Interfaith Outreach

People rarely fear a religion once they have shared a table with someone who practices it. Our interfaith program prepares Pagans to sit at that table as informed, dependable partners, and helps other communities make room for them.

Interfaith work is not about blending religions or settling which one is right. It is neighbors of different convictions learning enough about one another to cooperate, to disagree without hostility, and to stand together when any one of them is treated unjustly. Pagans have something to give to that work and a great deal to gain from it.

What We Do

• Seat at the Table Roundtables

  A quarterly online conversation among clergy and lay leaders of many faiths, held since 2011. Each session takes one theme and hears from several traditions before opening the floor.

  See the next roundtable

• Interfaith Representative Training

  A ten-week course that prepares Pagans to represent their communities on councils, panels, and chaplaincy committees. It has 212 graduates since 2013.

• Community Partnerships

  Affiliate groups join congregations of other faiths in food drives, land and water care, and shared observances in their own towns.

• Guidance for Faith Leaders

  A short, practical guide for clergy and lay leaders of other religions who would like to include Pagan neighbors and are not sure where to begin.

Our Principles

1. We come to explain, not to convert. Pagan religions do not seek converts. We ask the same restraint of everyone at the table.
2. We speak honestly about difference. Most Pagans honor many gods and find the sacred within nature. We do not blur this to seem familiar, and we do not sharpen it to seem interesting.
3. We send prepared people. A representative should know their own tradition, know something of their neighbors' traditions, and be a steady presence in a meeting.
4. We show up. Trust is built by attending the dull meetings, stacking the chairs, and keeping commitments.
5. We defend our neighbors. When any religious community is threatened, we say so and we stand with it.

These principles are set out in full in our Guidelines for Interfaith Dialogue.

Seat at the Table

The roundtable was first convened in 2011 by our co-founder, Rev. Desmond Carrow, with leaders of seven religious communities. It now meets four times a year, online, and is open without charge to clergy and lay leaders of every faith and to people of no religious affiliation who work in chaplaincy or community service.

To be added to the invitation list for a session, write to interfaith@paganednet.org.

Where Pagans Serve

Graduates of our training now serve on more than seventy local interfaith councils, clergy associations, hospital and hospice spiritual care committees, campus interfaith boards, and community relations commissions. They take their turn offering opening words at public meetings, staff tables at community fairs, and sit on planning committees for services of remembrance and thanksgiving.

For the first year I mostly listened and washed coffee cups. In the second year they asked me to chair the hunger committee. Nobody has asked me about broomsticks since.

Graduate of Interfaith Representative Training, serving on a county interfaith council

Invite a Pagan Participant

If your council, panel, classroom, or service project would benefit from a Pagan voice, we will try to introduce you to a trained representative near you. Write to interfaith@paganednet.org with the name of your group, your location, and what you have in mind. For a single presentation about Paganism, see the Speakers Bureau.

For Chaplains and Institutions

Hospital, hospice, corrections, and campus chaplains who are caring for Pagans may write to the same address with questions. See also A Guide for Healthcare Staff and Chaplains and the Chaplaincy and Institutional Access Project.