Newsletters and Updates

Current Articles Indonesia Seminar 2009 (February 2008) Little Rock Cities Program (February 2008) Restorative Justice Work (February 2008) Interfaith Dialogue Initiative (February 2008) Ghost Ranch Workshop (January 2008) Local Training Opportunities (April 2007) Hong Kong/China Seminar 2008 (April 2007) Hartford Seminary Course (February 2007) Truth and Friendship Commission Update (January 2007) South Africa Seminar 2007 (January 2007) Aceh Peace Project Prospers (December 2006) Plowshares Celebrates 25th Anniversary (November 2006)

Interfaith Dialogue, Human Rights, Research, and Development
 
December 2007

A new pilot project on this theme continues Plowshares partnership with Dr. Professor Hafid Abbas, Director General of Research and Development in the Ministry of Law and Human Rights (HRRDA). In this role, Dr. Abbas serves as coordinator of research and development for the numerous governmental ministries in Indonesia. Hartford Seminary is the other partner in this project with direct support from President Heidi Hadsell and Prof. David Roozen.

Heidi Hadsell and Bob Evans, in cooperation with Hafid Abbas and his HRRDA staff, led the first of two week-long workshops in Jakarta in August 2007. The focus of this workshop was on the role of religion in either promoting or inhibiting and national development. The participants included senior representatives of the ministries as well as human rights and development representatives from universities, civic organizations and non-government organizations.  The leadership included distinguished Indonesian resource persons from both Christian and Muslim communities. 

The second workshop in the pilot project for a second group of 30 participants is scheduled for Spring of 2008.  If funds are available, a third component of this pilot project will bring ten of the Indonesians who participated in the first two workshops to Hartford Seminary in June of 2008 for three weeks of extensive course work in the fields of interfaith dialogue and applied research as well as meetings with development organizations in the United States.  These participants would then be equipped to extend these priorities and techniques throughout their ministries upon their return to Indonesia.

Heidi Hadsell and Bob Evans agree that one of the most significant developments in this project is the recognition by the largest ministry in the Indonesian government that religion and religious communities affect development in implicit and explicit ways.  The government’s commitment to equipping key officials in skills of interfaith dialogue and applied research is an example not just to other Indonesian ministries, but also other predominantly Muslim nations that watch developments in Indonesia closely due to its size and status within the Muslim community.