Event encourages religious harmony amongst students

Faith2face at Warwick, a religious tolerance and awareness week took place between the 18th and 22nd January.

Organised by the Coexist society, there was a programme of events with three external speakers visiting to present talks.

Coexist is a newly established, multi-faith society that aims to promote discussion and understanding between different religions.

President Leonard P. Boe explains, “religion is a reality of society and equally religious tension and misunderstanding.

“If we want to create a better society without voluntary segregation, greater tolerance is imperative.

“As a first-year society, we were very pleased to get a week dedicated to the premise of Coexist.”

The week commenced on Tuesday with psychology professor Dr. Pickering’s talk on Buddhism in contemporary society, in which he spoke about its origins, common misconceptions about the religion and how Buddhism ties in with cognitive science.

Pickering, not himself a Buddhist, gave an enlightening and impartial explanation of some of the most important tenets of Buddhism such as karma, and reincarnation, which is an offshoot of Hinduism.

He pointed out that Buddhism has been one of the only major world religions not to have been responsible for conflict.

On Wednesday, Professor Eleanor Nesbitt of the Warwick Religions and Education Research Institute gave a talk on identity in a time of ever-increasing diversity.

She explored the connection between religion and faith and culture, ethnicity and identity.

This provoked an engaging discussion on self-perception and religion in a very multi-cultural society.

Concluding the week, Peter Cave of the British Humanist Organisation gave an emotive talk entitled, “Better with or without God?” of which he argued the latter category, emphasising his belief that “religion is not the answer to questions that we are unable to qualify with science.’

However he gave a philosophical rather than evangelical exposition of his views, criticising militant atheism and highlighting the fact that as with other religions there are a vast array of atheists.

Peter Cave explained his ideological opposition to the fundamentals of religious belief but not to the individual expression of religion, stressing the need for mutual tolerance.

The talk was the best-attended of the week and provoked a heated round of questions.

Reflecting on Faith2face, President Leonard P. Boe commented: “Co-exist is a specialist society, that aims to appeal not necessarily to religious people but to those who are interested in the impact religion has on society.

The fact that the talks attracted such a good turn-out is a testament to the success of the week.”