Located in the scenic Hudson River Valley in New York is Stony Point Center. The conference and retreat center is also home to a multifaith community that provides opportunities for interfaith growth and spiritual reflection. The opportunity to learn the ins and outs of small\u2010scale farming through a farm apprenticeship, along with study sessions to further her Islamic knowledge, is what drew Amirah AbuLughod there in 2013.<\/p>\n
Homeschooled through high school, AbuLughod\u2019s first taste of public school was as a freshman at 51ÁÔÆæ at Washington County, where she excelled academically. Active on campus, she also provided computer support as a student worker in the Information Technology Department \u2013 a job that three of her siblings also held when they were students. After completing an associate degree in 2010, she transferred to UW\u2010Milwaukee, where she graduated with a degree in geography,\u00a0in the environmental geography track.<\/p>\n
The Farm the Land Grow the Spirit summer institute program at Stony Point Center was a perfect fit for AbuLughod, then a 23\u2010year-old Wisconsin native. For someone who cared about the environment and loved working with the earth, it was an easy decision.<\/p>\n
The earth\u2010care program integrates study in the Jewish, Islamic and Christian traditions, with sustainable agriculture, social justice, nonviolence and\u00a0intentional community living. Amirah spent five intensive weeks living in a multifaith community while working on Stony Point Center\u2019s one\u2010acre farm.<\/p>\n
After the experience of the summer institute, she stayed connected. In 2015, she returned as Stony Point Center\u2019s first farm apprentice. She also became a member of the Community of Living Tradition, an intentional multifaith community of Muslims, Jews and Christians that work together to offer radical hospitality at Stony Point and participate in grassroots movements for justice and peace.<\/p>\n
Since accepting a full-time position with Stony Point in 2018, Amirah has had the opportunity to\u00a0meet and share ideas with other farmers, organizers and faith leaders from all over the country who are engaging earth\u2010care, sustainability, and food and land justice issues through a faith\u2010based lens.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese connections are always inspiring and are one of the aspects of my work here that I truly appreciate \u2014 building community and coalitions across faith traditions with the land being central to our engagement together,\u201d AbuLughod said.<\/p>\n
Last fall, AbuLughod participated in the olive harvest delegation to Palestine and Israel. Sponsored by\u00a0Interfaith Peacebuilders (now named Eyewitness Palestine), the purpose of this annual delegation is to \u201ceducate North Americans about the region and deepen their understanding of its conflicts.\u201d<\/p>\n
As a person with Palestinian heritage, AbuLughod wanted to \u201cexperience a piece of the land that my family once called home.\u201d\u00a0As a farmer, she hoped to \u201cconnect, observe and tend to that land \u2014 not because it is contentious soil, but because it is earth,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Her participation sharpened her \u201cability to draw connections between illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank and settler colonialism on indigenous lands in the United States,\u201d she said. \u00a0The result was to \u201cmore deeply engage my work as a Muslim\u2010American working and living on land that is not my own,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
As the rest of the delegation whizzed through passport control, AbuLughod was detained for more than 30 minutes. Questions by Israeli security, such as, \u201cWhy are you here? \u00a0Are you Muslim? Do you have family here?\u201d were asked repeatedly.\u00a0 The process was \u201cnerve-racking and intrusive,\u201d but left her even more determined to \u201cstand up against power that says \u2018you have no place here and we will do everything in our power to make you continually question yourself\u2026\u2019why am I here?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Referring to herself as \u201ca person of faith and a person engaging with the land,\u201d AbuLughod is clearly rooted in her faith and life mission. The Muslim Peace Fellowship at Stony Point Center allows her to engage with land and faith issues. This work also ties into the vision and mission of the fellowship, which is to have \u201cpeace, faith and justice central to the work I engage in as a Muslim.\u201d<\/p>\n
As she weaves together faith and farming, her goals are often \u201cvast and wide \u2014 ecological and human health, a just and balanced distribution of food and land, basic human rights and dignity for all, specifically those who put the food on our tables,\u201d she said.\u00a0 Her goals can also be \u201cmoment to moment \u2014 seeding 35 trays of spinach so we have greens to eat mid-winter from our gardens, stopping my task of harvesting to take the time to actually watch the monarch butterfly I found emerge from its cocoon, and praying for rain as we sow the cover-crop seeds.\u201d<\/p>\n
Clearly rooted in her faith and life mission, AbuLughod\u2019s goal is simply, \u201cto always be growing \u2014 on the land and in my faith.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Amirah AbuLughod is learning about small-scale farming while working at Stony Point Center, home to a multifaith community that provides opportunities for interfaith growth and spiritual reflection.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":40008,"featured_media":67391,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","uwm_wg_additional_authors":[]},"categories":[174],"tags":[249,250],"section":[139,143],"display_categories":[115,116],"related-coverage":[260],"uwmnews-feed":[167,158],"class_list":["post-67390","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-community-engagement","tag-student-success","section-science-technology","section-water-environment","display_categories-top-story-secondary","display_categories-top-story-section","related-coverage-community-engagement","uwmnews-feed-alumni-association","uwmnews-feed-letters-science"],"yoast_head":"\n