Faith Communities - Leadership Training

Religions deal with the many basic questions: how life began, and what happens to us when we die? From the beginning, religions have attempted to explain these questions and offer people the opportunity to experience that invisible presence or spirit, sometimes as a sense deep within themselves. Each religion has developed its own ideas, beliefs and rituals on these matters.

Not all beliefs about these basic questions involve religion however. Atheists or humanists, for example, are not religious and deal with the same basic questions by finding ultimate importance in the natural world, and human beings in particular, rather than in God or gods.

Aspects of Religions generally comprise the following aspects:
* Faith / experience - what people personally feel, their awe and reverence, a sense of belonging and commitment to something greater than the self;
* Creed / doctrine - the system of beliefs and ideas held by a religion about God, other divinities, creation and salvation;
* Code / ethics - the way people behave because of their beliefs, including their taboos, and ideas of sin and holiness;
* Rituals - all that is involved in practising the beliefs, e.g. forms of worship and other gatherings of the followers, holy songs, prayer and other practices, ceremonies, festivals, and customs relating to food and manner of dress;
* Community - the social aspect of a religion, e.g. the worshippers at a particular church or temple, the wider denomination or sect, monks, nuns and priests.

Faith Training For Your Organisation
* Does your organisation deliver services to people of different faiths?
* Do you work in partnership with religious organisations?
* Are you an employer of a religiously diverse workforce?
* Are you unclear about the legislation relating to religion and belief and how this affects you?
* Do you want to start an inter-faith project and want some guidance?
* Are there religious tensions in your area of work which you want to reduce?
* Do you know whose hand you can shake and which days are religious holy days?

Tony Blair issues call for faith communities and development workers to learn from each other. The keynote address on why faith matters for development to launch a groundbreaking series of seminars hosted by The Tony Blair Faith Foundation, DFID, Islamic Relief, World Vision and Oxfam.

The next five seminars will explore the role faith communities play in conflict resolution, as healthcare and education service providers, installing ethics in the marketplace and as stewards of the environment. Douglas Alexander, Tariq Ramadan, Ken Costa and senior advisor to the World Bank Katherine Marshall will be joining a prestigious line up of academics, development workers, journalists, and government, business and faith leaders.

Miroslav Volf, the Henry B. Wright Professor of Systematic Theology and Director for the Yale Center for Faith and Culture, explores the relationship between faiths and the forces of secularization.

At TEDxUSC, business professor David Logan talks about the five kinds of tribes that humans naturally form -- in schools, workplaces, even the driver's license bureau. By understanding our shared tribal tendencies, we can help lead each other to become better individuals.

TED Talks is a daily video podcast of the best talks and performances from the TED Conference, where the world's leading thinkers and doers give the talk of their lives in 18 minutes. Featured speakers have included Al Gore on climate change, Philippe Starck on design, Jill Bolte Taylor on observing her own stroke, Nicholas Negroponte on One Laptop per Child, Jane Goodall on chimpanzees, Bill Gates on malaria and mosquitoes, Pattie Maes on the "Sixth Sense" wearable tech, and "Lost" producer JJ Abrams on the allure of mystery.

TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design, and TEDTalks cover these topics as well as science, business, development and the arts.