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Imam beside priest. Priest beside rabbi. Rabbi beside preacher.
A diverse group of religious leaders from across the Salt Lake Valley came together with an equally eclectic crowd of parishioners on Sunday evening to celebrate all the ways they are the same — and all the ways they are not.
"God has given us great diversity in our creation," said the Rev. John Charles Wester, bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Salt Lake City. "There is always something more to see, something new to see, for which to be thankful."
That includes Salt Lake City's great diversity of faith traditions, Wester and others agreed.
Some fervently believe they know the one true path to God, but Alan Bachman, chairman of Utah's Interfaith Roundtable, illustrated the audacity of such claims by recalling a question that his 5-year-old son once asked him.
"What religion is God?" he asked the hundreds of people packed into the Congregation Kol Ami synagogue for the 21st annual Thanksgiving week interfaith prayer service.
Because it is not possible to know the answer, Bachman said, it is important for people from different faiths to understand each other and respect each other.
That means getting beyond ideas that keep people apart. "The stereotypes are almost always inaccurate," he said.
Taking a light-hearted aim at one of the points of contention between Jews and Latter-day Saints — the ceremonial baptism of the dead into the Mormon faith — Bachman looked down at a row of faith leaders. "I don't know what's right," he said. "When I'm dead — I want all of you to baptize me into all of your faiths."
Imam Muhammed Mahte, who was born in South Africa, recalled witnessing divisions that were created for no greater purpose than for one group to feel superior over another.
God has no time, place or purpose for such divisions, he said.
"You may think low of certain people, but if God thinks higher of them, you and I can do nothing about it," he said.
Father Elias Koucos, of the Prophet Elias Greek Orthodox Church, said that friendship across faith traditions is one of the beauties of life and a requisite of faith.
"We all have our own specific beliefs and practices that we are held accountable to," he said.
But among all of those beliefs, he said, is a call to offer "love, respect and kindness" to others.
John T. Nielsen, vice chair of the public affairs council of the LDS Church, noted that Thanksgiving, as proclaimed as an official American holiday by President Abraham Lincoln, was "not to be a celebration for only Christians, or for any particular denomination, but a day of giving thanks for all people."
And just as Martin Luther King Jr. once dreamed of a day in which his children would not be judged by the color of their skin, Nielsen said he dreams of a day in which "we could love, appreciate and respect our neighbors, irrespective of the nature of the building in which they worship."