|
Jan. 31, 2005
Dr. Mark Finkelstein
and The Rev. Goanar Chol will speak on “Religious
Responsibility in the Face of Genocide in Sudan”
at the annual Goldstein Lecture
to be held at 7 p.m., Thursday, Feb.
10, in the UPS Auditorium of the Lincoln Center.
Finkelstein and Chol will also speak on Friday, Feb. 11, at
8 p.m. at Congregation Beth Shalom, 815 38th Street.
The Goldstein
Lecture is co-sponsored by Morningside’s Academic
and Cultural Arts Series (ACAS) and the Jewish Federation
of Sioux City. The Goldstein Lectures are made possible through
a permanent endowment provided by the Harold and Bernice Goldstein
Foundation. Finkelstein and Chol’s presentation at Congregation
Beth Shalom is sponsored by Congregation Beth Shalom and the
Jewish Federation of Sioux City.
Both events are
free and open to the public.
Finkelstein and
Chol will discuss the current situation in war-torn Sudan,
where over one million people have been displaced from their
homes and hunted throughout the desert of western Sudan. Over
30,000 people have been killed during the last year.
A resolution was
passed calling attention to the situation in Sudan at the
General Assembly of Jewish Federations in November 2004. Action
on the issue within Jewish communities nationally is based
in part on the findings of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum,
which has issued its first-ever genocide alert with regard
to the situation in Sudan.
 Finkelstein
has been the director of Jewish community relations for the
Des Moines Jewish Federation in Des Moines, Iowa, since 1996.
He is a facilitator for the Des Moines Interfaith Coalition
on the Crisis in Sudan, a response team leader on the Des
Moines Mayor’s Task Force on Hate and Hate Crimes, a
board member of the Interfaith Alliance of Iowa, and a past
member of Iowa’s Lt. Governor’s Committee on Diversity.
He was assistant
professor of music at the University of New Brunswick from
1984-85 and assistant professor of music at the D’Angelo
School of Music at Mercyhurst College, Erie, Pa., from 1985-87.
Finkelstein graduated
from New York City’s High School of Performing Arts
in 1968. Finkelstein, a graduate of New York University, holds
a master of music degree from the University of Toronto and
a doctorate in music education from Michigan State University.
Chol, who works
out of the Des Moines Presbytery’s office, is the  coordinator
of Sudanese ministry in the Presbyterian Synod of Lakes and
Prairies. He works mainly with eight Sudanese groups or fellowships
in Des Moines, Lincoln, Neb.; Omaha, Neb.; Kansas City, Mo.;
Sioux Falls, S.D.; and Minneapolis, Minn. He was ordained
by the Presbyterian Church of the Sudan in 1991 and came to
the United States in 1996.
He holds diplomas
from Grace Bible Institute in Ethiopia and from Nova Scotia’s
St. Francis Xavier University and a bachelor of divinity degree
from St. Paul’s United Theological University in Kenya.
|
