Day one!

I have successfully completed my first day at IFYC!  Hooray!!  It was a really a great day just getting acquainted with the office and the people.  I recieved an incredibly warm welcome, which made me feel like I belonged there.   We started out the morning with a staff meeting where I was introduced to everybody and heard their reports about the work they are doing.    One of my favorite stories from the meeting was one of the staff who was on a campus visit where Westboro Baptist was protesting something and one of the Fellows-essentially a college intern for IFYC on a college campus instead of in Chicago-organized a campus response to Westboro's presence.   Six people from Westboro showed up, 1,000 college students from all varieties came together to sing and dance and join together in community.  This was all located in front of one the dorms and at one point a young man came out of the dorm to figure out what was going on, looked around, went back in his dorm and came back out a bit later with his bagpipes playing Amazing Grace.  The student body part to accept this young man into its circle and continued dancing and singing to bagpipes Amazing Grace.  When I can access my IFYC e-mail from home I will post a link to the story as written by one of the student organizers of the response.   To me this was an amazing testament of the power that interfaith work and dialogue can have.  Our meeting was filled with testaments to the work of IFYC in a variety of campuses and cities, with even some mention of the work that is happening on the Luther campus!  (GO NORSE!!!!)   

After the staff meeting, I was given a tour of the office and more formally introduced to a lot of the staff, it was a lot of names in a short amount of time but again I was greeted warmly by everybody.   I then spent the afternoon being introduced to the intiative I will be working directly with and some of the staff who are working with it.  It is a complex intertwining of a variety of elements that I am still trying to figure out.  It is called One Chicago, One Nation (OCON)  and it is aiming to encourage interfaith participation in a variety of ways, including a film contest.   As I heard about all that was happening, it made me wish I could be here this summer to see everything come together and hope to find a way to make it back for some of the bigger events this summer!   

The other big success story of the day was that I made it to and from my placement with no incidents and no getting lost! YAY!!!!