Sara and Elyse

 
Sara Eftekhar

Sara Eftekhar

Ottawa - Muslim
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Sara Eftekhar, 19, from North Vancouver was born in Tehran, Iran and immigrated to Canada with her family at the age of seven. Sara is currently studying Nursing and Health Sciences at the University of British Columbia hoping to specialize in maternal health and infancy. In the future she hopes to work internationally as a nurse to provide health care to mothers and children who have limited access to healthcare. She has volunteered at an orphanage in Iran and has built houses in Ecuador and hopes to continue traveling and volunteering her free time. Sara enjoys playing the saxophone, drawing and reading English literature. You can email Sara at Sara.Eftekhar@faithsactfellows.org

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Elyse Brazel

Elyse Brazel

Ottawa - Humanist
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Elyse Brazel, 26, was born into a secular family, grew up in Edmonton Alberta Canada and graduated from the University of Alberta with a Bachelor of Fine Art, focusing on painting. Elyse is still on her faith journey and describes herself as a seeker, saying that "It was only after I had the opportunity to serve with people motivated to act by their faith that I came to understand the importance of faith in people’s lives, and consequently, the positive power faith could have in the world." This year she will be placed in Ottawa. Geeky yet awesome fact: she has been a Girl Guide leader for the past 7 years. You can contact Elyse at Elyse.Brazel@faithsactfellows.org.         

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We are part of the Faiths Act Fellowship, a group of 30 young leaders of faith spearheading multi-faith action in the UK, USA and Canada. We need your help in bringing faith communities together to make a difference, explore our page to find out how to get involved. You can meet the rest of the Fellows by clicking here.

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10 May 2010

Kiersten Jensen’s Blog for being a Faiths Act Hub Leader

My faith has always been very important to me. I am Presbyterian by baptism and United by confirmation (those are both denominations within Protestant Christianity, so basically I’m United, with a Presbyterian foundation). Constantly learning and growing in my faith and spirituality is a very important part of my everyday life. Being a daughter of two ministers, I’ve spent most of my life having to undo the preconceptions people had about me and finding myself in discussions about beliefs, morals, etc. with people who had different perspectives than my own. One of my favourites was this random interfaith discussion on a bus with a guy who was Wiccan.  
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07 May 2010

Heather Smith’s Blog at the One Voice of Faith Conference in San Francisco

Wow, what a whirl-wind of events that happened over the course of the 2-day conference in San Francisco. As anticipated, I certainly came back inspired and more knowledgeable than when I left. 
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06 May 2010

Multifaith Week Of Action Video 2010

From Aril 25th-May 2nd 2010 a group of religiously diverse youth worked together to answer the call to serve and put their faiths into action. They organized community events to give people of all faiths and no faith the opportunity to share how their faith/philosophical tradition inspires them as well as a chance to do good things for their community and the world through local service projects and fundraising 
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29 Apr 2010

Light overcomes darkness

Today was World Malaria Day; a day where people from all over the world remember all of the lives lost due to Malaria and reflect on the work that needs to be done to eradicate it. In Ottawa, a Muslim, a Jew, a Hindu, two Unitarians, a humanist, a Catholic and two Christians from the united church gathered on parliament hill with candles to commemorate World Malaria Day. The first person lit the first candle, passed on the light to the person next to them and around the circle; people of faith lit each other’s candles. This act was a symbol of all the work that this interfaith group has done together during the year to help eradicate malaria. The passing of light around our circle was also a symbol of how we had all enriched each other’s faiths by passing on our knowledge and stories to each other.  
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29 Apr 2010

An evening and discussion with Glen Pearson about Malaria

On April 21st members of the Sikh, Hindu, Muslim, Christian and Jewish faith gathered together at the Shankman Arts Centre in Ottawa for an evening discussion about Malaria with Glen Pearson and entertainment. Members of the Capital Region Interfaith Council were present, the Multifaith Housing Initiative, Jewish Family Services as well as the Ambassador of Sudan and Madagascar were present at this event. This event brought our vision of mobilizing religiously diverse people to act on the eradication of malaria because the members of the organizing committee were interfaith. Hillel Ottawa, Jewish Family services, Mutlifaith Housing Initiative, Muslim Student Assoication and the Student Christian movement were all in charge of helping mobilize their communities to buy bed nets for Spread the Net. By the end of the night, people of different faiths were talking to one another while eating ice cream and enjoying each other's company.  
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22 Apr 2010

Three Generations wanting to Eradicate Malaria

On April 20th, The Malaria Caucus composed to Mr. Patrick Brown, Senator Mobina Jaffer, Spread the Net, Buy a Net, Faiths Act Fellows and the Canadian Red Cross gathered together to raise awareness about malaria on parliament Hill. We had two rooms in the building of parliament hill to have our event; in one room the different organizations had their promotional materials as well as a slide show presentation showcasing pictures of children and families with bed nets. In the other room, we had some food as well a stage for children from the “Not so Amateur Amateur” theatre company perform a play about malaria!  
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18 Apr 2010

Faiths Act Hub leaders in Ottawa blog about why they want to go to the One Voice of Faith conference

We asked Heather Smith (Christian), Stefanie Duguay (Unitarian) and Kiersten Jensen (Christian) about why they want to go to San Franciso for the One Voice of Faith Conference and what they’re looking forward to. Here are their reflections. 
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17 Apr 2010

Meeting with the Princess Astrid of Belgium by Faiths Act Fellow Sara

I never thought that out of all the random things I would be doing for this fellowship, one of them would be meeting Princess Astrid of Belgium. It started when I was on a phone call with the malaria caucus trying to organize an event on April 20th for World Malaria Day. When Senator Mobina Jaffer mentioned that the Princess of Belgium is interested in eradicating malaria and wants to meet with the malaria caucus, I imagined a woman wearing a tiara, white gloves coming to Ottawa to drink tea with us with our pinkies up and making superficial conversation. I never imagined how much a passionate and sweet woman she would be!  
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06 Apr 2010

Dignity and not Charity

The Faiths Act Fellowship has given me the opportunity to get really into and learn about development work. Now that this fellowship is ending, I can think back at the time I started the fellowship and realize how much my perception has changed about development, community work and sustainability. Being able to travel to Tanzania and talk to community workers, health care workers, religious leaders and average citizens definitely contributed to my understanding of the Millennium Development Goals. Prior to travelling to Africa, I did not know what to expect; the only images of Africa I had gained from North American media was the imagine of starving children with mosquitoes around their gloomy and sad faces but what I saw in Tanzania changed my perception about Africa for ever. I saw how rich in culture and high spirited the Tanzanian people were; everywhere we went, people were dancing and singing of joy. I saw an ideal society that I wanted for Canada in Tanzania where Christians and Muslims worked side by side to ensure the well being of every community member.  
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30 Mar 2010

Multifaith Week Of Action

Multifaith Week of Action April 25th-May2nd Calendar here! “Be the change you want to see in the world” -Mahatma Gandhi One week of local events and service projects to do our part to make the world a better place. Put your faith into action!  
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28 Mar 2010

10 for 2010 Canada

 
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18 Mar 2010

World Malaria Day Plans!

The Ottawa Youth Alliance for the Millennium Development Goals Multifaith Week of Action 2010! Around the world ordinary people of faith are doing extraordinary things by putting their faith into action! Ottawa is one of the first cities to be a part of a movement of positive religious cooperative through common action for the common good. Engaged young people inspired by their faiths/philosophical traditions are coming together for a common purpose, to take action together, locally and globally, towards achieving the Millennium Development Goals. The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are eight goals set in the year 2000 by the international community to be achieved by 2015 that respond to the world's main development challenges. We are only five years away from the deadline and we still have much more to do! Inspired by the shared value of service, a passionate group of religiously diverse young people are organizing local events and small service projects the week of April 25th to May 2nd that they dream will raise awareness of the MDGs and inspire the people of Ottawa to take action.  
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08 Mar 2010

Happy International Women’s Day!

 
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24 Feb 2010

Maternal Health

 
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16 Feb 2010

Dialogue, not dominance

Hear from our guest blogger Sean Neil-Barron, a second-year conflict studies student at St.Paul's University, about his reasons behind organizing The Great Dialogue.  
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08 Feb 2010

Letter of Invitation to The Great Dialogue

Dear people of all faiths and people of no faith and everyone in between, As we were walking through the University Centre of the University of Ottawa the other day, we came across a poster with a cross and a crescent moon on it. Being people of faith ourselves, we decided to mosey on over and have a look. We were disturbed to find out that the poster was for "The Great Debate" series, an event that we feared would be divisive rather than strengthen the sense of inter-religious community on our campus. The Great debate aims at arguing articles of faith. What worries us is not exclusive truth claims, but it is the framing of the discourse in an antagonistic way such as a debate that we fear will cause religion to be seen as a source of division and not of great love. We worry that using the debate forum will send the message to people that these two great religions, Christianity and Islam, cannot coexist and must always strive to dominate one another. We would like to suggest an alternative option for peace........................  
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25 Jan 2010

Young Leaders Interfaith Networking Night

On Monday night, in observance of Martin Luther King Jr day, celebrating a great pioneer in interfaith cooperation, a group of bureaucrats and students of all ages, dance instructors and camp counselors, human rights educators and advocates against discrimination, childrens library facilitators and refugee settlement workers, software engineers and former-bakers, all from different faiths and philosophical traditions, gathered in a room to rub shoulders, recognize our common humanity and talk about something we all shared: a passion for working with youth 
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21 Jan 2010

Canada’s World

 
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31 Dec 2009

Delivering Baskets: Being reminded of the past

On December 19th, I went door to door and delivered seasonal baskets to low income families most of whom were immigrants and refugees. I was excited to see peoples reactions when I gave them their seasonal presents but I didnt expect to get so emotional in return. I knocked on their doors, handed them a basket and said Happy Holidays! Here is a present for you! and a lot of them were surprised, most of them responded with a present for me? Really?! Thats so nice of you!. When I delivered baskets to one house, one lady answered the doors in tears. She said that no one had ever done anything this nice for her in a long time and seeing me think of her during the holiday season made her day. I gave her a big hug and left her house with tears in my eyes.  
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15 Dec 2009

It’s all about our choice.

 
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24 Nov 2009

BIG Thank you for making housing into home

"When many birds take off together, they make a BIG noise!" ~ Proverb from Mali . This Sunday's Multifaith Day of Service is a shining example of what amazing things people inspired by their faith can accomplish when we come together! Great job everyone who donated their time, treasure and talent! Read on to find out more about this great work of community spirit... 
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24 Nov 2009

Putting Faith into Baskets; Good Times for a Good Cause

On November 22nd, 2009 at St.Basils parish, thirty religiously diverse people between the ages of 14 to 40 came together to live in the world as they believe it should be, to show it what can be. On that day this group of Buddhists, Hindus, Christians, Muslims, Unitarians Universalists, Agnostics, Atheist and Sikhs came together to act locally and think globally at a Multifaith Day of Service event. ***Hear Carleton Midweek Radio coverage, Nov 25th show @ 31 mins (http://www.carleton.ca/midweek/audio/show20091125.ram) 
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16 Nov 2009

International Conference on Child Rights @ uOttawa

Elyse - In my many years working with youth, I have been lucky enough to work with children from around the world. Poor “Fresh Air” kids from inner city New York. Rich kids from Long Island. Keener Girl Guides of all ages from across Canada. Refugee kids from Mexico, Columbia, Somalia, Rwanda, Burma, Afghanistan and Iraq. No matter where they come from, their economic or social status, I have learned this; kids are kids.

Read more about the Conference at uOttawa Nov 18th-20th and celebrate Universal Children's Day Nov 20th!  
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12 Nov 2009

Donation Blitz Ideas

Youth group donation drive games and activities, door to door flyer ideas, involving local businesses and simply asking your faith community to put their faith into action. Read on to find out more! 
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05 Nov 2009

Welcome Basket Collection Ideas

Do you remember that feeling of moving into a new empty place, needing to hit the washroom then realizing that you don't have toilet paper? Sadly, as I have just moved recently to Ottawa, I remember that all too well. But what if you couldn't afford to pop into walmart and just pick some up? This is the reality of many people in Ottawa who are living in poverty. The multifaith housing initiative finds people affordable rent geared to income housing but when they move in, they are starting off with absolutely nothing. Check this out for some ideas of what to collect for people in the Multifaith Day Of Service November 22nd!  
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24 Oct 2009

The Danger of the Single Story

Admittedly, I sometimes find myself guilty of the single story syndrome. I think we all do. Chimamanda Adichie is a captivating storyteller that reminded me that everyone has a richer tale to tell, if I take the time to listen.  
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17 Oct 2009

United Nations MDG’s!

At the turn of the millennium, the people of the world looked around and saw that the world needed to change. With our future at stake, here are the UN's dreams for 2015:  
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12 Oct 2009

Starting our Work in Ottawa!

Hi everyone! Sara and Elyse here. We are placed at the Micah Challange in Ottawa which is just a few blocks away from Parliament Hill! We’ve been so warmly welcomed by the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada staff and we are meeting some great people. We had a chance to meet with the All Party Interfaith Parliamentary Friendship Group (APIF), co-chaired by MP David Sweet and Rabbi Reuven Bulka.

 
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14 Sep 2009

Chicago Shabbat Dinner Faiths Act style

Elyse - I love food. Who doesn't? It tastes great and it builds community. One of my favorite moments during our mind-blowing training adventure was one of our last nights in Chicago; the night the Jewish contingent of our amazing journey graciously invited all of us to share in Shabbat dinner... 
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14 Aug 2009

Interfaith Dinner in Africa

Sara-The Faiths Act Fellows were invited to a catholic priest’s house for dinner. For me, this was truly an interfaith and inspirational gathering

 
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30 Jul 2009

What inspires you to become a Faiths Act Fellow?

Sara-“Spend in charity for the benefit of your own soul, for those saved from covetousness of their own souls are the ones who can achieve success.”- QU’RAN 64:16-18.

 This quote which outlines the importance of practicing compassion and giving charity is what inspires me to be a Faiths Act Fellow. I want to practice my compassion and empower youth to use their teachings from their faiths to become involved in global issues. Humanity has used faith as a way to measure our differences and divide nations; but Faith can be used as a positive tool in the world; to unite people of different faiths together based on our common value of service.

 
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