October 14, 2009
The president's faith council meets
by Eboo Patel
The Washington Post
I told a friend that I was off to DC this week for the third meeting of the President's Faith Council, and I got a chuckle and a snide comment in return: "So what do you do after meditating together and trading spiritual insights?" he asked.
Hah! The Faith Council feels more like a second job than a self-enrichment group (the fact that our administrative meeting was held on a federal holiday should tell you something). Our task is to offer recommendations on how faith-based and community groups can better partner with the federal government in six distinct areas: poverty reduction, fatherhood and healthy families, environmental issues, interfaith cooperation, global development, and reform of the faith-based office.
The 25 Council Members can choose to be on one or more of the six committees, and many are on two or three. We are joined on these committees by an impressive collection of experts. Take the interfaith cooperation committee: a half-dozen Council member are joined by the likes of the renowned Yale theologian Miroslav Volf, the President of the Islamic Society of North America Ingrid Mattson, the Secretary General of Religions for Peace Bill Vendley, and the religion and public policy expert James Standish.
Shaping recommendations is far harder than it sounds. We want to offer ideas that feel fresh but not far-fetched, that are implementable but still visionary. There can't be too many recommendations because nobody will read them all, but there have to be enough to make a difference on the issues. A whole lot of time this past week was spent reducing the number of recommendations!
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