah (Reform) in Bellevue, Wash.

Len and Libby Traubman in San Mateo, Calif., began a living room dialogue involving Palestinians, Christians and Jews. Their Call to Dialogue invites others to do the same and offers ideas on how to begin. The Traubmans organized a Children of Abraham dialogue weekend in Duluth, Minn., in fall 2004.

Hands of Peace is a summer program in Glenview, Ill., that brings youth from all sides of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict together with American kids from Christian, Islamic and Jewish homes. The Middle Eastern teens receive year-round support to maintain connections when they return home. A trio of congregations (Jewish, Muslim and Christian) founded the camp, which […]

Read a Dec. 6, 2004, Christian Science Monitor article about Christian churches considering divestment.

In September 2004, the Episcopal Church began studying whether to divest from companies helping to cause destruction in Palestine. Other religious groups speaking in favor of divestments are the Roman Catholic Sisters of Loretto and Jewish Voice for Peace, a small Jewish peace group.

Read on the Presbyterian Church (USA) website about the church’s 216th General Assembly approval in July 2004 of a controversial program involving possible “selective, phased divestments” from multinational corporations doing business in Israel. Caterpillar Inc. often is singled out for making bulldozers used to level homes and orchards of Palestinians in the West Bank and the Gaza […]

Read a Beliefnet article about Protestant churches contemplating divestment.