22.02.2022

Meeting of people of different religions

Participants of the JCM meeting in Tanzania; © Photo: JCM/UEM

Participants of the JCM meeting in Vallendar; © Photo: Leo Mindel

"Stewards of Creation: What our faith traditions teaches us about environmental protection." - That is the theme of the 49th International Conference of Jews, Christians and Muslims (JCM), February 21-27, 2022. The conference brings together participants from the three Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam) from Germany, England, Israel, Tanzania, Congo and Indonesia - in three different locations and online.

In Tanzania, a group meets at the Sebastian Kolowa Memorial Universtiy in Lushoto and in Tanga; in Germany, JCM representatives meet at Haus Wasserburg in Vallendar. Due to increasing corona infections in the Asian region, the JCM meeting in Indonesia has been postponed to August this year. Other participants will attend online at Sebastian Kolowa University and in Vallendar.
 
JCM has pioneered the meeting of representatives of the three Abrahamic religions. Among the numerous interfaith initiatives, often initiated by the JCM experiment, JCM continues to stand out for its unusually open and direct way of bringing people of different religions together in person. For 18 years, the UEM has been one of the sponsors, along with Jewish and Islamic organizations, of the JCM process, which has now been going on for almost five decades.

The conference topics will deal with the issue from a Jewish, Christian and Muslim perspective. In addition to the lectures, there will be project groups and group discussions. In Tanzania there will be an additional excursion to religious environmental protection projects.  

The JCM weekend was traditionally opened with church services on Friday: Participants participated in the worship services of their respective faith traditions and, to the extent they can arrange it, those of other participants as well.

This year, the JCM conference is being held in parallel with the JCM college collaboration. Students from the Abraham Geiger Kolleg, the Faculty of Protestant Theology of the Ruhr-Universität Bochum and the German Islam Kolleg will meet one day before to discuss the concept of dialogue between all three religions. They will also participate in two other extended weekends where they will discuss the images of God in the three religions and social responsibility in the three religions.