Kinship Circles: Communities of Belonging
Third Fridays, September – December 2022
The Inayatiyya’s Kinship Activity cultivates the natural connection of one heart to another, fostering harmony, a broad perspective, and caring action. Kinship Circles are gatherings designed to nurture a sense of belonging. Join us on the third Fridays of the month this fall, as we explore the theme Communities of Belonging.
All are welcome to attend. This program is open and free to the public. Come to all or any parts of the series.
Dates & Themes
- Friday, Sept. 16th – Belonging with the Natural World
- Friday, Oct. 21st – Belonging in a New Land – The Refugees’ Challenge
- Friday, Nov. 18th – Bridging Experiential and Cultural Gaps to Build Belonging
- Friday, Dec. 16th – Beloved Community and Climate Justice
All circles are from 3-4:30 pm New York Time, 9-10:30 pm Central Europe Time.
If you have questions about Kinship, or about this series, please email us at kinship@inayatiyya.org.
September 16th
Belonging with the Natural World with Maori Grandmother Jamia Haqq Eila Paul,hosted by Shams Kairys.
The Maori concept of whanaungatanga tells us we belong in a web of life in which everything is intimately related. This is true not only of our relationship with the living world but also to the past, present and future through our whakapapa (our lineage), which is our relationship with those who came before us and are yet to come. Join Jamia Haqq to explore how these understandings of belonging are expressed and lived in the Maori worldview.
This program is part of the Inayatiyya Kinship Council of North America’s “Responding with love and courage to the Ecological Crisis” series.
October 21st
Belonging in a New Land – The Refugees’ Challenge with Daena Thelen-Daniel, hosted by Rabia Povich.
Join Daena Thelen-Daniel, a member of our Inayatiyya community, as she shares her experiences serving refugee families and children in Germany. As an art therapist, Daena has been supporting dozens of displaced children from Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq and now Ukraine as she helps them express their experiences through art. What is needed to feel part of a community of belonging for families who are navigating a new culture, language and way of life?
November 18th
Bridging Experiential and Cultural Gaps to Build Belonging with Fatima Hafiz-Muid, hosted by Rabia Povich.
You are invited to a community conversation with Dr. Fatima Hafiz, about creating welcoming and safe spaces for clarity and connection to help bridge cultural differences that lead to healing, harmony and belonging. We will explore the historical impact of violence and trauma on intergenerational patterns of behavior and life outcomes. She will address the gaps in communications across racial boundaries that adversely impact the human potential of individuals and families living in a society that devalues their humanity based on race.
December 16th
Beloved Community and Climate Justice with Paloma Pavel and Carl Anthony, hosted by Shams Kairys.
Join us for an important conversation with Paloma Pavel and Carl Anthony, pioneers in environmental justice work and founders of the Breakthrough Communities Project. Viewing through the lens of their rich experience, they maintain that our ecological crisis will not be solved by tech fixes and legal/policy regulations alone. We’ll explore their most recent work developing the field of eco-chaplaincy for the beloved Earth community and a transformative curriculum for ecological and climate justice, which requires a transformation of consciousness.
This program is part of the Inayatiyya Kinship Council of North America’s “Responding with love and courage to the Ecological Crisis” series.
Speakers
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Dr. Fatima Hafiz-MuidDr. Fatima Hafiz-Muid is an experienced teacher, group facilitator, counselor, and coach for professionals in education and social services. She is founder, CEO and Senior Facilitator of Transformative Education Associate LLC, an education consulting group working with human service providers, schools, and community groups to foster shifting consciousness about how we live, learn and work together. As a student of Hazrat Inayat Khan for 40 years, Fatima has studied his message through books and from his talks. As a Shafayat in the Inayatiyya Healing Activity and a Suluk graduate, she continues her spiritual expansion through intense retreats, lectures, meditation, and engagement with the Inayatiyya community. Fatima is a practitioner of Reiki, Psychodrama, Art Therapy, Meditation, and Aboriginal Oriented Therapy. She is committed to creating social spaces that foster individual, family, and community progress by focusing on the whole person including relational and spiritual health of human beings.
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Jamia HaqqJamia Haqq (Eila Paul) of Tainui descent has been walking a spiritual path all her life. Introduced to the Inayatiyya in 1997 she was soon initiated by the late Murshida Halima McEwan at the Sharda Centre, Aotearoa/New Zealand. Through her Maori heritage, having a strong connection with nature drew her to the Inayatiyya’s annual Summer Camp in Switzerland in 2002, where she was initiated into Ziraat by Pir Zia. In the last 15 years she has been a trustee, and at times custodian and kaitiaki/guardian, of the Sharda Centre, caring for the beautiful natural native forest, stream and visitors with an outward expression of her inner path.
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Shams KairysShams has been a student and guide in the Inayatiyya for over 45 years, with ongoing engagement in the Kinship activity. He has worked with many innovative organizations and projects, including Berkeley Area Interfaith Council, Meeting of the Ways, Creating Our Future, Seva Foundation, ReachingOut Project, EarthSave, Youth for Environmental Sanity, and Seven Pillars House of Wisdom. His love of the natural world and growing awareness of its degradation led him to focus on shedding light on the roots of the ecological crisis and the profound challenges it presents. He has advanced ways to deepen our sense of intimacy within the web of life and to cherish and protect it. He enjoys outings in nature with his son and friends, occasional flirtations with his violin, and working with authors as an independent editor.
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Rabia PovichRabia Povich, a student of the universal Sufi path, co-leads a local Inayatiyya center in Charlottesville, VA. Motivated to advance the ideals of justice and equity, Rabia is engaged in a local community low-barrier homeless day shelter and an interfaith clergy group addressing inequity caused by systemic racism. Her professional background spanned 25 years in public policy, where she utilized advocacy, research, communication, and organizational development skills to reduce poverty and injustice and increase opportunity. She currently serves as North American Vice President of the Kinship Activity.
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Daena Thelen-DanielDaena Thelen-Daniel was initiated into the Inayatiyya in the 1980s by Pir Vilayat. At the same time she started her training as an art therapist and there, incidentally, met with her first guide Ischtar. She serves as a Representative, Conductor of the Healing Order, Ziraat Farmer, Guide and Retreat Guide, and was appointed Mentor in the Leaders Training by Pir Zia. In an early initiation Pir Vilayat said to Daena: “Make life a piece of art.” Since then she has been exploring creativity in life along the Sufi path. Her kinship and healing work in the world includes supporting refugee children from Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq and the Western Balkan countries since 2014. Currently her work is dedicated to Ukrainian refugee children who live in a camp in Cologne, Germany.
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Carl AnthonyCarl Anthony, architect, author and urban/suburban/regional design strategist, is co-founder of the Breakthrough Communities Project. He has served as Acting Director of the Community and Resource Development Unit at the Ford Foundation, responsible for worldwide programs in Environment and Community Development, and funded a dialogue of national policy analysts and advocates for new metropolitan racial justice strategies. He was founder, and for 12 years Executive Director, of the Urban Habitat Program in the San Francisco Bay Area. With his colleague Luke Cole at the California Rural Legal Assistance Foundation, he founded and published the Race, Poverty and the Environment Journal, the only environmental justice periodical in the United States. He has a professional degree in architecture from Columbia University. In 1996, he was appointed Fellow at the Institute of Politics, John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University.
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Paloma PavelPaloma Pavel, PhD, President of Earth House Center, is co-founder of the Breakthrough Communities Project and served as Director of Strategic Communications for the Sustainable Metropolitan Communities Initiative at the Ford Foundation. Her academic background includes graduate study at the London School of Economics (LSE) and Harvard University. Her dissertation on Organizational Culture and Leadership Development was part of a five-year study by the Carnegie Foundation on the workplace in America, which culminated in the publication Good Work. She has taught at many Bay Area institutions, including the California Institute for Integral Studies, where she co-chaired the graduate degree program in Organizational Development. Paloma is a frequent lecturer and keynote presenter nationally and internationally on the theory of living systems and urban sustainability, and is the editor of Breakthrough Communities: Sustainability and Justice in the Next American Metropolis (MIT Press).
