Vanessa also attends Pace e Bene Australia national gathering

For the past week, Pace e Bene staff-person Vanessa Gomez Brake  has been in Melbourne, Australia at the Parliament of the World’s Religions.  She has been the guest of the Interfaith Center at the Presidio, whom she has been assisting with webcasting segments of the conference.

She also arrived in Melbourne in time to take part in Pace e Bene Australia’s annual gathering!

Here are Vanessa’s reports from Australia:

Report 1: Arrival Down Under

Report 2: Day One at the Parliament

Report 3: Broadcasting the Parliament

Report 4: Peace through Abrham

Report 5: Parliament, Day 5

See all of Vanessa’s Blogs

Growing Interfaith Engagement

Over the past year, Vanessa has begun integrating her passion and work for interfaith engagement into Pace e Bene’s mission for nonviolent change. Pace e Bene’s Oakland office manager, Vanessa has long been involved with interfaith organizations. 

Currently she is a research assistant for the Abrahamic Family Reunion, which offerspsychological and spiritual approaches in reconciling conflicts among Jews, Christians, and Muslims in the United States by emphasizing shared values of compassion and justice; by exploring positive historical precedents; and by acknowledging collective traumas. 

At the same time, Vanessa is establishing a partnership between Pace e Bene and the Interfaith Center at the Presidio and itsAbrahamic Showcase project.  She recently represented Pace e Bene at the Interfaith Youth Core conference in Chicago.

One of the most exciting projects Vanessa is engaged with is the Soliya-Connect Program, which sponsors web-streaming discussion between students in the West and in the  Arab/Muslim Worlds.  As a Soliya Online Dialogue Facilitator, Vanessa facilitates two-hour sessions once a week for nine week. Currently she has participants located in Kuwait, Qatar, Washington DC, Morocco, Oklahoma and Jordan.