Please Join Us for an Important Gathering
Co-Sponsored by UUCCSM
Concerned members of religious communities will join together this coming November for what promises to be an interactive learning experience about public policy and advocacy. The Interfaith Call to Justice: LA 2007, scheduled for November 11-12, 2007, brings together people of faith with a burning desire to create justice in their local community. Hosting this gathering will be Temple Isaiah in West Los Angeles. The two-day social justice training and community strategy planning conference will educate and train religious leaders and their congregations about how to effect systemic change through legislative and public policy advocacy.
More than 60 faith-based organizations are co-sponsoring this event including the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles, the Office of Justice and Peace of the Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles, the Presbyterian Synod of Southern California and Hawaii, the Southwest California Synod Board for Public Ministry of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the Union for Reform Judaism, and the Islamic Center of Southern California.
- Keynote speakers include:
- Father Greg Boyle, Founder/Executive Director of Jobs For A Future/Homeboy Industries
- Rev. Cecil “Chip” Murray, retired pastor of F.A.M.E. and current Chair of Christian Ethics at the University of Southern California
- Rabbi David Saperstein, Director of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism
- Maria Elena Durazo, Executive Secretary-Treasurer of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, AFL-CIO
All four individuals are examples of how organized efforts make an enormous difference. One of the topics they will address is: Moving from Charity to Justice.
During breakout sessions, participants will be introduced to the “nuts and bolts” of advocacy training, community organizing, and issue-based campaigns, such as immigration, economic justice, the environment, youth at risk, affordable health care, homelessness and affordable housing.
The conference is the brainchild of Rabbi Suzanne Singer, who has spent a year and a half planning the event. Rabbi Singer is no stranger to the social justice cause. In November 2005, she organized a similar conference within the Jewish community in Oakland, CA called the Consultation on Social Justice (COJS), winner of the Irving J. Fain Award for Social Action from the Religious Action Center.
“The conference in the Bay Area demonstrated the appetite people have for social change,” said Rabbi Singer. “The Bay Area conference also underlined the need for joining together in interfaith coalition. Clearly there is a great deal of enthusiasm for working together in this city, as over 60 congregations, denominations and faith organizations, Jewish, Christian, and Muslim, have signed up as sponsors. The LA conference is just the first step towards joint efforts in Los Angeles.”
Major Financial Support Provided by the Jewish Community Foundation of Los Angeles.
Established in 1954, the Jewish Community Foundation is the largest manager of charitable assets and the leader in planned giving solutions for Jewish philanthropists in Greater Los Angeles. The Foundation currently manages assets of nearly $750 million dollars and, according to the National Foundation Center, ranks among the ten largest Los Angeles foundations (based on assets). In 2006, The Foundation and its 1,200-plus donors distributed $63 million in grants to more than 1,500 organizations with programs that span the range of philanthropic giving.
Additional funding provided by (partial list): the local archdiocese, diocese or synod of the Episcopal, Presbyterian, Lutheran, and Catholic Churches; Brentwood Presbyterian Church; St. Alban’s Episcopal Church, Westwood; St. Michael and All Angels Episcopal Church, Studio City; the Kalsman Institute on Judaism and Health; the discretionary funds of rabbis from several Reform congregations.
Conference Location: Temple Isaiah, 10345 W. Pico Blvd., Los Angeles
PRE-REGISTRATION REQUIRED. See http://www.call-to-justice.org
