The categories into which we group our classes help us to further define and express our mission. You can click on links below or scroll down for full descriptions of the current courses.

• Introduction to Islam. Gain an understanding of the basic teachings and practices of Islam including commonalities with the other Abrahamic faiths of Judaism and Christianity.
• Three Key Roles of Moses: Prophet, Liberator and Lawgiver. Study the greatest of all the Hebrew prophets, who had the most direct knowledge of God of any human being of his time.
• Writing Advent Liturgies. Create prayers and readings for Advent with help from Biblical scholars and writing professors. Learn how liturgy is constructed and with help from experts, try your hand at creating a liturgy for public, family or private Advent worship.

• Who Speaks for Islam? A Report of Counterintuitive Discoveries from Gallup’s World Poll, 2001-2007, illustrated in interviews with Muslims from five continents. Discover the diverse political, social, and religious messages of modern Islam as described in the book Who Speaks for Islam? What A Billion Muslims Really Think, by John L. Esposito and Dalia Mogahed, and as revealed in conversations with local Muslims.

• Voluntary Simplicity: Stories of Living Simply. Discover the value of intentional simplicity in stories of life, faith and family by three Mennonite families.
• My Patients, My Father, Myself: Ethical Caregiving in Aging America. As you hear a popular doctor, author and speaker discuss medical ethics and his personal story of caregiving, explore “faith-full” ways to meet the critical challenges that all of us expect as our population ages in a high-tech medical world.
• The Holy Longing: Our Inborn Ache for Union with God and Everything Else. Enjoy a special lecture by world- renowned scholar, writer, speaker and current President of Oblate School of Theology- Rev. Ronald Rolheiser, OMI.
• Days of Grace: Meditations and Practices for Living with Illness. Guided by a popular local Episcopal priest and workshop leader, discover new ways to bring grace to the experience of illness—even chronic or terminal.
• Walk on the Wild Side I. Enjoy the sacredness of nature in local ecosystems, and identify wildlife in a series of field trips with local botanists

• Our God-Drenched Universe: Science and Sacrament in a Changing World. Gain new insight into current religious implications of our new understanding of the magnificence of the story of the universe. See page 3.
• Writers on Writing. Renowned writers Jacques Barzun, Jan Jarboe Russell, and Robert Flynn share stories of their lives and writing.

• Couple Talk: Communications for Intimate Partners. Improve your relationship journey, using methods developed by Harville Hendrix and Helen La Kelly Hunt.
• Family Violence and Its Impact on Children. Learn from a local expert about family violence, and its many layers of impact in the community, along with ways you might help with the problem.
• Plugged In: Communication and Connection between Parents and Preteens. Be guided by an expert counselor in discovering new pathways to authentic and loving communication for you and your family.

• Mexico-U.S. Border Issues: Race, Violence, and Criminalized Migration. Hear an expert sociologist discuss these issues scientifically, and explore ways to decrease the violence associated with them.
• Reconciliation and Restorative Justice. Hear the personal stories of victims and victimizers and the way peace came into their lives through a special form of non-punitive justice.

• T’ai Yoga. Learn and practice this gentle, powerful yoga using breath for connecting with the heart and Tai Chi as a meditation in motion.
• Qigong. Experience wellness, peace and tranquility by practicing this gentle form of Chinese wellness exercise.
• Movement from Within. Experience a centering form of movement to connect with yourself and the universe in a deeply satisfying way.

Course Description: Enjoy a gentle, powerful yoga using the breath and connecting with the heart. Esther introduces Tai Chi in the yoga practice as a meditation in motion. Tai Chi and yoga are complementary, each being a source of tranquility through use of movement. Participants should wear comfortable clothing and bring a yoga mat, blanket and pillow.

About the Instructor: Energetic, compassionate, persistent, Esther Vexler is an inspirational teacher and pioneer of yoga in San Antonio. She has been teaching since 1968 and inspired a nonprofit yoga teacher training school. Her loving spirit has touched many lives over her nine decades of life.

Course Description: This experience in “authentic movement” is a centering form of movement to reconnect mind and body in a deeply satisfying way and to focus awareness on sensation and movement. Each class consists of a warm up, a movement time, a drawing or writing period and an opportunity to share experience as desired. These activities lead many participants into increasing their self-awareness, reconnecting  mind and body, merging  intuition and action, accessing  creativity, and reducing stress. Participants should wear comfortable clothes.

About the Instructor: Kathy Reynolds, has a B.S. in education and M.A. in somatic psychology:  dance/movement therapy.  She has shared the joy of movement and creativity with groups and individuals at all age levels for over 30 years. She believes that connection with our deepest selves and personal authenticity are essential to a healthy future. She is the founder of livingCREATIV: fostering creativity and access to true self in the lives of women.

Course Description: "If you want to stay healthy and live to 100, do Qigong!" These are the words of Dr. Mehmet Oz, during an interview with Oprah. Qigong is a gentle form of Chinese wellness exercise. It helps you improve your digestion, blood circulation and immune system. Each class uses techniques to strengthen your internal organs to prevent illness, improve your posture and balance, and enhance your quality of life. Beginners and intermediates of all ages experience a feeling of wellness, peace and tranquility. Participants should wear comfortable, loose clothing and bring a mat or towel.

About the Instructor: Barbara Munoz has been a teacher for more than 32 years, working for the Department of Defense in Japan and Europe and traveling to twenty-two countries. She became interested in Qigong as one of the Eastern therapies used to heal her husband of illness and to keep her family on the path to vibrant health. She studied Qigong with Mary Martha McNeel and attended Qigong workshops with Jampa Stewart and Kay Hutchinson. Currently, Barbara teaches Qigong at ALIR and NEISD Community Education and is a guest presenter at learning centers all over San Antonio.

Course Description: Learn a unique and exciting new approach to exploring the divine and the traditional sacraments. Through lecture, storytelling and small- and large-group discussion, we will travel from the most comprehensive context--God and the universe--to the most local--us and our call to live sacramentally with God and creation. Linda Gibler will show us the stuff we are made of and the way the sacraments celebrate the uniqueness of the moment and our faith.

About the Speaker: Overwhelmed by the first Hubble Deep Field picture, Linda, a Dominican Sister of Houston, became enchanted with the magnificence of the universe and intrigued by the images’ significance for a Catholic understanding of God. In 1999, she began formal study of cosmology with famed cosmologist Brian Swimme at the California Institute of Integral Studies, where she completed an M.A., then a Ph.D. in philosophy and religion with an emphasis in philosophy, cosmology, and consciousness. Before her cosmic epiphany, Linda was the director of social ministry for a parish in Houston where she coordinated direct services, social outreach and social justice programs and served on a hospital medical ethics board. Linda is the associate academic dean at the Oblate School of Theology in San Antonio and science editor for Collins Foundation Press. Her new book, From the Beginning to Baptism: Scientific and Sacred Stories of Water, Oil, and Fire, was published in March 2010 by Liturgical Press.

 About the Speakers:

• John Blatz and Stacey Merkt were drawn to San Antonio's East Side 23 years ago to live among like-hearted people of faith who became a community concerned for justice and peace for Central Americans. Blatz and Merkt raised two boys (now 20 and 22) in that community, gardened, and sought to live compassionately.  John is an immigration attorney working with people from many countries seeking asylum.  Stacey home-schooled their boys and worked with immigrants in a variety of ways.  She is currently a paralegal for an immigration attorney. 
• Rachel Epp Miller has been the pastor at San Antonio Mennonite Church for the past five years.  She grew up in Ontario, Canada, and completed her undergraduate studies at Canadian Mennonite Bible College and the University of Winnipeg.  She holds a Master of Divinity degree from Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary in Elkhart, Indiana.  When not busy with ministry work, Rachel joins her husband, Wendell, in house renovations and loves to spend time hiking, reading fiction, playing with her dogs and baking bread.

Vine House community is an intentional community of Christians located in a primarily working-class Latino neighborhood on the southeast side of San Antonio. Their household life together at their current location began in May of 2008. However, many of them have been working and living in community since the 1990s. The larger, looser network of community dwellers in their neighborhood began with a few families sharing a common interest in working for peace and justice, especially among the immigrant community, and the community has continued to grow and deepen ever since. Thirty households in the neighborhood now share in each others' lives.

Course Description: Join us for a series of one-hour conversations about the work of writers and issues of their craft, with three outstanding practitioners of the art:  renowned cultural historian Jacques Barzun, journalist Jan Jarboe Russell and writer/educator Robert Flynn.  Our time together will touch upon the business of writing and the many roles writers play including musicologist, historian, journalist, biographer, satirist or chronicler of war.  Each session will consist of a facilitated discussion led by Jack Jackson, the SoL Center's founding director.
Featured Writers:

• Sept. 12:  Jacques Barzun, cultural historian and educator.  If one were to think of writing as a seniority system, Dr. Barzun, now 103 years young, would be our greatest living writer.  The author of over 40 books, he published his masterpiece, From Dawn to Decadence: 500 Years of Western Cultural Life, in 2000 to high praise and best-seller status.  Along with numerous books on music, art and literature, he has authored two books on the writer's craft, Simple and Direct: A Rhetoric for Writers, and The Modern Researcher, co-authored with Henry F. Graff.  This world-renowned author and former provost of Columbia University has called San Antonio home since 1997.
• Sept. 19:  Jan Jarboe Russell, biographer and journalist.  For more than two decades Jan has been crafting portraits of the great figures of Texas politics, bringing them down-to-earth for Texas Monthly, for which she serves as editor at large.  She also has researched and authored the definitive biography of our 38th president's spouse in Lady Bird: A Biography of Mrs. Johnson.  Closer to home, Jan writes a weekly column featured every Sunday in the San Antonio Express-News.
• Sept. 26:  Robert Flynn, writer and educator.  Professor emeritus of Trinity University, Bob is the author of seven novels and various projects that have included a two-part ABC-TV documentary, A Cowboy Legacy; a non-fiction narrative, A Personal War in Vietnam; and several story collections, including an essay collection titled Growing Up A Sullen Baptist.  He is a native of Chillicothe, Texas, and a member of the Texas Institute of Letters, the Writers Guild of America, Marine Corps Combat Correspondents, and P.E.N.

What to Bring: water bottle, snacks, hat and walking shoes, notebook and binoculars.
Location: Meet at the SoL Center, 300 Bushnell Ave., San Antonio, TX 78212, Phone: 210-732-9927.
Course Description: Connect to the natural world and the sacredness of nature. Get to know the native plants in our region and their uses by early pioneers and Native Americans. Learn to identify plants in a variety of regional ecosystems, including Brackenridge Park, Medina River Natural Area and Salado Creek Greenway to a Hill Country park in northwest Bexar County. Starting with a slide show on plants and their uses followed by a short walk in Brackenridge Park, this series includes two walks with Paul Cox, one of the region’s most knowledgeable botanists, and two walks with Patty Leslie Pasztor, whose previous walks have been among our most popular offerings. These field trips are appropriate for all levels of fitness.

About the Instructors: Patty Leslie Pasztor, a botanical and natural resource consultant, is co-author with Paul W. Cox of the book Texas Trees--A Friendly Guide. Her experience includes many years as the native plant horticulturist at the San Antonio Botanical Gardens, park naturalist at Friedrich Wilderness Park, adjunct professor at Northwest Vista College and workshop presenter on landscaping for birds and butterflies, plant identification, and ethno-botany. Patty conducts natural resource surveys and leads plant identification hikes for several city and state parks. Patty has been a master naturalist instructor for several years. Paul W. Cox, former assistant superintendent, San Antonio Botanical Gardens, has served the San Antonio area as a botanist for over 30 years. An alumnus of Stephen F. Austin State University in Nacogdoches, he received his M.S. in botany and B.S. in biology/forestry. He is adjunct professor at Palo Alto College and has named and released many new plants. Paul is an international and local speaker on horticulture, native plants, endangered plant species, prehistoric flora, and tropical plants. He serves as continuing and master naturalist instructor on botany, tree identification and horticulture. He is senior co-author of Texas Trees--A Friendly Guide, winner of two awards for significant contribution to horticulture.

    Click here for Registration Form

Course Description: A writing workshop for congregational worship leaders, this class will offer participants the opportunity to explore the meaning and themes of the Advent season, to explore the Old and New Testament lectionary texts for the four Sundays in Advent, and to receive coaching in the creation of fresh new resources for use in worship. With the guidance of Biblical scholars and writing coaches, the class will create, collect, and share liturgical materials for use in their own congregations or churches.

About the Instructors:

• The Rev. Kelly Allen, pastor at University Presbyterian Church, holds a Master of Divinity with honors from Columbia Theological Seminary and a Master of Arts in politics and religion from the University of Birmingham, England. While in England she also served as pastor of St. Andrew’s United Reformed Church. Before going to England, she served as Pastor of churches in Missouri, including First Presbyterian Church, St. Louis.
• C.W. (Bill) Spinks, Ph.D., professor emeritus of English, Trinity University, earned his Ph.D. at the University of Nebraska. His major research interests have been the “trickster,” Romantic poetry, semiotics, myth, and science fiction. He is the former editor of the Proceedings of the Semiotic Society of America and also served as president of the Society in 2003. He is publisher and editor of Trickster's Way, and founder and “chief dirt dauber” of the Raven’s Mud Project for computer recycling and re-sourcing.
• Rubén R. Dupertuis assistant professor in the religion department at Trinity University since 2006, received a B.A in English literature from the University of Michigan, an M.A. in theological studies from the Claremont School of Theology, and a Ph.D. in New Testament and early Christian literature from Claremont Graduate University.
• Mary Lou Mueller, professor emeritus of religious studies at the University of the Incarnate Word, received her M.A. in theology and Ph.D. in religion from the University of Notre Dame, South Bend, Indiana. After a decade of teaching elementary school, she began her 40-year career in the religious studies department at the University of the Incarnate Word.

Course Description: Roughly defined as ages 9 to 12, the preteen years present interesting developmental issues for youngsters. This two-part seminar will describe some of the developmental tasks of this age and offer strategies for parents to help maintain good communication with their children. Particular attention will be given to limit-setting and communication around peer interactions, use of social media, and electronic devices such as games, computers, phones, music players, etc.

About the Instructor: Dr. Cynthia Díaz de León is a psychologist in independent practice working with children, adolescents, and adults. Her areas of specialty include trauma, parenting, and psycho-educational assessment. A particular focus of her current work is helping children and parents develop “emotional muscle” to deal with life’s ups and downs and with each other. Despite 25 years of practice, she is convinced that her work and research is really to help her keep ahead of her almost 7-year-old son, Caleb.

Course Description: Living with physical illness presents challenges of many kinds. In this four-session class, we will reflect together on the difficulties, dilemmas and peculiar graces that are encountered when physical or mental illnesses become conditions of life. The class will include lecture, discussion, meditations and other spiritual practices.

About the Instructor: Mary C. Earle is an Episcopal priest, retreat leader and author. Her most recent book, Days of Grace: Meditations and Practices for Living with Illness, follows two other works on this topic. Mary is author in residence for the Work + Shop, a ministry in partnership with St. Mark’s Episcopal Church.

Course Description: Learn a new way to talk and a new way to listen. Discover the uniqueness of your partner and uncover opportunities for emotional healing and personal growth. Improve understanding in your relationship journey, using the methods developed by Harville Hendrix and Helen La Kelly Hunt. Couples should read Getting the Love You Want; the instructor will follow the approach pioneered by the Hendrix/Hunt collaboration. This educational program, using the Hendrix/Hunt relational paradigm called “Imago Relationship Theory,” focuses on a shared vision rather than an individual or competitive one. Healthy communications extend beyond the relationship into the family, the community and the nation as a whole.

About the Instructor: Dr. Marian Higgins, a clinical psychologist, received her Ph.D. from the Fielding Graduate University in Santa Barbara, California. She also received master’s degrees in educational psychology from U.T.S.A. and in marriage and family therapy from St. Mary’s University. Prior to this, she received credit in clinical pastoral education and pastoral counseling from the Ecumenical Center. Marian’s experience includes 25 years in private practice, contract work with Child Protective Services and Boystown, as well as serving as counseling coordinator at the Community Clinic. Marian and husband, Larry, have been members in University Presbyterian church since 1967. She offers compassion, wisdom and skill in helping couples co-create exuberance and understanding in their relationships.

Course Description: In this one-evening presentation, learn from an expert about the cycles of violence, and verbal and physical abuse and ways to help families turn them around to constructive, respectful relationships.  Children who grow up in violent families accept violence as normal in relationships and as an appropriate way to cope with stress. They are unable to build healthy, happy relationships with themselves or with others.  Violence patterns are at great risk of being repeated generation to generation. Patterns are learned as we model what we see.  Certificates are available for early childhood teachers and professionals.

About the Instructor: Joan B. Wells was the clinical director of the Battered Women’s Shelter Counseling Center for five years.  Previously she served as executive director for the San Bernardino Rape Crisis Center.  In San Antonio she trains family assistance crisis team volunteers and speaks publicly in a variety of settings.  In her private practice as a counselor, she specializes in abusive relationships, helps victims of sexual assault, and coaches parenting.  She earned a bachelor’s degree in child development and has taught preschool for many years. 

Course Description: Dr. Jerald Winakur, an internist and geriatrician, will discuss the basic principles of medical ethics, explore his personal journey with his father who suffered with Alzheimer’s disease, and review some of the critical challenges that confront all of us as our population inexorably ages in this high-tech medical world. He will also discuss resiliency in aging. Dr. Winakur believes in the power of stories to move, to guide, and to instruct us. His book, Memory Lessons: A Doctor’s Story, published by Hyperion in 2009, is a “memoir-manifesto” about caring for his father with Alzheimer’s disease and the changes he has witnessed in the practice of medicine. Participants should bring a copy of his book or one at the class.

About the Instructor: Dr. Jerald Winakur, M.D., F.A.C.P., C.M.D., has practiced internal and geriatric medicine for 35 years. He is a clinical professor of medicine and an associate faculty member at the Center for Medical Humanities and Ethics at the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio. He has lectured in the humanities at UTSA and Trinity University. Dr. Winakur garnered national attention in 1995 when his essay, “What Are We Going To Do With Dad?,” was published in The Washington Post and then syndicated in newspapers across the country. He was interviewed on the Diane Rehm Show and Fresh Air with Terry Gross and was featured on many other radio and television shows around the nation. This essay about caring for his father was followed by the publication of his book, in which Dr. Winakur describes the state of elder care in our nation today and challenges we face as our population ages.

Contact: Lou Taylor at 210-824-5387, or visit the website at http://events.dwtx.org.

About the Course: Phyllis Tickle, author of The Great Emergence, will share her incisive perspective on the trends and transformations of our time, stemming from her own faith and decades of observation and analysis. Her work has led her to chronicle our pivotal time in the church’s history so that we will better understand where we have been and what the future holds. In cooperation with the Episcopal Diocese of West Texas.

Contact: Rick McClatchy, dbftex@aol.com, 210-488-8169.

Conference Theme: Explore how religion can be a positive force, shaping public policy while maintaining vigorous separation of church and state. Explore differing views in disciplined, openhearted accord about how religious groups can shape public policy and still operate within constitutional guidelines. Speakers will frame perspectives of church and state separation and proceed to show constitutionally legal ways that faith communities can be a positive influence upon public policy.

Plenary Speakers:

• Rev. Barry W. Lynn serves as executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, a Washington, D.C.-based organization dedicated to the preservation of the Constitution’s religious liberty provisions. In addition to his work as a longtime activist and lawyer in the civil liberties field, Lynn is an ordained minister in the United Church of Christ.
• James M. Dunn, professor, Wake Forest School of Divinity, was formerly executive director of the Baptist Joint Committee on Public Affairs from 1980 to September 1999. He still works part time for the Baptist Joint Committee, which deals with issues of religious liberty and separation of church and state for Baptist conventions and conferences in the United States.
• Also enjoy a dramatic presentation by Al Staggs, on the life of Walter Rauschenbusch (1861-1918), a pastor and theologian in the Social Gospel Movement, and presentations by local clergy.In cooperation with Conference for Americans United for Separation of Church and State.

About this course: Learn about the diverse political, social and religious messages of modern Islam with knowledge and understanding based on Who Speaks for Islam? What a Billion Muslims Really Think, A Report of Counterintuitive Discoveries from Gallup’s World Poll, 2001-2007, by John L. Esposito and Dalia Mogahed. A university professor of sociology will report on the study and its findings. Also, hear live personal interviews with Muslims from different regions of the world, including Africa, Asia, Europe, Middle East and the Americas.
About the goal of this event: This is an excellent opportunity to meet with members of our diverse interfaith community to learn more, to build community relations, and to work for peace and understanding. A diverse planning committee of Muslim, Jewish and Christian representatives worked to bring this program to you. Special thanks to Narjis Pierre for arranging interviews.
About the report: Are we on the verge of an all-out war between the West and 1.3 billion Muslims? When the media search for an answer to that question, they usually overlook the actual views of the world’s Muslims. Who Speaks for Islam? What A Billion Muslims Really Think is about the silenced majority. It is based on Gallup’s World Poll, the largest study of its kind. This is a multiyear research study, a groundbreaking project of interviews with residents of more than 35 nations that are predominantly Muslim or have significant Muslim populations. Gallup posed questions that are on the minds of millions: Is Islam to blame for terrorism? Why is there so much anti-Americanism in the Muslim world? Who are the extremists? Where are the moderates? What do Muslim women really want? This study brings data-driven evidence--the voices of a billion Muslims, not those of individual experts or extremists--to one of the most heated and consequential debates of our time. Gallup’s research produced a number of insights, but the most important was this: The conflict between the Muslim and Western communities is far from inevitable. It is more about policy than principles. However, until and unless decision makers listen directly to the people and gain an accurate understanding of this conflict, extremists on all sides will continue to gain ground. The study revealed many surprising conclusions.
“Who Speaks for Islam” is a SoL Center interfaith program made possible by a memorial donation from the estate of Mary Ella Schaefer, a champion of the SoL Center vision. She was born March 11, 1927, in Lawrence, Kansas, to the Rev. Harry and Mary Preyer McColloch. Mary Ella was a longtime member of University Presbyterian Church and Philanthropic Educational Organization (PEO), one of the pioneer societies for women. A voracious reader, she loved to play piano and was devoted to her pets. She is greatly missed by her friends and family. Mary Ella Schaefer died December 2, 2009 at the age of 82.

Course Description: Explore the basic beliefs of Islam, starting with the six articles of faith, the Islamic concept of God, its books, and its prophets--Adam, Abraham, Moses, Jesus and Muhammad. A study of the Quran will be highlighted, and participants will receive an English language copy of the Quran. Learn about the five pillars of Islam mainly from a Sunni perspective. This course is particularly suited for those familiar with Christianity and Judaism, who would like a comparative study with Islam to recognize the deep similarities between the three Abrahamic faiths, Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

About the Instructor: Dr. Rehan Akbani received his Ph.D. in computer science from the University of Texas at San Antonio in August 2009. He is currently working at M. D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas, as a cancer researcher. Dr. Akbani lived in San Antonio for 11 years. He served as the vice president, president, and chair of the Interfaith Committee of the San Antonio mosque, Muslim Children Education and Civic Center, president of the Muslim Students’ Association at UTSA, and as a board member for an interfaith dialogue association of mosques and churches across San Antonio. Having grown up in the Middle East and Asia, Dr. Akbani received Islamic education from early childhood. He continued with higher level Islamic courses in the U.S.A. and received mentorship, guidance and education from the religious scholars of the mosques of San Antonio. His experience and education in both Eastern and Western cultures affords him a unique perspective on the challenges facing the world today.

Course Description: Hear the personal stories of two families’ experience with reconciliation and restorative justice. Linda and Chris will each tell us about their respective journeys through the criminal justice system, along with their ideas of reform. Founded in 1976, Murder Victims’ Families for Reconciliation (MVFR) is a national organization of family members of victims of both homicide and executions who oppose the death penalty in all cases. MVFR includes people of many different perspectives. Because violent crime cuts across a broad spectrum of society, its members are geographically, racially and economically diverse.

About the Speakers:

• Linda White’s 26-year old daughter Cathy was abducted, raped and murdered in 1986. Following this devastating loss, Linda returned to college to study grief and loss in order to be able to educate others and counsel those with similar losses. She currently works in several areas of restorative justice, including victim-offender mediated dialogues. Retired from college teaching, she was adjunct faculty at Sam Houston State University in psychology, philosophy and criminal justice. Research in the area of death and dying has led her into other academic areas, primarily violence and its prevention, and finally into restorative justice. She served as a volunteer mediator with the Victim Offender Mediation/Dialogue program in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice and was appointed in 2003 by Governor Rick Perry to represent victims’ issues on the Texas State Council for Adult Offender Supervision. Linda values, above all, responses to violence that are themselves non-violent--and therefore opposes the death penalty for any crimes. Her video of the mediation in her family tragedy Meeting with A Killer: One Family’s Journey tells the remarkable story of her family’s journey of grief, loss and mediation.
• Chris Castillo is the Texas/national organizer with Murder Victims' Families for Reconciliation. Castillo started his career as a reporter for a Texas newspaper. He was covering the court beat when he learned his mother, Pilar Castillo, had been murdered in her Houston home. Soon after his mother’s death he began working with crime victims in Jefferson County and attending their annual Candlelight Vigil. About 10 years ago he joined a faith-based ministry called Bridges to Life, which takes crime victims into prison to help inmates see the impact of crime on the individual. It was through that program that he found forgiveness. His involvement with prison ministry has continued. He volunteers with a Bible study group at the U.S. Federal Prison Camp in Beaumont and has worked with Karios and Epiphany, programs aimed at bringing faith into the prison and changing the hearts of inmates. Castillo, based in Beaumont, will work with family members in the Houston region and various other states. He has more than a decade of marketing and public relations experience. It is his goal to make a difference within in the world. For him, his work with MVFR is more than a job. It is a calling.

In cooperation and with support from the Texas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty.

Featured Speaker: Paul Rusesabagina is the real-life hero of the film Hotel Rwanda. Rusesabagina saved the lives of more than 1,200 people during the 1994 Rwandan genocide.  He served as manager of the Hotel des Mille Collines in Kigali and bravely risked his life to shelter Hutus and Tutsis who were seeking refuge from the genocide that killed more than 800,000 people. In order to further the mission of his foundation, Rusesabagina now tours the world speaking about social justice, human rights activism and the lessons learned from the Rwandan genocide, one of the worst tragedies of the 20th century. Rusesabagina describes his experiences during the horrific genocide and the ways in which governments, non-governmental organizations and ordinary people can work together to prevent genocide throughout the world. Proceeds will be used toward support services for refugees escaping war and persecution who have been resettled in the United States through the U.S. Department of State programs. In cooperation with Catholic Charities Refugee Program, 202 West French Place, San Antonio, TX 78212.

Course Description: “You have made us for Yourself, Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in you.” Augustine wrote that famous phrase 1,700 years ago, and those words were meant to summarize his whole life. They also summarize our lives. We are all deeply restless, and that restlessness isn’t something that sets us against the spiritual life. Rather what we do with our restlessness is our spiritual life. This presentation will explore longing as an undergirding spirituality, as a deep cavity of soul, as soul itself.

About the Instructor: Ronald Rolheiser, a Roman Catholic priest and member of the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate, is president of Oblate School of Theology in San Antonio, Texas. He is a community-builder, lecturer, and internationally renowned author. His books are popular throughout the English-speaking world, and his weekly column is carried by more than 60 newspapers worldwide. For most of the 35 years of his priesthood, he taught theology and philosophy at Newman Theological College in Edmonton, Alberta. His book The Holy Longing won the USA Catholic Press book award for 2000 for the best hardback book in spirituality. His many other books and articles include Secularity and the Gospel, Being Missionaries to our own Children, N.Y., Crossroad, 2006; Forgotten Among the Lilies, revised edition, N.Y., Doubleday, 2005; and The Restless Heart, revised edition, N.Y., Doubleday, 2004.

Course Description: Moses is considered the greatest of all the Hebrew prophets because he had a more direct knowledge of God than any human being of his time. As a liberator, he led the Israelites from Egyptian slavery into freedom. Soon thereafter, as a lawgiver, he transmitted the content of the Revelation at Mt. Sinai to the people of Israel. In this course, we shall explore these three major roles Moses played.

Suggested reading: Walking the Bible: A Journey by Land through the Five Books of Moses by Bruce Feiler; Moses: A Life by Jonathan Kirsch; Did Moses Really Have Horns? and Other Myths about Jews and Judaism by Rifat Sonsino.

About the Instructor: Rabbi Samuel M. Stahl is rabbi emeritus of Temple Beth-El of San Antonio, where he served as senior rabbi for 26 years. The co-chair of the Program Committee of the SoL Center, he has authored two books: Making the Timeless Timely and Boundaries, Not Barriers.

Course Description: U.S. immigration enforcement policies over the last two decades have generated growing levels of violence and criminality at our Southern border with Mexico. Using a human rights framework, this special lecture will discuss the causes of border violence, the forms such violence takes, who its victims are and actions we might take to reduce it. Recommended reading: Bacon, David (2007) “The Political Economy of International Migration,” New Labor Forum, 16:3, 56-69.

About the Speaker: David Spener is an associate professor in the department of sociology and anthropology at Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas, where he has worked since 1997. He is the author of Clandestine Crossings: Migrants and Coyotes on the Texas-Mexico Border (Cornell University Press, 2009) and editor of Adult Biliteracy in the United States (Center for Applied Linguistics, 1994), The U.S.-Mexico Border: Transcending Divisions, Contesting Identities (Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1998), and Free Trade and Uneven Development: The North American Apparel Industry after NAFTA (Temple University Press, 2002). In addition he has published numerous articles for books and journals in both English and Spanish. At Trinity, Dr. Spener coordinates the Languages across the Curriculum program and the Latin American and Latino studies concentration for the international studies major. He received his doctorate in sociology from the University of Texas at Austin and his M.S. in applied linguistics from Georgetown University in Washington, D.C.