Gaia House Interfaith Center

Gaia House Interfaith Center is a community center located at the heart of Carbondale, Illinois. Ever since my freshman year of undergraduate studies at SIUC, I've been involved in this unique center in a variety of ways. This place is one of the main reasons why I ended up staying in Southern Illinois after receiving my Bachelor's degree. Therefore, I'm pleased to announce that this Fall, I'm serving as the interim Program Director of Gaia House Interfaith Center.

So what is Gaia House? Honestly, that's a question we explore just about every day. One answer is provided by our mission statement:

"With a mission to SIUC students and an outreach to the wider area, we are a welcoming community committed to spiritual awareness that integrates peace, justice, and ecological sustainability."

This sentence goes a long way to describe why we do what we do. But you can only understand Gaia House fully by learning more about the people who come here and coming on by sometime to experience it for yourself.

Gaia House is a place where people of many faiths, beliefs, and cultures meet. We are an eclectic mix of independent thinkers, spiritual seekers, ecological activists, and a wide variety of other everyday folks who enjoy meeting new people in a friendly environment and taking the time to get to know them. At Gaia House meetings, dinners, and other events, we eat good food, cook and clean, meditate, do yoga and tai chi, watch movies, celebrate holidays, and talk about questions of faith and reality. This is one of the few places in Southern Illinois where you can meet and spend time with new people regardless of your different beliefs and backgrounds.

Gaia House means something a little different to everyone who comes here. This also means that Gaia House has something for everyone, allowing us to expand our horizons by learning what we have in common with other people in our community.

The Gaia House website explains more details about some of the different groups, events, and individuals that call Gaia House home. The front page includes a Like Box that shows the latest news from Gaia House on Facebook. The Gaia House newsletter, Happenings in Faith, Peace, and Justice, offers a weekly overview of what's going on at the center and in the community, including a description of this week's dinner themes and any special events and news.

As the new Program Director, I've already had the good fortune of working with other people in our community to restart old Gaia House programming from last Spring and develop new programming at Gaia House for the Fall. There's already plenty going on over here, and always room for new and exciting ways to meet new people and learn new things at Gaia House!

If you live here in Carbondale, are going to school in Southern Illinois, or are just passing through the Carbondale area, here are just a few of our regularly scheduled programs that you can check out while you're in town:

• InterVeg is a vegetarian potluck that happens every Thursday at 6 pm. It's an opportunity for both vegetarians and non-vegetarians to eat healthy vegetarian and vegan food and share a delicious meal in a community environment. When local veggies are in season, we get fresh veggies once a week from Hollow Pumpkin CSA to use in the meals.
• Rice and Spice is an international slow foods dinner that happens every Friday at 6 pm. People get together to prepare and eat a meal together with a different theme each week. Our themes often feature the cuisine of a particular country, allowing everyone to learn more about the delicious food of the world each week. When local veggies are in season, we get fresh veggies once a week from Hollow Pumpkin CSA to use in the meals.
• Questions of Faith and Reality, a popular new series that started in the Spring, offers you a place to search for wisdom with other students and community members. Pradnya Dharmadhikari and Maurine Pyle will be facilitating this ongoing conversation about love, faith, uncertainty, and other questions raised by the participants. The group will meet on Monday nights at 6:00 PM in the library beginning August 29th.
• Free Wifi and Comfy Couches. The building is open Monday through Thursday from 10 am to 4 pm and Friday from 11 am to 4 pm. Feel free to come on in, have a seat, drink some water or coffee/tea, and make use of our free public wifi. Feel free to stop by the office to say hi to me or our Operations Director, Jon-Paul Diefenbach, or just take some time to yourself to relax, do homework, meditate, or walk in the Carbondale Labyrinth and Peace Garden out back.

If I sound excited about everything going on at Gaia House, it's because I am! I've been going to Gaia House for a long time now, and I feel very excited and blessed to be playing a new role in developing our programming and keeping our doors open. Let me know if you have any questions, comments, or ideas for new programming. Thanks for listening, and if you're here in Southern Illinois, I look forward to seeing you sometime at Gaia House Interfaith Center!