In a time when many are emphasizing religious differences, local groups will be trying to find common ground at Sunday's Interfaith Thanksgiving Celebration.
Ann Schoonmaker, a member of the Baha'i faith who is involved in organizing the event, said Thanksgiving is an especially appropriate holiday because it has not been "claimed" by any one faith.
"It's a holiday about setting down our differences, crossing boundaries and seeing what unites us," she said.
The gathering will be held at 7 p.m. at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints on Green Road, and includes many denominations that practice in Ann Arbor.
A donation of either canned or dried goods, or money is suggested.
Rabbi Robert Dobrusin of Beth Israel Congregation on Washtenaw Avenue agreed that the holiday holds special importance.
"As an American Jew, Thanksgiving is a tremendous opportunity," he said. "It has a spiritual root, a religious root, but it's also a secular holiday where we don't have to be completely centered on our own heritage. Thanksgiving is the one holiday we can truly share."
The celebration will feature readings from the Torah, Quran, New Testament and the Book of Mormon, as well as a Hindu chant, an organ prelude and Buddhist meditation.
The Ann Arbor Interfaith Alliance, which will be hosting the event, was founded three years ago as an offshoot of the nationwide organization United Now in Serving Our Neighbors. UNISON encourages the clergy and lay people of different religions to unite in the common goal of social and political change.
UNISON, which is co-sponsoring the event, has sought to organize communities of low to moderate incomes, said Tad Wysor, countywide UNISON director.
Although still associated with UNISON, AAIA has gone its own way, responding to needs unique to the Ann Arbor community.
The Rev. George Lambrides, a minister at the First Baptist Church on Huron Street and a founding member of AAIA, remembered that while the idea of strengthening interfaith relations appealed to Ann Arbor clergy, further meetings revealed differences.
"We just felt that we should concern ourselves first with building unity within the faith community, and then with social change, not the other way around."
Made up of both clergy and lay people, AAIA has strived since its inception to bring together the wide variety of faiths that make up the Ann Arbor community.
"We found that we were coexisting and never talking to one another," said Beth Ament, one of the organizers for this year's event and a member of the Unitarian Universalist Church on Washtenaw Avenue.
Ament said she realized the necessity of interfaith exchange when she first heard of the travesties in Bosnia.
"I just saw how lucky we are to live in a country where there's so much diversity and tolerance of religious differences," she said. "We need to learn and share our traditions with other religions."
Lambrides explained that, before AAIA was founded, Ann Arbor did not have a real forum to deepen appreciation for other religions.
"I can be pejorative toward another faith until I start to know them personally," he said. "These are friends of mine, not labels or denominations. These are people who are part of my weekly conversation."
The basis of this ongoing dialog is a meeting on the third Tuesday of every month, where members of different congregations come together to discuss matters affecting the entire faith community.
As to the more profound resonances of this gathering, Sukha Murray, resident priest of the Zen Buddhist Temple on Packard Road, sees the Ann Arbor interfaith community as a microcosm that mirrors and prepares people for the macrocosm of the world. "We are like a drop of water in an ocean that bears the same characteristics."