Loading ...
`David Shenk spoke to a crowded room about the Islamic Iranian Revolution and his work with trying to create peace among religions.
David’s mother had graduated from Millersville as a teacher around 1930 and moved to East Africa where Shenk was born and taught by her for 10 years.
As an author, Shenk has written several books on religion and specifically the relationship between the Christian and Muslim faiths. His latest book is titled “A Muslim and a Christian in Dialogue,” in which he has a conversation with a Muslim leader across seven topics.
The majority of his talk was centered around his visits to Iran and meetings with Shiite clerics about the relationship between Christians in America and Muslims in Iran.
He has been a speaker at four conference-like meetings among leaders in each religion, where hot topics in differences between the religions and issues of the world have been addressed. Shenk said these talks were of “high academic caliber” and agreed with a Muslim organizer of a speech that described them as “a profound encounter.”
Shenk also said, “I was of the greatest admiration for the Shiite clerics who had invited me to speak.”
As a Christian, Shenk was an outsider at many of these Muslim talks, yet he was greatly welcomed by the Shiite clerics. Following one of his discussions, he heard comments from many clerics who were stunned to hear that an American Christian was such a person of peace. The Muslim clerics were surprised to hear this because in their eyes, these two things did not mix which is something Shenk found troubling.
Other than these talks, he has also been witness to events such as an exchange program, where the women scholars of each faith were guests at the other’s University in order to gain a more worldly view of their faith, and to give students of the opposite religious study a chance to interact deeply with someone of different faith.
Another opportunity Shenk has had was to be a part of a conversation with the president of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. After a meeting in which Shenk followed Ahmadinejad’s talk, he spoke with the president briefly and was invited to a session that included leaders of many Christian backgrounds to discuss their concerns with Ahmadinejad. These dialogues have since expanded to four such talks that have been held in both the U.S. and Iran.
Following his talk, Shenk opened the floor for questions, and answered concerns regarding such things as the treatment of women in Iran and some of his personal thoughts about why his efforts are important.
Jim McLaughlan, a sophomore Secondary Education Social Studies major, was at the talk partly for extra credit for a psychology class and partly because of his interest in American and Iranian diplomatic relations. McLaughlan said, “There were parts that I had a different view but I respect [Shenk] overall.”
Robah Hess, a Senior International Studies major, attended for extra credit and for his own personal interests. Hess had a very unique perspective of the talk because he had grown up in the middle east and had just finished reading one of Shenk’s books. Hess said “I learned a lot about this open dialogue that has been going on and I am in agreement about the need for peace.”