Institute for Islamic, Christian, and Jewish Studies Inc.

Responsible civic life requires more than tolerance and coexistence. It requires participation in community, respectful dialogue, mutual understanding, and flexibility with resources and positions. We build robust interreligious communities that interweave the civic, educational, and religious dimensions of our lives together.

For over 30 years, the ICJS has developed and offered distinctive educational programs for clergy, religious leaders and communities, and the general public. More recently the work of the ICJS has expanded to include programs designed to equip teachers and community leaders working for social justice to be agents of interreligious understanding in the public square.

We use scholarly and educational resources to challenge religious bigotry and to confront the historical injustices that have divided our religious communities. Through the give-and-take of learning together, our understanding of ourselves and others expands through a process of encounter; translation; interpretation and/or misinterpretation; and clarification. We endeavor to create learning spaces where productive discomfort stretches us toward mutual discovery and deepens relationships.

As an independent organization, not connected to any specific religious or academic institutions, ICJS is in a unique position to promote religious diversity and inclusion. Because ICJS believes that the most effective interreligious learning is grounded in local relationships, we use the diverse Greater Baltimore Region to build models of robust interreligious learning and community. Over the last 30 years, ICJS has built relationships in many faith communities within this region, in many cases serving as a bridge between such communities.

ICJS is home to four resident scholars who bring their academic and theological understanding to bear on ICJS’s work in the community. These scholars are intimately involved in the programming and strategy of ICJS as it engages the greater community. By constructively engaging with religious pluralism in education, outreach, and scholarship we are shaping a new relationship among Christians, Jews, and Muslims, and modeling a new conversation that affirms and values religious diversity in America.

Since its founding in 1987 as the Institute for Christian and Jewish Studies, ICJS has focused on disarming religious hatred through education. In 2013, ICJS expanded the mission to include Islam. In 2015, ICJS developed programs to reach deeper into the divided community, equipping community leaders (“Justice Leaders”) and secondary teachers to be interreligious leaders in the public square.

In 2021, ICJS launched a new Congregational Program to bring religious and lay leaders from Muslim, Jewish and Christian congregations in the Greater Baltimore region to study and dialogue together.

ICJS is committed to five central Values: Difference, Equity, Dialogue, Learning, and Community. These values highlight how ICJS differs from other interreligious organizations in that it welcomes and embraces differences, rather than merely focusing on finding commonalities.