This public meeting will examine how international factors influence these four conflicts, and compare efforts to achieve a just and peaceful resolution to them. Key experts and activists from the conflict zone will address the meeting.

Time: 7-9 PM

Venue: Edmund Burke Theatre, Arts Building, Trinity College Dublin

Contact: geopolitics2012@gmail.com

Click here to download the poster.

Images: Layden chairs the event; Shore and Williams

Dr Lee Smithey, Associate Professor of Sociology, Swarthmore College, Pennsylvania

‘No More Them and Us’ or An Alternative Ulster?:
Unionists, Loyalists, and Conflict Transformation

Thursday 17 May 12.30 – 1.30pm

For a flyer about the event, click here.

At the Irish School of Ecumenics, Trinity College Dublin, 683 Antrim Road, Belfast, BT15 4EG

To book a place please RSVP by return of email, or call Caroline Clarke on 9077 0087.

Parking on site is very limited so it is better to park in side streets, however if you need special access please feel free to use our car park.

Community Relations Week 2012, takes place from May 14 to May 20, organised by the Community Relations Council, with the theme ‘No More Them and Us?’    Over 150 events will take place across all local council areas making this the biggest event in the community relations calendar.
Tony McCusker, CRC Chair welcomes the progress made in the ten years since Community Relations Week began in 2003 but stresses the continued need to tackle difficult issues:“The vision of a society which has moved beyond ‘Them and Us’ still has to be turned into reality. Taking part in Community Relations Week events is an active way of demonstrating your dedication to peace building.”

A full listing of Community Relations Week events can be found at www.nicrc.org.uk and printed programmes can be obtained from local libraries.

The speaker at the the launch was Rev. Harold Good. Good praised the new book, and paid tribute to the work of McMaster and his colleagues in the Irish School of Ecumenics’ Education for Reconciliation programme – Cathy Higgins, Denis Anderson and Eileen Gallagher – over many years.

Click here to read McMaster’s response to Good’s remarks.

Audio of Good’s remarks, and McMaster’s response:

Press play above or right click here to download mp3 file…

Venue: Trinity College Dublin: Long Room Hub, Lecture Theatre

Booking and Information: ressec@tcd.ie

In spite of the powerful secularization processes under communism and the ensuing transformation of religious institutions, authorities, practices, and levels of faith commitment, the religious factor remained an important cultural force and identity marker in the Balkans. Moreover, religious outlooks continued to shape and inform gender regimes. Postcommunist developments in the Balkans brought about a significant redefinition of the roles and status of Muslim women—both in the Muslim communities themselves and in the larger societies. Drawing on literature from the region and on my own fieldwork, I will discuss the place and role of Muslim women in different spheres of life such as the family, religious education and the public arena, focusing also on the veil as a central issue in debates on Islam and women.

Ina Merdjanova is a Marie Curie Fellow at the Irish School of Ecumenics / Trinity College Dublin (2010-12). She previously served as director of the Center for Interreligious Dialogue and Conflict Prevention at Sofia University, Bulgaria (2004-2010). She received her PhD from Sofia University, and has held visiting fellowships internationally. Her publications include: Religion, Nationalism, and Civil Society in Eastern Europe—The Postcommunist Palimpsest (Edwin Mellen Press, 2002); Religion as a Conversation Starter: Interreligious dialogue for Peacebuilding in the Balkans (co-authored with Patrice Brodeur; Continuum, 2010). She is currently finalizing a book project on Muslim communities in the Balkans after the fall of communism.

The Roll of Honour serves to recognise the learning gained by students outside the classroom through extra-curricular voluntary activity. This initiative aims to fulfil college’s commitment within the Strategic Plan 2009-2014 to implement a certification system to acknowledge students’ civic engagement, both within the College community and outside the College environment (p. 31).

Last month, the students were honoured at the Roll of Honour ceremony in the Dining Hall, which was addressed by Ms. Frances Fitzgerald T.D., Minister for Children and Youth Affairs.

Annah Nyadombo spoke about her work with the Student2Student Programme:

In the academic year 2011/2012 I was one of the Student2Student volunteers who offered special help to students in the university. There are two main types of volunteers within the Student 2 student , namely Peer Mentors and Peer Supporters. Peer Mentoring Programme is to help first year students settle in the college. I was mainly engaged with Peer Support Programme which is aimed at helping students with some difficulties. These students need someone to talk to. Peer Support requires you to be trained so that you will be able to know your boundaries and to refer issues to professional authorities in the Counselling Service. This special training also equips you with the relevant skills for that special role; special emphasis is focused on developing listening skills which is the key to this role. Peer Support is a service to any student in the college. As a student I have benefited from this programme: it helped me to meet with peers, I gained experience of listening, being able to participate in the Trinity community, being able to plan, organise, and time management. I also learned life skills: self-discipline and commitment. I am very grateful for our Coordinator Ralph Astley who worked tirelessly with us.

Ceri Wallington spoke about her work with Ruhama:

I have been volunteering for approximately ten months with Ruhama, an organisation that assists women involved in prostitution and trafficking.  My volunteer work is through the  Education and Development department and I have been providing literacy lessons and study support on a one-to-one basis, the aim being to further the women’s education so they have more opportunities in life while also building their self-worth.  The work has been immensely satisfying as the women I have been working with have made real progress and they have become visibly more confident; they have also been an inspiration to myself and it has been a pleasure to work with them and the organisation itself.

(Images: Annah Nyadombo with TCD Provost Patrick Prendergast and Ceri Wallington)

Dr. Paul Shore, Brandon University, Manitoba

Professor Paul Shore was a Senior Research Fellow at Trinity College Dublin, 2011. He has held posts at Saint Louis University,

Harvard Divinity School, and the University of Edinburgh. Publications include: The Eagle and the Cross: Jesuits in Baroque Prague;

Jesuits and the Politics of Religious Pluralism in Eighteenth-Century Transylvania: Culture, Politics, and Religion, 1693-1773;

Narratives of Adversity: The Experience of Jesuits on the Eastern Periphery of the Habsburg Realms (1640-1773) (forthcoming).

Heirs of Ignatius, Heirs of Calvin: Heroes? Villains? ‘Others’?

How Jesuits and Calvinists Visualized One Another during the High Baroque

(1635-1700)

This lecture will explore some of the words and images employed to render the Calvinist in Jesuit literature, and vice versa, with the

hope of shedding light on the competition, conflict and confluence between these two world-spanning religious movements.

Respondent: Dr Stephen Williams, Professor Systematic Theology and Church History,

Union College/Queens University, Belfast ‘Heroes and Villains: A Response’?

Chair: Very Revd. Tom Layden, SJ, Jesuit Provincial, Ireland; Chair of ISE Trust Council

Date:               Wednesday 2 May 2012, 3.45 p.m.

Venue:            Irish School of Ecumenics, 683, Antrim Road, Belfast BT15 4EG.

RSVP by 26 April, to Ms. Karen Nicholson, Cenisec@tcd.ie or Tel. 028.90775010, Ext. 221 (from R.o.I. 048.90775010, Ext. 221.

Click here for a Poster about the Event.

Click here to read about all the programmes.

Click here to listen back to the programmes on the RTE website.

(image: Barbara Walshe, left, in west Belfast during the recording of the Picking up the Pieces’ series)

Dr Reaves’ doctoral dissertation is titled, ‘Safeguarding the Stranger: A Theology and Ethic of Protective Hospitality from the Abrahamic Traditions.’ She was supervised by Dr David Tombs.

Dr Reaves’ research explores the provision of protective hospitality, namely in the acts which provide sanctuary or refuge for the threatened other in contexts of conflict.  This work is a unique contribution to the area of theology and theological ethics in that it both considers hospitality from an inter-religious perspective and widens the discussion related to the various actions found within the practice of hospitality itself.  Methodologically, the research is based in Christian political theology, utilizing specifically the methods of liberation and feminist theology, and is contextual as it focuses upon case studies of protective hospitality as practiced in the 1992-1995 Bosnian war.

It is hoped that Dr Reaves’ research will be useful for building inter-religious cooperative action and safe spaces on behalf of marginalized groups and individuals and create space to consider the development of a culture of courageous reciprocity and resistance to abusive power and violence through the memory of acts of protective hospitality provided in the past.

Images: Dr Jayme Reaves with Dr David Tombs; and with Dr David Tombs and TCD Provost Patrick Prendergast.

Cordially invite you to the launch of
Overcoming Violence
by Johnston McMaster
Keynote Speaker: Dr Harold Good
Thursday 26th April at 1.30pm
Venue – ISE, 683 Antrim Road, Belfast BT15 4EG
RSVP Karen Nicholson email: cenisec@tcd.ie

You can download a poster for the launch here.