(Photo provided by Dave Hamilton)

Grade eleven students had the wonderful opportunity of being able to listen to various religious speakers here at MDHS on Wednesday, November 26th.

The conference (that ran over the course of periods two through four) started off with a question and answer session in the theatre, where students and teachers were offered the ability to discuss religious topics in a calm setting – not arguing which faith is the best, but discussing their similarities and differences.

Since both Judaism and Islam was represented within the panel, one of the main topics of discussion was the war currently going on in Israel and Palestine. It wasn’t just the speakers talking either; young people got to voice their opinion on such a serious topic in a safe, non-threatening environment, and were heard and agreed with.

The students were then sent back to their classes, and the religious speakers were rotated between rooms. With representatives from Islam, Christianity, Bahá’í, Judaism, Native and Sikh faith the students were exposed to a variety of different religions. They were able to ask questions in smaller groups than before, the most popular subjects of discussion being LGBT+ acceptance within religion, as well as the variations between each faith’s beliefs in afterlife.

An important thing to touch on was this was not MDHS trying to convert anyone, rather a celebration of our differences and similarities. It was an example of our ability to all believe in different things yet coexist happily with one another.

Congratulations to Ms Mooney and the Social Science team for running this in house conference for the second year in a row!