Minutes of first Interfaith soc meeting of new year

University of Manchester Interfaith Society
6:00pm, 15/01/2008
St Peter's Chaplaincy's Library

Attending

James, Kevin, Mo, Simon, Yoji

Apology

Joy



Approval of the minutes of last meeting held in 11/12/2007
Approved

Events Calender between 21/01/2008 to 14/03/2008

22/01/2008

-Tu B'Shevat (Jewish New Year for Trees)

-Visit Jackson's Row Manchester Reform Synagogue

-Yoji will arrange a visit.

29/01/2008

-Hare Krishina

-Invite a ISKCON member to give us talk about Hare Krishina diet and if possible ask to prepare us meal.

-We will pay for the cost of food

-Kevin will pay them a visit to their temple this Friday and ask

-Yoji will see if it is possible to claim union funding



05/02/2008

Pancake day

-Join a celebration at Catholic Chaplaincy of University of Manchester
-Kevin will check the exact schedule
-We may also have a small meeting to finalise the topic/theme of Banquet


12/02/2008

-Invite new Muslim Chaplin for a talk
-May be, Hana could make an invitation.
-James will give Yoji the detail so he can pass it to Hana



19/02/2008

-Society Meeting prior to the Banquet, plus Film plus food

26/02/2008

-Invite Sikh Speaker from the last Banquet for a talk

-John will contact the speaker

-James is going to find out where John is at the moment



04/03/2008

-Banquet
-The date may be changed to Wednesday or Thursday
-More details in the next section



11/03/2008

-End of the term meeting


Church/Temple/Synagogue/Mosque Visit
-21/01/2008 World Religion Days at Baha'i Center in Fallowfield.
-Chinese New Year (a celebration at Chinese Buddhist temple)
-Purim (Jewish) March 21 - March 22
-Multifaith week - Kevin will find out the date
-Standing invitation from Sikh (Saturday 7 am)
-Standing invitation from Hare Krishina (Sunday)

The Banquet

Date
-It will be held duringManchester Peace Week (01/03/08-09/02/08) http://www.peaceweek.co.uk/2008/01/
-According to Nathan & Clare, preferred day for the Banquet is Wednesday or Thursday rather than Tuesday due to schedule crush with other event.
-James will esquire about it in the staff meeting held in 16/01/2008

Location
- James suggested that more neutral location is preferred than St. Peter's Chaplaincy
- There is a possibility that the Students' Union of Manchester Metropolitan University may let us use their conference room
- James will make inquiry to a member of Man Met students' union executive.

Publicity
-James will ask Gary to make poster and leaflet. It should be ready by 19/02/2008
-Poster should be posted to Students' Union Building of Man Met and UofM, Barlington Society, International Society, Middle Eastern Department (Various members are responsible for distribution of the posters)
-Leaflet should be distributed during Wednesday soup and Chinese packed lunch (Mo)
-Student's Direct and Students' Union Event Diary should be contacted (Yoji or Kevin)
-Email/letter invitation to all religions societies in Man Met and UofM (James will obtain email lists from ManMet, Yoji from UofM)
-Facebook - Joy
-Mailing List - Yoji is making a mailing group using googlegroup.
-James will ask Nathan if the Banquet can be included in publicity material for Peace Week 2008

Guest & Speaker
- We have decided to postpone this matter until the topic/theme of the event is decided

Topic/Theme
- Many society members could not attend today's meeting due to various circumstances
- We have decided to canvass for the topic/theme for another 2/3 weeks
- The theme/topics must be finalised by 05/02
- The Banquet coincide with Peace week and Multifaith Women's day of prayer
- It was pointed out that we have done many topic related to peace and women so maybe, different topic may be appropriate
- Given that it is held in the peace week, the topic for this particular Banquet should be positive rather than controversial (and possibly divisive)
-Topics suggested so far: Peace, Women's right, Just War, Role of religious communities in fostering peace, Role of religious communities in secular societies, Music

Retreat after the Easter holiday
-It was suggested that we should have multifaith pilgrimage instead.
-For examples, Glasgow has a multifaith museum, largest Tibetan temple in u.k., etc.
-We could visit various religious temple/church/synagogue/mosque in Glasgow over the weekend. -Transport expenses can be covered by the special funding from the union. (Yoji will look into it).
- We need to find an free accomodation to make the visit affordable for everyone.
- Each of us could get sleeping bag, so as long as we get a roof, it is fine.
- James (who used to live there) says he will look into it.

Administrative matter

Society registration
- strangely someone registered the society for us, despite us lacking union members for exective.
- Yoji has applied to life membership of SU. Once accepted, he will apply to the position of the treasurer.
- Yoji has created an mailing list account in googlegroup

Next Meeting
- A small meeting is held in 05/02/2008 before or after Pancake day event to decide the topic/theme of the next Banquet
- The next formal meeting will be held in 11/03/2008