“We’re called from different spaces but we found each other in the calling. I mean you have a different book under your arm than I do, religiously, but yours and mine both tell us that we need to go out and heal where we see there are wounds, so to speak.”

Interview of James Patton, Executive Vice President of the International Center for Religion and Diplomacy captured at the Global Peace Convention in Asuncion, Paraguay on November 21, 2014.

Mr. Patton speaks on how to help people break down barriers and get past seeing people as “the other.” He says that having them work on a shared project towards something for the betterment of the community and seeing the shared value they posses is a critical step.

Patton cites an example of ICRD’s work in protecting religious minorities. He talks about when Christian and Muslim Pakistanis and Americans gathered in Nepal to discuss protecting their own religious minorities and how in the end, US Christians were looking to protect Muslim minorities and Pakistani Muslims were looking to protect Christians.