Making the Case for Interfaith Dialogue: Feat. Margaret Karram

As part of an undergraduate course taught by Notre Dame Jerusalem faculty at the university's academic center in Rome, Avraham Burg sat down with Margaret Karram, president of the Focolare Movement, an international Catholic organization dedicated to interfaith and ecumenical dialogue. Over the course of their conversation, Karram discusses what it was like to grow up in the mixed city of Haifa, and her later experience as a Palestinian Christian studying in an American Jewish University. Karram goes on to tell the story of the Focolare Movement and her work towards communion and tolerance, explaining how she aims to bring peace through dialogue and bridge-building.

Transcript

Daniel Schwake: I'm Daniel Schwake, the director of Notre Dame's academic center in Jerusalem. And you're listening to Jerusalem Talks. As part of an undergraduate course taught by Notre Dame Jerusalem faculty at the university's academic Center in Rome, Avraham Burg sat down with Margaret Karram, president of the Focolare movement, an international Catholic organization dedicated to interfaith and ecumenical dialogue. Over the course of their conversation, Karram discusses what it was like to grow up in the mixed city of Haifa and her later experience as a Palestinian Christian studying in an American Jewish university. Karam goes to tell the story of the Focolare movement and her work towards communion and tolerance, explaining how she aims to bring peace through dialogue and bridge-building.

Avrum Burg: Peace on you, Margaret.

Margaret Karram: Thank you.

Avrum Burg: Salaam alaiki.

Margaret Karram: Salaam alaikum.

Avrum Burg: How do you say it? In Italian?

Margaret Karram: Pace la con voi.

Avrum Burg: Margaret, the president of the place you were born in Haifa?

Margaret Karram: Yes.

Avrum Burg: A friend once told me about Haifa that it's maybe the most significant city in Middle East Israel. Palestine. Because it's a city. Neither Moses nor Jesus nor Muhammad ever set a foot there. So therefore it functions. Tell me about the Haifa of your childhood.

Margaret Karram: Okay, so good morning to everyone and welcome here. As Abraham said, I was born in Haifa. It's a city in the north of Israel, in the region of Galilee. And my family is an Arab Catholic family, originally Palestinians. And I have two sisters and one brother. And our home was at that time in a Jewish neighborhood. So all our neighbors were Jewish neighbors, and I went to school run by a Catholic. Nuns. Religious nuns.

Avrum Burg: Carmelites.

Margaret Karram: Carmelites, yes. The school where I attended was all the students were Arabs, and they were Catholics, Catholic, from different denominations, Orthodox Protestants, you know, different churches, different churches, Dominations and Muslims. So it was like 50/50 almost. So I grew up, you know, in a multi-religious and multicultural atmosphere, a city where at school I was with Muslims. And when I went back home, I was, you know, surrounded by other Jewish boys and girls, but families, you know, families. So that was my childhood. So I grew up and teenagers. I met the Focolare when I was 14 years old, by young people. And they came to our school and they were talking about the Focolare movement. I never heard about it. It was very, very new in our country, and I was not really interested so much because I was already like, you know, I was practicing my Christianity, and my parents really educated us as Catholics. We were going to church every Sunday. I considered myself being a good Christian, so I didn't need anything else. But when I heard this young, you know, boys and girls, they were like maybe 17, 18 years old, maybe even less. They were so enthusiastic about where they were talking about. And I saw in their faces a lot of joy.

Avrum Burg: Margaret, before you take us from your childhood immediately to Rome. Okay?

Margaret Karram: Slow down. It's still. It's still in Haifa.

Avrum Burg: No, no. Yeah, but slow down.

Margaret Karram: Yes.

Avrum Burg: You said earlier I was a Catholic Palestinian.

Margaret Karram: Yeah.

Avrum Burg: Actually, at a time, maybe up until today. You have three IDs. You have an official Israeli ID?

Margaret Karram: Yes.

Avrum Burg: Which is in conflict with your national Palestinian identity. And then you are a Christian?

Margaret Karram: Yes.

Avrum Burg: Take us through this maze. I mean, how this clash of identities are working. Who are you, when? When I stop you at the roadblock and I said, Margaret, give me your ID which one you give me.

Margaret Karram: Well, that's a very difficult question.

Avrum Burg: I have another one.

Margaret Karram: No, no. It's a difficult question, but I try to answer it.

Avrum Burg: Please.

Margaret Karram: Well, I was born when there was the State of Israel. Of course, you know, after the 48. And my parents got also Israeli citizenship because they stayed in the land and other family members like my grandma and grandpa, and my future cousin, you know, uncles and cousins, they were flew to Lebanon and they hope to turn back. So we were the only part of the family from my dad's side. The only ones remained. So all of us got the Israeli citizenship. So I have to be sincere. When I grew up, you know, I only saw the state of Israel, even though at home I was soaking in Arabic. That was my language, the first language. I went to school. I was learning also Hebrew because it was the the language of the state. And if I wanted to live in Haifa, they were like the majority were, you know, Jewish, Muslim, and Catholics. But we were studying Hebrew as a second language. So then, you know, I didn't even know what the Palestinian flag was looking like. I was considered myself being Arab.

Avrum Burg: Because of language?

Margaret Karram: Because of language, because my family. And at the same time, you know, I was, you know, connected with the state of Israel because I was living in that state.

Avrum Burg: Citizenship. I'm an Israeli, my culture I'm an Arab.

Margaret Karram: Exactly. And you know, the stories of my family, of my grandma, and brought us always back to the memory and to the life of Palestinians.

Avrum Burg: Just to open up here a point of information. Up until 48, there were hundreds of thousands of Palestinians living in the land with no state definition. The establishment of the State of Israel and the eruption of the conflict created a situation in which hundreds of thousands of Palestinians either were expelled or ran away, and Palestine was fragmented into five elements: Gaza, Palestinians in Israel, 20% of the population. West bankers, later on East Jerusalemite, and Palestinians in exile. So when Margaret talks here about the elements, she knew one segment. And this is a Palestinian with an Israeli ID, later to expand to the rest of the Palestinian being. Accurate?

Margaret Karram: Accurate.

Avrum Burg: Go on. Please.

Margaret Karram: Okay. So even in school, just to let you know, even when I went to the school. So what we studied, we didn't study the Palestinian history. We studied the Israeli history and the state of Israel, the government of Israel. So I grew up knowing a lot of Jewish faith, of Jewish identity as country as state. But I was really rooted in my Arab culture. But then I went to live in Jerusalem.

Avrum Burg: Which is a different city.

Margaret Karram: Which was a different city, not as Haifa, where there were three religions living there in harmony and coexistence. And we were like mixed neighborhood. So for me to go to the bus and talk in Hebrew or seeing Jewish people was normal. But I went to live in Jerusalem, and this was a very shocking place for me.

Avrum Burg: What was it? It was what is the it?

Margaret Karram: To live in Jerusalem. Because it was a divided city.

Avrum Burg: So it's a conflictual rather than harmonious.

Margaret Karram: Exactly. It was the contrary of what I was living in Haifa. Just to give you an image. Like in Haifa, also, there's the sea. It's a city. The port. Yeah. Yes. So it's a beautiful city also from, you know, like the atmosphere and the sea. And everything is so harmonious, so beautiful. Jerusalem is all built by stones, no sea. So every time, you know, I went from Jerusalem to Haifa to visit my family was like breathing. But it's not only physical, physical breathing because I felt like in Jerusalem the air was missing in my lungs. Just to give an, you know, plastic example. So when I realized that something was, you know, like with my identity was a little bit like a conflict side was when I was in Jerusalem going to the East, Jerusalem, which was a divided city, East and west.

Avrum Burg: West was mainly Jewish.

Margaret Karram: Yes.

Avrum Burg: East was mainly Palestinian Arabic.

Margaret Karram: Exactly. So when I was going to the east part, going to buy things or meeting people that I know, meeting the Christians that I know, going to to the church, whatever. So whenever I spoke Arabic, which is my first language. So the Palestinian living in Jerusalem were telling me, you know, Margaret, your accent is different than us. You are Arab from the North. And that moment I felt like, what? Then I felt, you know, so I'm not like them.

Avrum Burg: So I do not even belong to my language.

Margaret Karram: Exactly. And that I was different than the Palestinians living in Jerusalem, even though I was. It's the same nation. And that was from one side. So if I went, you know, to the Jewish part, you know, going to work, going to in the bus, going and I was speaking in Hebrew and my Hebrew was actually good Hebrew, I, you know, not perfect, but was good. And so the Jewish people tell me, where do you where do you come from? I say, you know Haifa. And they said, but you don't sound like you are Jewish, so you are not Jewish. So it was like, so you're not Israeli. So that was, you know, the moment that I felt within me like, it's so who am I? Am I Israeli?

Avrum Burg: Who are you?

Margaret Karram: So how I solved this problem? I decided, you know, I am first of all, I am Christian, and I belong to that people. I belong to God. So whatever people can say of my I country of my homeland. Of my Patria. Patria?

Avrum Burg: Yeah. Homeland.

Margaret Karram: Homeland. You know.

Avrum Burg: Motherland.

Margaret Karram: Yes. It is very important to have a homeland. It is very important to be rooted to a land because that's identify you. But as a Christian, I felt much more. I am identified with my Christian faith, with my homeland, which will be, I don't know where in another world. And I left for that world that I dream that can be a better world, and I work for that.

Avrum Burg: So in the junction in which many have to decide between national definition and religious definition, you took the turn towards religious spiritual definer before the others.

Margaret Karram: Yes.

Avrum Burg: Okay, so walked into your life, or maybe before the Focolare movement. Okay. Which is the heart of the house?

Margaret Karram: Yes.

Avrum Burg: Okay. And. It's a movement that, among other things, tries to build different kind of bridges between humans and humans. So the first bridge of Focolare is between Margaret and Margaret, or between Margaret the Christian and the Jewish majority. What is the first bridge the Focolare builds within you?

Margaret Karram: The first bridge was to connect me with God. That's the first step.

Avrum Burg: And the other side responded?

Margaret Karram: Yes.

Avrum Burg: Okay, good.

Margaret Karram: That was the first step because I felt that, you know, if I really wanted to live my Christian life, even though with all what you know, my identity is, it was to really be connected to God. And through him, I could really connect to the others. Because what I really felt, you know, that with the meeting, the Focolare helped me to see the image of God in every person. And that's what made the difference, because maybe I was looking first. This is a Jewish person I can respect or I can hate. This is a Muslim person I can respect or hate. Depends what they did for me. But what I felt was, you know, every human being is created at the image of God. If we believe in that and that, we could really build, you know, human relations first of all. So that really changed. And what changed also was that always I wanted to change society because I was feeling that I, you know, the society that I was living in was not just was not peaceful. So I wanted to change something, but with the spirit of the I understood that it's not I have to change others. I have to change my heart.

Avrum Burg: So that's the first bridge.

Margaret Karram: That's the first bridge. Changing my heart. Changing my, how I look at people. This makes a big difference because if you look at the person who is in front of you.

Avrum Burg: As a lesser human being.

Margaret Karram: Yes. So your relationship is different. You cannot connect with that person.

Avrum Burg: But then you moved from Haifa to Jerusalem for harmony, to conflict. Okay. And then you are not accepted by neither side, or you do not feel belong for neither side of the city.

Margaret Karram: Yeah.

Avrum Burg: So instead of going east and west, you went up.

Margaret Karram: I went up.

Avrum Burg: Okay. So you connected to the up, though the horizontal was a bit more problematic. And instead of going to, I don't know what to the Vatican College of Theology. You went to an American Jewish university?

Margaret Karram: Exactly.

Avrum Burg: Built this bridge for us, please.

Margaret Karram: Okay. When I met the Focolare, I felt, you know, as you understood from the video and what you were talking before. The Focolare focuses on unity, on fraternity. And I really felt that's what I really want to give all my life, all my energy to this cause. And the Focolare, as you have understood, works towards also dialogue between different religions, between different people, different churches. So I had this opportunity to see that if I really wanted to know the other, I have to learn about the others, because many times it's ignorance that makes us fear the other person. And so I decided I'm going to go, you know, because of the Foculare, to go and study Jewish studies, which was not easy at the beginning because, you know, it was something very different of what I have thought. And it was a Jewish university. So most students.

Avrum Burg: Which one?

Margaret Karram: American Jewish university in Los Angeles, California. And so most students were Jewish, but it was a very strong, I can say, very strong and enriched experience because there I really understood that if we really get to know the history, the tradition, the philosophy, the politics, everything I have studied in that 4 or 5 years helped me to understand the narrative of the other people.

Avrum Burg: Wait a second. When you go to this university and you study the Jewish history, it is connecting to the other, i.e. the Jew, or is it connecting to the origin of the church and the time in which Jesus Christ was born and crucified as a Jew? What did you connect to?

Margaret Karram: Well, you know, at that university I really didn't connect with, you know, even though it's our roots, you know, and I was studying the Bible and the Mishnah and whatever, and the commentaries of the Bible. But in that university I didn't study from the Catholic or Christian point of view. All what I studied there for five years was only from a Jewish perspective.

Avrum Burg: Well, how did it help you to understand better your own identity?

Margaret Karram: That's why. Yes. If, you know, I already was very rooted in the Catholic Church and the Catholic education from my parents and from my school. But when I went again back from Los Angeles to Jerusalem, I went to study theology. Christian theology to make it balance in me. Both things.

Avrum Burg: How many years you need Christian balancing for five years of Judaism?

Margaret Karram: Maybe hundreds.

Avrum Burg: I see. Okay, just to make sure.

Margaret Karram: No, no, that's true, because, you know, it was very interesting. But then, you know, I really wanted to go back and know, you know, from Christian point of view, but I really found a lot of similarities, a lot of things that unite us. You know, we have shared history and shared Bible, so.

Avrum Burg: I will not ask now, maybe later. Is it possible that both sides simply do not know each other? Very few people like you try do the effort to get to know both sides of the coin. Maybe we'll leave it later, but you are no doubt since childhood, up until today, you are very profound, devoted dialogist, okay, dialogue is the core of your being. Let's talk a little bit about the dialogue. What is a dialogue? It's like ours, which is two kinds of monologues. Your monologue. My monologue. Or is it something that you walk in and you say, I'm ready for an exchange?

Margaret Karram: It's both things, you know, if it is real dialogue, you have to be ready to exchange. Otherwise it's one side talking. I think that's the importance of dialogue. You have to find a way to let the other enter in your heart and be welcomed, and to let yourself be welcomed by the other. So if this doesn't happen, I don't call this dialogue. I call this a conversation. Getting to know each other. But it's not constructive dialogue. So dialogue for me is also putting aside many times, like, if I'm talking to you now, I have to put aside whatever I'm thinking. I have to listen.

Avrum Burg: I love to know what you think, but okay.

Margaret Karram: Okay, so I have to really try to answer your questions to be sincere and not to invent things, but to be really sincere. Asking because you are interested. You want to know me better, or these students want to know more about my story. So it's not because I want to share also. That's the first point sharing what I have lived. But also I would love that the other part can share with me what they feel, what they think, even though we do not agree. You know what I mean?

Avrum Burg: Yeah, I do. I hope I do. I walk into this dialogue room with you, with open heart and open ears, and I listen to you, and I listen to your reasons and a reason to your devotion and commitment, and I'm persuaded. Do you expect me to convert?

Margaret Karram: Not at all.

Avrum Burg: Why?

Margaret Karram: Because, you know, real dialogue, sincere dialogue, is not expecting people to convert to another religion, to convert or to change, you know, whatever they are. Because otherwise my conversation with you will be of interest. And dialogue means being ready to respect you, to love you, love you in the sense of, you know, respecting.

Avrum Burg: I understand, you know.

Margaret Karram: Yeah. You understand. Not waiting for something. Otherwise, it's like it's an egoistic thing. I'm here because I really want to convert people to become Christian, or I want them to.

Avrum Burg: Without the vested interest. When I walk, you walk into a dialogue, ask you, you walk into a dialogue and I make a case. Okay, I tell you, Margaret, listen to me, okay? And you say, wow, he's 100% right. How far are you ready to go with changing your original mind and take my own position, or your co dialoguers position or there is a limit. You say this line I do not cross. Even if you are right, there is a limit in my dialogue. What are the limitations of this exchange program?

Margaret Karram: That's very hard, I think, to answer in my experience, when I really many times I faced this with the people also, especially with political point of views that are different than mine, or also with the Jewish people or Muslims that they have, you know, been talking to. You know, I remember times that we have really in exchange a lot of things that were contradictory or I didn't agree with. So I said with a lot of conviction, what I have to say, you know, because I was convinced and many times maybe some of these conversations may lead us to different ways because we don't we didn't got to to agree on things, but that's okay.

Avrum Burg: The problem is not with disagreeing. My problem is not problem. I want to challenge you with agreeing. You walked into the conversation. You didn't know what I think. You thought that you you have your katechismus, you have your dogma. And I persuaded you that I have a different one. And you say, wow, he's right. Would you leave yours and come to mine regardless of interest. I mean.

Margaret Karram: Okay.

Avrum Burg: Conviction speaking or there is a limit. You say that's a red line I do not cross. Never mind what happens.

Margaret Karram: Well, it depends on what it is, you know, it depends on what you are talking about. You know, I think in my, my heart I would respect what you are saying. If it is something that I can accept and I say, well, I never thought about it, you have really opened my mind. It is something that I have really to look into it. Personally, I don't right away say, okay, I agree with you and that's what I really want to do. I'm a person. Maybe that I say, okay, let me think about it.

Avrum Burg: Slow down,

Margaret Karram: Slow down.

Margaret Karram: I will think about it. We can meet again. We can talk about it.

Avrum Burg: Vapiano.

Margaret Karram: So vapiano. So maybe I have to to look for it, to understand, to see if this is something that it's not in conflict with my beliefs of what I'm doing so.

Avrum Burg: As part of it is the patience of the church. The church has 2000 years of patience. Okay, let's wait another thousand years before I consider your position. But I understand how you are careful walking through and out of a dialogue.

Margaret Karram: Yeah.

Avrum Burg: Let's talk about walking into a dialogue. Are there any kind of a position or ideology or individual you say with them, I do not talk. These are the kind of people I'm not interested, or I cannot allow myself, value wise, to communicate with? Adolf Hitler? You sit down with, and communicate with him.

Margaret Karram: Well, if he gives me the chance to meet him.

Avrum Burg: Well, now it's too late.

Margaret Karram: But too late. No. If I have the chance to meet, you know, whoever is leader now in the in politics or in Israeli government, and I have the chance to meet them. I would love to meet them and talk. Why not? And I have the chance.

Avrum Burg: What comes across my mind is you said. You said earlier something about a political leadership. And I asked you conceptually in human dialogue between humans and humans. Whom do you not dialogue? And you say, I even dialogue with Israelis. What does that mean? Subconsciously, that the neighborhood of your red lines. I mean, forget about our conflict. Go to some other place. Anybody around the universe between here and the in the next galaxy, you say with him or her? I do not talk. 

Margaret Karram: Sincerely?

Avrum Burg: But me.

Margaret Karram: No, I don't. I don't put a limit.

Avrum Burg: Okay, good.

Margaret Karram: I don't put a limit. That's what I think.

Avrum Burg: That's fair enough.

Margaret Karram: A very sincere answer. Maybe I will be afraid to meet people. Maybe. Yeah. Yeah. Physically. Or maybe I will be, like, with sentiments that maybe these people will not accept me or will not. But from my side, Aside, I can say really, truly, I'm ready to to meet anyone.

Avrum Burg: At least to try.

Margaret Karram: At least to try. Then if it goes wrong, it goes wrong. But at least to try not to put a wall because that's what we do. Usually we put walls between us and we have prejudices. This person is, you know, a terrorist. This person is have political ideas different than me. This is not Catholic. This is whatever. We have a lot of prejudices and different things that we put on people, you know? That's what really builds wall between us. So from my side, I would love to be ready to meet anyone, even though he cannot agree and he can disagree and quarrel with me. But at least we had the chance to look in each other's eyes.

Avrum Burg: You are the third female Foculare president, and we heard earlier that by by laws, the president has to be a woman, a female. What's the meaning of female leadership in such an important movement in the Catholic Church.

Margaret Karram: That's a very good question.

Avrum Burg: The previous one was difficult. This is a good one.

Margaret Karram: Good one. Yeah. The others were very.

Avrum Burg: We make a progress in our dialogue. Okay.

Margaret Karram: That's a good, good question I think for us in the Catholic Church, you know, as you know, the history of the Catholic Church, usually the people in these institutions, most of them are men.

Avrum Burg: Yeah. You refer to.

Margaret Karram: Pope, the cardinals.

Avrum Burg: To God as he.

Margaret Karram: He or. Yeah.

Avrum Burg: If he is a he. So most of them are men. Okay. Go on.

Margaret Karram: Okay. We don't discuss this theologically.

Avrum Burg: Why?

Margaret Karram: So as I was, I was saying so it's the church has a lot of different, you know, cardinals all of them are men. Mostly are men. So to have, you know, a movement like ours that has also put now there are many other religious orders that they have also women. But as our movement that has not only women but have men and women and families and young people and people from different religions, and to have the president woman, it means a lot a difference in the history.

Avrum Burg: What is this lot? What is this lot? What it means.

Margaret Karram: It means that also women have a lot to give to society, have to contribute to the church, and they have other talents and other characters that may. I don't say they don't have, but they complete each other.

Avrum Burg: What do you say in a world in which the role of the woman is so different than previous centuries? Much more equal, open, contributing, etc.? So if it is right in the general world, be it academia, be it sciences, be it business, be it Beat politics. Beat culture? Why not in the religious realm?

Margaret Karram: Exactly.

Avrum Burg: Can you imagine? Can you envision? Can you draw for us a church that all of it is Foculare like mentality. How this church looks like? Or you just want to be secluded in Focolare and let them have their own masculine world?

Margaret Karram: No no no absolutely not. I think we are working a lot within the church, and a lot of collaboration with different movements that are in the Catholic Church, different organizations in the church and outside the church. And I think that now, just to give you an example, different years ago, we were doing like a big festival for young people, and we were inviting Chiara Lubich felt a lot that new generation, they are the future. And she wanted to give them something great in their life to see the future in a more positive way. And she invented a way that she said, but it's not enough to have people in Italy, young people in Italy. Why don't have like a big festival inviting many young people from all over the world? And she did it once in Rome, and they were like more than 20,000 young people from Africa, from Australia, from. And Chiara would go there and they will have many testimonies, many, many things that give courage and hope to young people. And we did that for different years. And the church was looking at, at this model. So now in the Catholic Church, since a few years, they started to do something which is called la giornata mondiale della gioventù. International day for youth. And they are organizing it, you know. So I don't want to say that they copied from the Focolare. But, you know, we are very happy to see that now the church is doing something to gather different youth from all over the world.

Avrum Burg: It's beautiful. It's a beautiful project. But what is feminist in it? Why is this feminine? I mean, it could be done by anybody. I ask you a specific question about imagine the church, which is ran with a female philosophy and equality. As Folculare do?

Margaret Karram: Okay, so I didn't understand the question.

Avrum Burg: No, no, you understood the question. I asked the wrong way. Go on.

Margaret Karram: Yeah. Well, now, also in the church, there are different women running dicastery, dicastery. It's like, you know, a section of the church, different offices that were run only by men, by cardinals, by bishops. And now, you know, there are different ones now that there are women. And, you know, we had just, you know, the meeting in the Vatican for three years, the synod at the Vatican for the first time, there were 54 women, and I was one of them sitting in the hall with different people of the church. So I think the church is also learning how much women have to give to the institutions of the church. I don't know if I answered your question.

Avrum Burg: You know, what's my next question? Yes. What is it?

Margaret Karram: Can the Pope or can the.

Avrum Burg: Will there be one day.

Margaret Karram: I understood.

Avrum Burg: A female pope or mom. Actually, Pope is a father, so. Mom.

Margaret Karram: I don't know.

Avrum Burg: You want to or you don't want to be asked this question?

Margaret Karram: I don't know what I think now. Maybe if you ask me this question a few years, maybe I have, I will have an answer. But right now, what I think, you know, it could happen in the church. That right now, when they elect the Pope, it's only cardinals. So my hope could be, you know, in a few years that whoever elects the Pope will be also women lay people because they represent the whole church. So why it has to be only cardinals? So that's my hope. Then the other question I will leave it for a few years ahead.

Avrum Burg: If they offer and if they offer you the job, you take it.

Margaret Karram: I don't think I will be alive still.

Avrum Burg: Okay, let's calm down. Okay. Among other things that you're doing, you do a lot of religious cultural communication, exchanges, dialogue. Buddhist in Japan. Muslims in Indonesia. The ecumenical Patriarch in Istanbul. Is there something in common with all of these exchanges? Or. Each and every one of them is different. The Buddhist is a Buddhist. The Jew is a Jew. Commonality. Differences.

Margaret Karram: Of course there are differences, but there is a lot of common what I see from our experience all religions. We are talking about religions. All religions have a spiritual dimension, and the spiritual dimension has a lot of common. So when we are together and we have really experienced that, it's such a strong feeling that even though we are, we are different Buddhists, they believe in Buddha. The Muslims, you know, I mean the religions, they believe in God, but in Islam. Whatever. You know what we really share? It's the spiritual dimension, first of all. And then the desire to do something together for the good of humanity.

Avrum Burg: Bring us a little bit closer to Earth. Okay.

Margaret Karram: Okay.

Avrum Burg: I mean, you come back from a dialogue with a Buddhist somewhere or hinduist in somewhere. Give us some examples of. I went to this dialogue and I came back home here and I introduced this concept into, for example, the community. What happened to you in this exchange? What happened to them? We should ask them separately.

Margaret Karram: Okay.

Avrum Burg: Well, what happened to you? What you brought back?

Margaret Karram: Okay. You know, the experience that, you know, I did personally also when I came back from different, you know, kind of meetings like that, I felt my how I can explain this, you know, my life became more rich because I learned from them different things, new things from their religion, from what they talked about.

Avrum Burg: Example,

Margaret Karram: Example. Yeah.

Avrum Burg: The abstract I understand.

Margaret Karram: Okay.

Avrum Burg: You do meditation because you met a Buddhist. You go with an orange robe.

Margaret Karram: No not.

Avrum Burg: Really. I mean, what do you do that shows that.

Margaret Karram: No. Like for.

Avrum Burg: World Expanded.

Margaret Karram: Let's say an example, like when I met Buddhists or whatever, I learned that they have a lot of moments of silence.

Avrum Burg: Okay.

Margaret Karram: So when I came back and I was looking at my life and I said, okay, I do a lot of things. I'm very active. I talk in many meetings. I pray, but I do not practice silence. So what I learned from them is how important it is to have moments of silence. That's one Example.

Avrum Burg: How you manifest it? You do meditation or you have more hours of silence with the community here. How real life changes because of this encounter?

Margaret Karram: So what happened is that when when I pray. Because also I have meditation every day. So usually I took a book and I was reading the book and having meditation. So what I learned is that also I can leave the book aside and have just silence. That's one thing. The other thing I learned, not only in prayers, but when you are talking to people or we are in meeting also with the Foculare and we have to decide things and we are always thinking and talking and and so I learned that maybe some moments of silence, even in our meetings. And now we are practicing this also in our meetings to have some moments of silence, to understand what we are talking about, to grasp what we are thinking, even though they are concrete things. But maybe each one said something different. And so you need some silence. Inner silence to understand what you really want to do and then express your ideas. So that's one thing I learned.

Avrum Burg: So before the next question, let's take a moment of silence. Okay. Was a short moment. Is there a difference between the interreligious dialogue in the Middle East. You and me know so well in other dialogues in Asia, Far East and Europe.

Margaret Karram: Yeah, I see differences. I see differences because, you know, when when I talk, when I, you know, see people from Middle East the interreligious dialogue is very much influenced by politics and politics ideas, politic sentiments. So it is a different dialogue, you know? when I meet people from other countries, even like United States or Asia, and we were talking about Muslims and Jewish and whatever, you know, you feel that their dialogue goes to another level and you are free to say whatever you want. And you know, and there is richness of dialogue and different exchange of traditions and things and doing things together. When you are in the Middle East and you start talking about whatever thing you talk about peace, you talk about food, you talk about whatever. Right away, something happens. And I understand this because, you know, the conflicts, the war, the sentiments of fear and enemy influence our minds and hearts. So, so for me, it's really different. I find it much more difficult.

Avrum Burg: I think that you were in Lisbon when you spoke about building bridges in the context of conflicts.

Margaret Karram: Yeah.

Avrum Burg: And this is actually what you alluded to right now. Now you're an engineer of dialogue bridges. Okay? How do you build bridges in context of conflict? It's a different one than in a context of tranquility and harmony. How do you do it?

Margaret Karram: First of all, you need a lot of patience. That's the first thing. And then not to give up because, you know, I remember when I was in Jerusalem and we wanted to have like an exchange with the teenagers from Palestinians and Jewish people. The parents came and they screamed at me and they said, Margaret, what are you doing? That's something strange. And you know, you are going to change the mind of our children, and you don't know what it means for us to be Palestinian and how we feel. We have to fight for our rights. And and you want to change the mind of our children. And but I said, you know, if we all continue to think in this way, our society will never change. We have to do something. But another concrete example that we are doing just now, you know how we do help people to grow up in a different way of thinking. We are doing a project which is called Together We Connect. It's a project that we started in Bethlehem, and now it's also in other three schools. It's with the schools in Israel, in Haifa, and it's a project that we meet the young people from 12 to 17 years old, and we start with activities, theatre, songs, activities like that. But then there is like a program of knowing yourself, knowing how to deal with conflict. And young people can really talk about it because right now in Bethlehem, no one talks about it. Why do you feel so much discouraged? So much so it's it's a way of doing something. And after two years now it's the third year we are seeing that things are changing, at least in the minds of people.

Avrum Burg: Is it possible, after the last two years of violent violence exchanged between the Jewish segment and the Palestinian segment, is it possible to bring back to the bottle the genie of hatred, frustration and agony?

Margaret Karram: It is difficult because what happened recently in the 7th of October really have broke a lot of things and have put a lot of, you know, sad sentiments and negative sentiments. For me, it was like, you know, thinking how we can start all over again. But I think it is possible. It is possible. And I know about different organizations in Israel all around the world are trying to bring back this connection between people and this, bringing back the hope that it is possible to build another society. And we have a great responsibility in doing that because otherwise things will not change. The leaders, the politics and all what we are doing and what I hope this piece will be just and will continue. But if we don't start with the people, with the grassroots, you know, and with having chance to meet each other and to build this trust again, the society there will never change.

Avrum Burg: You spoke about patience, perseverance, trust, not losing hope. I want just to explore one more notion. And this is responsibility.

Margaret Karram: Yes.

Avrum Burg: The sense that a lot of what we witness, at least in our region, in other regions as well, is somehow a fruit of the the Christian world into the region that was not necessarily Christian. I mean, when you look at so many conflicts around the world, it's an outcome of colonialism, the burden of the white man, especially the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Whether you assume responsibility in this conversation. Not you, Margaret, but you, the Christian side to the dialogue. What is your role into history?

Margaret Karram: We can also assume responsibility. But my point of view is that each nation, each religion, you know, have the right to live and have the right to live in peace. Maybe it's a dream. Maybe I can sound very naive and maybe optimistic. What's the problem of being not to exchange resources and not to exchange lands and not to, you know, are we going to stay in this world and having our land with our hands and saying, that's my land and that's my history and that's my people, you know, that's what's we going to take with us at the end of our lives Or can we really take advantage and have a responsibility of our lives? Saying, you know, we can live together even though we have one land. Even though these people took us from there, and the imperialism and the consumerism and whatever and the and the Marxism and whatever. And now we are in 2025, technology have explored a lot of things, a lot of connections with people. Don't we think that we are ready to say, you are my brother, this other one in Ukrainian, in whatever, in Africa, in Sudan. Why they have to die from death and famine and have to emigrate from their own land to another land, looking for life and looking for happiness and looking for hope, just not even looking for richness. Looking for the right to live.

Avrum Burg: So from politics of property to politics of prospects.

Margaret Karram: Exactly, exactly. That's why I think also thinking about our land and our context. You know, God has made a lot of pacts with people, with the prophets, with many, many pacts are really, really faithful to these pacts. I don't think so. So I really dream that you wanted to ask me what is my dream? That's my dream. To see people nowadays, in this year of whatever century we are, that people are not using only their intelligence and not only artificial intelligence, their intelligence to build peace and harmony and connections with people and letting everyone live in their own Dignity otherwise destroying people.

Avrum Burg: Margaret, two last rounds. With your permission, if you have the opportunity. The omni power. The omnipotent power to change one thing in the world. One. And that's it. What will be that one? Not multitasking. Not thousand missions. Not organization. One thing to change in the world.

Margaret Karram: The heart of each person.

Avrum Burg: Enough. And one last thing. You went all through the thing about the dialogue. The original one between you and the upstairs?

Margaret Karram: Yes.

Avrum Burg: Right.

Margaret Karram: Right.

Avrum Burg: Let's go back there. What is the prayer that you pray for? This change of hearts of people. Give us a prayer.

Margaret Karram: A prayer that I know. The prayer that I can just do now. Invent. God our father, I want to thank you for this opportunity of meeting together to meet such a beautiful students and beautiful colleagues and interviewers. And I want to pray together with all of you, that God may change our heart of stone and give us a heart of flesh, a heart that seeing every person, the image of God, that where there is hatred we can bring true love. And as the prayer of Saint Francis, where there is division, we can bring unity. Harmony. Where there is refusal, we can bring acceptance and welcoming. We ask you, God, to bring peace first of all in our hearts Because peace in the world will start only if we have peace within us. We are confident that you will answer our prayer. We promise you that we will do everything and we will put all our energies, all our ideas, all our initiatives that this may happen soon. Amen.

Avrum Burg: Amen. Thank you very much.

Margaret Karram: Thank you.

Gabriel Mitchell: Jerusalem Talks is brought to you by the University of Notre Dame's Academic Center in Jerusalem, and was made possible by the efforts of Avraham Burg, Daniel Schwake, Gabriel Mitchell, David Turjman, Ben Wallick, and Nathan Steinmeyer. Learn more about us at Jerusalem.