By Kerri Linsenbigler
Features Assignment Editor
Community service is an honored tradition at St. Bonaventure. So when the White House invited 260 schools from across the country to promote interreligious service, Bonaventure accepted.
“(The White House) really wanted campuses to get more involved in terms of religious diversity and volunteering,” said Simone Bernstein, a White House Volunteer Initiative committee member. “So, what St. Bonaventure has decided to do is work with kids of different religious affiliations … to make sure that everyone has a voice.”
While Bonaventure is a Catholic university, some students enrolled are not Catholic. The White House Volunteer Initiative encourages schools to accept different traditions and learn more about each other.
“I think it’s extremely important to embrace everyone’s culture and really understand different religions and how they relate to the campus community,” said Bernstein, a Jewish sophomore undeclared major.
Committee member Emily Deragon, a senior journalism and mass communication major, uses her position as vice president of the Student Government Association (SGA) to encourage other campus organizations to participate in the initiative.
“My role is to utilize my communication skills with the SGA clubs to encourage and incorporate all 54 clubs on the various aspects,” Deragon wrote in an email. “More specifically through documenting community service.”
The committee’s events for interreligious service began last semester with a Spirit of Assisi celebration. This service incorporated different faith traditions in remembrance of the 25th anniversary of Pope John Paul II’s interfaith call for peace. A panel discussion between members of the Abrahamic faiths (Judaism, Christianity and Islam) also occurred last semester, according to Sister Suzanne Kush, C.S.S.F., faculty adviser to the committee.
This semester, the 10-student committee plans to have even more events to promote cooperation and understanding between different religions. The main project the students are working on is an event in honor of Holocaust Remembrance Day, April 19.
“This remembers all who died in the Holocaust – persons of various ethnic and faith groups,” Deragon wrote.
Bernstein said this day allows everyone to reflect on the Holocaust’s impact on all persecuted groups.
“(We) can embrace what Holocaust means to the school itself and to college students,” she said. “It wasn’t that long ago that so many millions of people were killed in such a tragic affair.”
Sister Suzanne is also encouraging the group to plan smaller events to promote diversity, but nothing has been finalized yet, Bernstein said.
Sister Suzanne said the group is required to report its progress once a month to the U.S. Department of Education, in addition to submitting midyear and final reports.
“In terms of St. Bonaventure, the Franciscan values showcase that it’s extremely important to serve your community,” Bernstein said. “But really we want to make sure that kids are not only (volunteering) because they have to, but because they want to.”
linsenka10@bonaventure.edu
