“Understanding Religion” is a series of site visit videos that are designed to take students into various religious sites, with conversations with the various community religious leaders throughout Tucson, Arizona. Each video is designed in consideration of research-based methods to instill cognitive, teacher, and social presence in the online classroom. One of the difficulties of online learning is the feeling of isolation, and one of the difficulties of studying diverse cultures from textbooks and lectures, are that they can feel distant, ancient, and unrelated to the worlds we live within. When coupled with course assessments, these videos serve as a pedagogical aid to help bridge that isolation gap and to allow students to see the lived experiences of religious communities from within their own sacred spaces and logic systems.
The ideal in showcasing different religions is to portray multiple perspectives from diverse groups from each religious category. These site visit videos are not meant to encapsulate or speak for “all” within each category. No community speaks for the whole, and no single category can be understood through a single sectarian group, and each interviewee speaks from a place of sectarianism. Roman Catholicism at the San Xavier Mission, for example, does not represent all of Christianity, any more than a Theravadan Buddhist abbot speaks for all Buddhists. Nonetheless, these videos represent a beginning of a larger discussion about religion and the limitations of our terms to describe it. Without being fully representative of entire global traditions, these different videos represent snapshots of different religious communities throughout my local community at a particular time and moment. Each video is instructive individually, but as a whole, they say something larger about religion. In desiring to put their voices front and center, each community leader has been given the opportunity to view and respond to the videos. I offer a special thanks to each community for their participation and for the team of videographers who generously gave their time in aiding the creation of these videos.
Understanding Christianity as Religion
A discussion with Friar Ponchie Vasquez, a Catholic priest and Franciscan friar at the San Xavier del Bac Mission on the Tohono O’odham Nation San Xavier Indian reservation just south of Tucson, AZ. The Mission was founded in 1692 by Padre Eusebio Kino and remains an active parish for the O’odham people
Understanding Hinduism as Dharma
A discussion with Director Dr. Parixit Modi of BAPS Shri Swaminarayan Mandir (Temple) in Tucson, Arizona. The Mandir represents an important center for the Hindu community in Tucson.
Understanding Buddhism as BuddhaSasana
A discussion with Abbot AjahnSarayut Arnanta of Wat Buddhametta Meditation Center in Tucson, Arizona. Wat Buddhametta is a Buddhist temple and meditation center overseen AjahnSarayut Arnanta, a Theravandan monk from Thailand.
Understanding Islam as Din
A conversation with the director of the Islamic Center of Tucson (ICT), Imam Burhan Hamdan. The ICT is more than a place of prayer, as it is also a community and learning center, doing things such as organizing marriages, funerals, charity, and motivational and outreach programs.
Understanding Judaism as Dat
A conversation with Rabbi Malcolm Cohen of Kol Ami, formerly known as Temple Emanu-El in Tucson, Arizona, a Reform Jewish synagogue. Temple Emanu-El is the oldest Jewish synagogue and congregation in Arizona (1910), though its original building in downtown has since been dedicated as the Tucson Jewish Museum & Holocaust Center. Kol Ami is a Jewish congregation that includes a Jewish school for children.
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