Dear friend,

I am pleased to inform you that our crowdfunding campaign for the United Planet Faith & Science Initiative reached and exceeded its revised $13,000 goal! Thank you to all of the 45 contributors, and to the lead support of the Julia Burke Foundation for making this campaign a success.

To read more about this special project, and how we plan to put this groundswell of support to use, click here.

In other news, we held a Women’s Seminar on Faith, Environment and Activism, which brought together young Christian, Jewish, and Muslim women and focused on empowering them to be active in environmental issues based on faith teachings. Click here to read more. To see videos from it, click here.

Our organization also held, in collaboration with Rabbis for Human Rights, an interfaith seminar with Jewish, Muslim, and Christian seminary and other students. The seminar took place in the pine forest and olive groves of the Gilboa Mountains and explored coexistence and shared ecological concerns. Read more here.

Our eco-tourism branches, Eco Israel Tours and Jewish Eco Seminars, worked with a number of groups, including from Brandeis University on the connection between Israel, ecology, and faith teachings. We also will start offering a bi-weekly eco tour in and near Jerusalem that is open to the public.

Finally, we are planning a Jordan River seminar for seminary students and clergy for March 31st, in collaboration with Friends of the Earth Middle East. It will explore interfaith perspectives on the Jordan River and contemporary challenges it is facing. This is the link to the seminar page.

With warm regards from Jerusalem,

Rabbi Yonatan Neril

Founder and Director
The Interfaith Center for Sustainable Development