Temple’s interactive map allows users to explore religious sites around Philly

While walking near Temple’s campus, you may miss some of the neighborhood’s deep religious history and not see all the sites for contemporary religious practice. Unless you had a card.

Temple University is developing a new resource to help its students, staff and other North Philadelphia community members explore the diverse religious practices of the Temple community. The Mapping Spaces of Meaning project will highlight religious sites on an interactive digital map of Temple and surrounding neighborhoods.

The map, which extends from 22nd St. to Sixth St. from west to east, and from Glenwood Avenue to Spring Garden Street from north to south, will also include additional information about the locations, including photos, videos and other resources that illustrate the help explain religious characteristics of a particular location. and cultural significance.

An initial version of the map is expected to be available on Temple’s website early next fall semester, and will be updated with information and other media about the sites as the project progresses. The project is funded by a $5,000 grant from the nonprofit Interfaith America, which promotes religious diversity.

“Examining our city’s religious history allows us to understand what our city is today and what we can aspire to,” said Ariella Werden-Greenfield, deputy director of the Feinstein Center for American Jewish History at Temple University, and one of the faculty leads of “Mapping Spaces of Meaning.”

“It really allows us to ask questions about how our students and our larger campus community interact with their religiosity, with the religious communities and institutions around them and the spaces that may be imbued with meaning on Temple’s campus,” she says. said about the project.

As David M. Kruger, executive director of the Dialogue Institute at Temple University and the project’s other faculty leader, explained, North Philadelphia has a rich religious diversity and history that can be overwhelming or go unnoticed without this kind of guide.

“There’s a long history (in) North Philadelphia of people of German Jewish descent, Ashkenazi Jews…during the Great Migration north there was a shift to more African Americans living in the area. Today, other immigrant communities live nearby,” he said.

Kruger also referenced the series of historic worship services in North Philly.

The most famous include Church of the Advocate, a National Historic Landmark where the 1970 Black Panther Party convention was held; Congregation Rodeph Shalom, a historic synagogue whose Ashkenazi members founded the congregation in 1795; and Makkah Masjid, formerly known as Mosque No. 12, where Malcolm X and the Nation of Islam once worshipped.

The project leaders said their map will include more than these traditional religious sites. They aim to mark all the places where people practice their religion or spirituality.

“You don’t necessarily know that on Fifth, near Temple’s campus, a little bit further north, we have a number of businesses that serve (Odisha Hindu) devotees,” Werden-Greenfield said.

The map will even include spaces where people go for peace and reflection, not specific to any particular religion.

“There are all these different religious communities that use spaces, even if they are not marked as religious spaces, to connect with each other, to connect with the divine, and to live lives filled with faith. ”

Several Temple students have been working on the “Mapping Spaces of Meaning,” first helping to document sites through research, and then working on outreach and surveys with other students to learn about other sites and their personal connections to those places.

The Kruger Dialogue Institute also provided these students with training on how to have better conversations with others about their religious differences.

“We can live in our own bubbles sometimes, and I think religion is a great way to connect people,” says 20-year-old Graysen Gill.

Gill grew up in an Episcopal church; she enjoyed the community there, but never felt particularly connected to her family’s denomination or religion. She joined the project to learn more about different religions and become more involved in the North Philly community, and believes it changed her perspective on religion and the city. Now she appreciates the history and cultural significance of these religious sites much more than when she simply walked past the buildings, oblivious to their significance.

“I want people to have introductory access to all these different spaces in a completely comprehensive way, because it can be quite intimidating to do the research on your own and then figure out what appeals to you,” she said.

Sidney Raine Jeffries, 19, similarly said working on the map, talking to other students and learning from the Dialogue Institute made her look at religion in a new way.

“Religion and experiential practices are often a taboo or uncomfortable conversation for people. When you go through these many workshops and talk within the team about our own upbringing, you realize that this should not be a taboo… it is something that is important to know… how to be religiously tolerant,” she said.

The project leaders understand that their work is particularly relevant at this time, as college campuses have become centers of protest and conflict over the U.S. government’s support for Israel during the war in Gaza, which followed Hamas’ unprecedented attack on Israel in October. safety concerns raised by students.

Although he resisted the idea that their map and calm discussion would be solutions to that struggle, Kruger said he was greatly encouraged by what he saw from the project’s students and their interactions with others. He says he believes this generation is capable of finding ways to successfully navigate their ideological differences.

“You see so much in the headlines that students don’t listen to each other. … I found an incredibly wonderful group of students who were deeply, intensely curious and wanted to approach conversations through a lens of dialogue and understanding. And I found that very hopeful,” he said.