{"id":6996,"date":"2018-11-20T07:54:56","date_gmt":"2018-11-20T12:54:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.elca.org\/faithlens\/?p=6996"},"modified":"2018-11-16T12:13:31","modified_gmt":"2018-11-16T17:13:31","slug":"november-25-2018","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.elca.org\/faithlens\/november-25-2018\/","title":{"rendered":"November 25, 2018–What Kind of King?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Angie Larson, Clive, IA<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong>Warm-up Question<\/strong><\/p>\n

Who is your favorite king or queen,\u00a0 real or fictional? What qualities do they have?<\/p>\n

What Kind of King?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Immediately following the shooting at Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburg, PA, Tarek El-Messidi took to Launch Good to raise funds for the Synagogue and the victims\u2019 families. The interesting thing\u00a0 is not that funds were raised, but that a Muslim organization, Muslims Unite for Pittsburgh Synagogue<\/a>, did it.\u00a0 Muslim and Jewish groups have not always cooperated in the past and are often in conflict in the Middle East.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

However, El-Messidi had a different vision. He hoped to raise over $25,000 to take the financial burden of funerals off of families affected by the shooting.\u00a0 \u201cWe wish to\u00a0respond to evil with good, as our faith instructs us, and send a powerful message of compassion through action,\u201d he wrote on the organization\u2019s webpage. Through his faith lens he talks about the recipients as fellow human beings being impacted by hate and tragedy. He led the Muslim community to see commonality with their Jewish brothers and sisters in their shared Abrahamic roots. His Launch Good effort has now raised over $238,000 for the victim\u2019s families. \u201cI think it says that there\u2019s a lot more good in humanity than there is bad and evil and hatred,\u201d said El-Messidi in a radio interview.<\/p>\n

Discussion Questions<\/strong><\/p>\n