TIRATH YATRA WALK 2013, STAGE 2: JAIN CENTRE

Stage two of the Tirath Yatra Sponsored Walk with Leicester Friends of Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies: The Jain Centre, Oxford Street. The goal is to visit 16 Hindu places of worship (mandirs) in Leicester on foot in a single day. 

Tirath Yatra (Hindi: तीर्थयात्रा) is a journey undertaken as a pilgrimage.

If you're wondering what became of stage one (Shree Jalaram Prarthana Mandal, Narborough Road) which was the starting point of the walk, I was on my way there myself when I met the group coming the other way through Bede Park, heading for the Jain Centre.

Jainism is seen as a religion in its own right as far as membership of Leicester Council of Faiths (and, for that matter, of the Inter Faith Network of the UK) goes, but no one involved today seems to object to the Jain Centre being included in a walking pilgrimage round Hindu places of worship in the city.

One of the distinctive and laudable features of Leicester's Jain Centre is that it offers a home for several sects of Jainism under one roof, giving each one its own worship space, while practitioners of the different denominations mingle socially.

Last year, on the Holi Yatra Walk, we spent quite a while in each place of worship, joining in devotions, receiving a talk or guided tour, enjoying refreshments. Consequently, we fell far behind schedule and overran by a few hours. I stay in the vestibule to update social media (Foursquare, Twitter and Facebook) about the walk while my fellow yatris head upstairs to the worship hall. I haven't even finished doing that before they come back down the stairs, start getting their shoes on and head out the door towards our next stage. I wonder if we're going to try and keep up this pace all day!

MEET ÅSA AMANDA ARBJÖRK, ASPIRING BLOGGER

At Phoenix this morning, for a bit of one-to-one social media coaching with Åsa Amanda Arbjörk. She and I have known each other for ages, since I was teaching Creative Writing at The Rutland College in Oakham.

She was one of the star students on those courses. I was always enthusiastic about her writing and I'm glad to see that she is still. Back in the day, there was no such thing as blogging or tweeting or Facebooking (if there is such a verb) but now I'm a big enthusiast of all three. If someone wants to write, in almost any capacity and for almost any reason, then they have to throw themselves into the social media mix. That's what we're talking about today - and I'm hoping to give her the "benefit" of my "wisdom".

Åsa has many facets that set her apart from most of the other students to whom I've taught Creative Writing over the years (quite a few hundred of them). She's bilingual in English and Swedish (which has led to all sorts of unusual opportunities, such as sub-titling movies and TV shows for the Swedish market), benefits from an observant and reflective outsider's view of our society - and she lives in Stamford, which was recently selected by the Sunday Times as the best place to live in the UK. A piece like that just published about the place where you live is manna from heaven for someone who's looking for an excuse to start blogging - in my humble opinion.

MEET WILL BALDET, PREVENT COORDINATOR

At St Philip's Centre for Study and Engagement in a Multi-Faith Society this morning for a meeting with Will Baldet, Prevent Coordinator for Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland.

I first met Will last month, at a Knowledge Exchange Seminar in the Multifaith Centre at the University of Derby on the topic of Islam and Higher Education. We've been looking for the chance to get together for this conversation since then.

I'm grateful to Will for clearing a couple of hours so close to the international conference that he's organising at De Montfort University this Saturday. "Virtual Voices, Real Lives" will consider the realities of radicalisation and the role of social media in Islamophobia, extremism and social change. As you can imagine, faithful reader, I'm excited at the prospect of social media being taken seriously in this context and am looking forward to taking part in the conference myself.

Will was appointed Prevent Coordinator for Leicester in October last year. He talks me through how Prevent has changed, what it means now and how it relates to the distinctive circumstances of our city. I, in turn, walk him through the structure, function and relevance of Leicester Council of Faiths. We map out areas of overlap between Prevent and the Council of Faiths, complementary aspects of his work and mine, particularly regarding social cohesion. It would make sense for him to meet the Board of Leicester Council of Faiths to brief them on Prevent. I hope we can make that happen soon. I also offer to help him make contact with other appropriate organisations and agencies, such as Network for Change and Leicester SACRE.

The appointment of a Prevent Coordinator at S Philip's Centre was funded by the Home Office and is designed to co-ordinate the preventative strand of the Government's counter-terrorism strategy CONTEST in Leicester. The aim of Prevent is to help communities develop the resilience to counter the national threat in all its forms, and to empower the community itself with the support of partner agencies to address these difficult challenges.

As we're wrapping up our two-hour meeting, we discover a shared interest in comics. Will favours Marvel (particularly Daredevil, the Man Without Fear), while I'm more firmly DC. Those who get such things may see what that might tell us about Will - and about how he and I could work together.

Follow Will's Twitter feed, @Leics_SafeSPACE: challenging religious and political extremism and providing the space for Leicester's communities to debate the issues online.

Follow Leicester SafeSpace on Facebook: An online forum to discuss and debate issues of political or religious extremism, share ideas on making our communities more resilient to extremist voices and publicise local and national events of interest.

BRIEFING LPT'S SPIRITUAL & PASTORAL CARE TEAM

I'm at the Chaplaincy Centre, Daisy Peake Building at The Towers on Gipsy Lane this morning with Abida Hussain, Equality and Human Rights Officer, Integrated Equality Service, Leicestershire Partnership NHS Trust (LPT).

We're briefing members of the Spiritual and Pastoral Care Team on the NHS Staff Multi-Faith Resource. Four of their six-member team are here this morning:

• Revd Sally Martin, Lead Chaplain;
• Revd Frances Ballantyne (no relation), Christian Chaplain who covers Ashby, Coalville, Hinckley and Loughborough community hospitals as well as one afternoon per week at the Bradgate Unit;
• Revd Rowenna Bass, Christian Chaplain who covers Lutterworth, Market Harborough, Melton Mowbray, Oakham community hospitals;
• Imam Fazlur Diwan, Muslim Chaplain who covers the Bradgate Unit, Arnold Lodge, and also works with Community Teams.

Sally was helpful in the development of the resource, which contains appropriate information about the services of the Spiritual and Pastoral Care Team.

Abida and I have done a number of briefings on the resource to ward staff at various hospitals over the past few months (see blog entries passim). These tend to be brief (though, hopefully not rushed), catching staff at the times of handover between shifts. This morning, it's good to be able to speak longer and to discuss the content and use of the resource in greater depth.

We also talk about the Prayer Room at Lakeside, LPT’s new company headquarters. I offer a copy of the dossier compiled by Rosemarie Fitton when we were working with Highcross on their Prayer Room, so that LPT can benefit from its collection of examples of good (and bad) practice, not only for this facility at Lakeside, but for Prayer Rooms operating at its other sites.

We discuss the proposed Staff Inter-Faith Forum, which is still in embryonic form. We talk about how use of social media (particularly podcasting) can play its part in making this project a success.

POLICING IN 2012 AND BEYOND

To Leicester Town Hall early this evening for a public meeting with the Chair of Leicestershire Police Authority (Barrie Roper) and the Chief Constable of Leicestershire Police (Simon Cole). This is the first meeting in a series of four being held in different parts of the force area this month. The remaining meetings (all starting 1800) are:

• Wednesday 25 January, Harborough District Council, Market Harborough
• Monday 30 January, Rutland County Council, Oakham
• Tuesday 31 January, Police HQ, St Johns, Enderby

More than 50 people are gathered in the Council Chamber for the meeting, which is facilitated by Ben Jackson from BBC Radio Leicester.

In general terms, these meetings are being held so that Leicesterhire Police can listen to the public's concerns about the service they provide in these challenging times and so that they can clarify priorities, limitations and pressures and communicate information about new arrangements for policing and governance. Specifically, the meeting addresses two main topics:

• The budget for 2012-13, which will be set next month
• The new post of elected Police and Crime Commissioner

Election of a Police and Crime Commissioner for each police force area in England and Wales outside London will be the most radical change to governance of police in living memory. All the necessary information about this (including qualifications and qualities required of those who are considering standing for election to this post) is available on the Home Office website. The key dates for this process are:

• 15 November: election covering whole force area takes place
• 22 November: newly elected Commissioner assumes duties. Leicestershire Police Authority legally abolished on this date

Leicestershire Police Authority is responsible for managing the transition. Members of the public shouldn't notice the handover.

There are three members of Leicester Council of Faiths present this evening: our Chair, Cllr Manjula Sood; Director Gursharan Kaur Thandi; and Cllr Rashmikan Joshi. All three ask questions from the floor, on topics as diverse as how the ongoing cuts are affecting the daily life of officers on the beat, how the police are addressing religiously motivated hate crime and use of Asian language media outlets to attract wider support for meetings like this. A member of Leicester's Pagan community also spoke about the vulnerability of smaller groups which may be more likely to feel isolated and vulnerable, contrasting the local scene (mostly positive) with the national scene (not so), referring to a number of horse mutilations that have taken place in Cornwall and Wales and have been blamed on "witches".

Chief Constable Simon Cole takes a moment to focus on Hate Crime, with special reference to Leicestershire Police's Stamp It Out! campaign. He tells us that there were 510 recorded Hate Crimes in the force area in 2010, a number which fell closer to 400 in 2011. He reassures us that, "If you commit a Hate Crime in Leicester, Leicestershire or Rutland, we will catch you."

I've been impressed by how Leicestershire Police use social media in their workaday operations. They host frequent webchats, have a well-received and regularly updated Facebook page with over 14,000 likes and a constant flow of interesting and helpful information via several Twitterfeeds. It's a lazy cliche, usually put about by people who don't use social media and don't understand it (and perhaps, are scared by it) that it's a means for spreading misinformation, rumour and panic. In my experience, Leicestershire Police use it to quell those very things and do the opposite: they use social media to keep the public informed and involved. This was particularly the case during the visit of the English Defence League to Leicester in October 2010 and during the one evening when Leicester was brushed by the wave of social disturbances that swept much of England last summer, It's fascinating to see how social media is used at this meeting this evening. Chief Constable Simon Cole presents Leicestershire Police's review of 2011 in a video posted on their YouTube channel. Support staff are tweeting live the headlines from the presentations, then the gist of the Q&A session. As well as disseminating information about what's going on in the meeting, this allows interested parties not present in the room to participate through following the content, tweeting their own comments and questions and retweeting to their own followers. The hashtag for tweets sent from and about this meeting is #chiefandchair. Tweets from this evening's meeting are readable via that hashtag and it will be good for the remaining three meetings too.

LEICESTER YOUTH SACRE

At Beaumont Leys City Learning Centre for the final meeting this academic year of the Youth SACRE. Today, members of youth SACRE have been designing and making models for resources that students can use in schools across Leicester: RE resources made by young people for young people. The following activities are also on their agenda today:

• Filming footage to complete their Youth SACRE DVD.
• Planning two seminars for the RE Conference in November 2011.
• Working on a Youth SACRE website.
• Developing posters and flyers advertising the work of the Youth SACRE.
• Planning an event during National Inter Faith Week (20-26 November).

I've been invited by Jill Carr, Secretary to SACRE, to speak to the students about developing their own blog (with reference to social media alrady familiar to them, such as Facebook). I'm given the services of a small group for half-an-hour or so this afternoon (in the photo around the table, above - joined by Jennie Duce, Head of RE and Citizenship at Sir Jonathan North Community College). My assistants in this session (and their lunch choices) are:

• Abdi (prawn mayo sandwich)
• Azim (cheese and tomato sandwich)
• Eeti (cheese and salad sandwich)
• Mariam (cheese and salad sandwich)

• Mohamed (cheese and pickle sandwich)
• Mohammed (cheese and onion sandwich)
• Saaima (cheese and coleslaw sandwich)
• Vinita (chicken burger)

My assistants think that a Youth SACRE blog should be:

• informative
• up-to-date
• attractive (people should want to read it and recommend it to their friends)
• useful
• inspiring
• appropriate

I set our group the task of completing the following statement: "I would like more people to know about Leicester Youth SACRE because ..."

• "... it gives an opportunity for the other young people to talk about their and others' religious views."
• "... it gives young people a chance to have their say in religious aspects which will affect them in future."
• "... because we could make the communities' future better."
• "... because it gives young people a chance to voice their opinions about Religious Education."
• "... because there are lots of things to learn in the Youth SACRE which will help in future. You learn about different religions and beliefs of different people from different backgrounds."
• "... because you can learn more about different religions and to communicate with someone who is a different religion, skin colour and race."
• "... because you can discuss about other religions and cultures involving people to know each other."

I show our team how, within 90 seconds of publishing this very post, it gets its first viewing, the next one following some 30 seconds later. They're quite excited by this and it appears to be enough to convince them that Leicester Youth SACRE should have its own blog! by the time I get to show this to the larger group at the end of the afternoon, the post has had nine viewings from as many as five different countries - a nice illustration, if ever there was one, of just how their work can be amplified!

REDP Core Reference Group

It's the regular bimonthly meeting of the Core Reference Group of the Regional and Equality Diversity Partnership (REDP). We're meeting at Leicestershire Centre for Integrated Living (LCIL) this afternoon - and as well as our hosts (representing disabled people), the meeting includes representatives of organisations working in the protected characteristics of faith or belief, older people, race and sexual orientation. There's a smaller torunout today than we've been used to at previous meetings; many of our regular attendees are caught up in tortuous negotiations with funders at the moment.

The following items are on our agenda this afternoon:

cuts in funding and support for equality-focused groups in East Midlands

our collective response to the Coalition's consultation on reforming the Equlaity and Human Rights Commission

our response to the Coalition's Red Tape Challenge to the Equality Act 2010

planning our conference: "Equality Act 2010 and its Duties" in Nottingham, 30 June

our current and future relations with English Regions Equalities Network

At the end of this month, REDP comes to the end of the second year of our initial three-year funding. We've been talking for several months now about how to make the partnership sustainable and a number of irons are in the fire. it struck me today, while discussing our plans for the next 12 months that our project could be described in the format of a three-act summer action-adventure movie (with each act akin to a year of our funding):

Act 1: You're given your mission

Act 2: Assemble and train your team for the mission

Act 3: Carry out your mission

Doesn't sound like much of a movie, perhaps, but I'm sure the bare bones are recognisable. In Act 3, REDP has to make its big impact. Our name has to be seen all over the place - and has to be associated with strong, positive outcomes. I've been put in charge of REDP's social media and am looking forward to using that to advance our cause.

Rosemarie Fitton is shadowing me this afternoon, as she comes to the end of her placement with Leicester Council of Faiths as part of her MA studies in Interreligious Relations at St Philip's Centre for Study and Engagement in a Multi-Faith Society.

Find out more about REDP: www.redp.org.uk

NEW CITY COUNCILLOR VISITS WELCOME CENTRE

I'm glad to meet Councillor Sundip Meghani this afternoon at the Welcome Centre. Sundip was elected Labour Cooperative Councillor for Beaumont Leys (in the north west of Leicester) earlier this month. He's a lawyer by profession and has been a newsreader and presenter on MATV as well as Public Relations Secretary for the British Hindu Forum. We've been connected through Facebook and Twitter for a while, but I was paying particular attention to his tweets last Sunday, while I was in Glasgow. Sundip was tweeting regularly throughout that day, as he visited different places of worship around Leicester, on what appeared to be a personal pilgrimage. The places he visited were, in order:

Christ the King Church, Beaumont Way

Shree Sanatan Mandir, Weymouth Street

The Church of St James the Greater, London Road

Leicester Hebrew Synagogue, Highfields Street

Central Mosque, Conduit Street

Jain Centre on Oxford Street

Guru Nanak Gurdwara, Holy Bones

I've included links to each of these faith centres' wesites so that you, faithful reader, may have the opportunity to undertake a virtual pilgrimage of your own. If you know Leicester well enough you can reconstruct the route for yourself. if not, you can take advantage of one of the great affordances of the internet and jaunt from one to the next!

I tweeted Sundip from Glasgow, saying that I was impressed with his dedication, commitment (and stamina) and that since he so clearly had a personal interest in the diversity of faiths in Leicester, we should meet when I get back.

Sundip's an accomplished, charming and interesting fellow, with an obvious interest in faith community issues and social cohesion. We talk about such things for an hour or so. I give him a potted introduction to Leicester Council of Faiths and we discuss its history, current condition and future prospects. I'm sure this will not be the only time our paths will cross and I look forward to meeting him again.

I also wish him all the best in his work as a newly elected City Councillor.

That's Sundip on the left in the photo above, alongside Rosemarie Fitton, who's on short-term placement with the Council of Faiths as part of her MA Studies at St Philip's Centre for Study and Engagement in a Multi Faith Society. There was a small moment of unexpected connection between the two of them when Sundip mentioned that he arrived at the Church of St James the Greater on Sunday afternoon, just as a service dedicated to The Laura Centre (a local charity that provides bereavement counselling to adults and children in Leicester and Leicestershire) was about to start. The purpose of this service was to call to remembrance those who have died in the past year, whose families and friends have sought assistance from the Laura Centre. Rosemarie told Sundip that she had been given the commission to refurbish the children's rooms at the Laura Centre, a job that was completed only within the last few weeks. I like these unexpected moments of positive crossover - serendipity is magical.

MINDFUL WAYS TO USE SOCIAL MEDIA

An interesting article combining two big themes of this blog: mindfulness and social media. This is written by Lori Deschene (founder of tiny buddha, a multi-author blog that features wisdom and stories from people all over the world) published online by Tricycle magazine. In the Buddhist parlance, Lori Deschene describes the practices she lists as "right tweeting" (and you can follow hers @tinybuddha)

I don't necessarily agree with every one of these points, nor do I practise all of them, but I think it's an interesting set of principles which deserves to be mentioned here.

1. Know your intentions
Doug Firebaugh of SocialMediaBlogster.com has identified seven psychological needs we may be looking to meet when we log on: acknowledgement, attention, approval, appreciation, acclaim, assurance, and inclusion. Before you post, ask yourself: Am I looking to be seen or validated? Is there something more constructive I could do to meet that need?

2. Be your authentic self
In the age of personal branding, most of us have a persona we’d like to develop or maintain. Ego-driven tweets focus on an agenda; authenticity communicates from the heart. Talk about the things that really matter to you. If you need advice or support, ask for it. It’s easier to be present when you’re being true to yourself.

3. If you propose to tweet, always ask yourself: Is it true? Is it necessary? Is it kind?
Sometimes we post thoughts without considering how they might impact our entire audience. It’s easy to forget how many friends are reading. Two hundred people make a crowd in person, but online that number can seem insignificant. Before you share, ask yourself: is there anyone this might harm?

4. Offer random tweets of kindness
Every now and then I ask on Twitter, “Is there anything I can do to help or support you today?” It’s a simple way to use social media to give without expectations of anything in return. By reaching out to help a stranger, you create the possibility of connecting personally with followers you may have otherwise known only peripherally.

5. Experience now, share later
It’s common to snap a picture with your phone and upload it to Facebook or email it to a friend. This overlaps the experience of being in a moment and sharing it. It also minimises intimacy, since your entire audience joins your date or gathering in real time. Just as we aim to reduce our internal monologues to be present, we can do the same with our digital narration.

6. Be active, not reactive
You may receive email updates whenever there is activity on one of your social media accounts, or you might have your cell phone set to give you these types of alerts. This forces you to decide many times throughout the day whether you want or need to respond. Another approach is to choose when to join the conversation, and to use your offline time to decide what value you have to offer.

7. Respond with your full attention
People often share links without actually reading them, or comment on posts after only scanning them. If the greatest gift we can give someone is our attention, then social media allows us to be endlessly generous. We may not be able to reply to everyone, but responding thoughtfully when we can makes a difference.

8. Use mobile social media sparingly
In 2009, Pew Research found that 43 percent of cell phone users access the Web on their devices several times a day. It’s what former Microsoft employee Linda Stone refers to as continuous partial attention—when you frequently sign on to be sure you don’t miss out anything. If you choose to limit your cell phone access, you may miss out online, but you won’t miss what’s in front of you.

9. Practise letting go
It may feel unkind to disregard certain updates or tweets, but we need downtime to be kind to ourselves. Give yourself permission to let yesterday’s stream go. This way you won’t need to “catch up” on updates that have passed but instead can be part of today’s conversation.

10. Enjoy social media!
These are merely suggestions to feel present and purposeful when utilising social media, but they aren’t hard-and-fast rules. Follow your own instincts and have fun with it. If you’re mindful when you’re disconnected from technology, you have all the tools you need to be mindful when you go online.

RELIGION AND PLANET VIEWPOINT DAY AT NEW COLLEGE

At New College, New Parks, early this morning preparing for "Religion and Planet: Viewpoint Day". This is a whole day activity, for Year 10 students (most of them 15 years old).

I'm here as one of a team of four facilitators, working together on different strands of the day's theme.

• Clare Carr, of Global Education LeicesterShire, is running a session modelled on "Philosophy for Children", using artifacts from different religions (most notably a "Jain cloth") as stimuli to encourage the students to come up with their own questions, developing skills of enquiry and reflection.
• Linda Harding, Leicester City Council Arts and Museums Outreach Officer, helps students explore the spiritual nature of our world in a "hands-on" session involving art objects - some of them created by the students themselves.
• Madeleine Coburn, freelance consultant currently attached to the Museums Department, helps students explore displays from the exhibition, "Our Leicester, Our Story", mounted in the school library.

In my sessions, I break the class (usually numbering 24) into eight groups of three (roughly), give each group a quotation from each of the religions who are members of Leicester Council of Faiths and ask them, first of all, to match their quote to the religion from which it comes.

• “Let your vision be world-embracing, rather than confined to your own self.” (Bahá'í)
• “Hatreds never cease through hatred in this world, through love alone they cease. This is eternal law.” (Buddhist)
• “God is love. Those who live in God live in love and God lives in them.” (Christian)
• “Where there is joy there is creation. Where there is no joy there is no creation. Know the nature of joy.” (Hindu)
• “Do not injure, oppress, enslave, insult, torment, torture or kill any living being.” (Jain)
• “Devote yourselves to justice; aid the oppressed. Uphold the rights of the orphan, defend the cause of the widow.” (Jewish)
• “We have created you from a male and a female and made you into different nations and tribes so that you may know each other.” (Muslim)
• “A place in God’s court can only be attained if we do service to others in the world.” (Sikh)

These are the same quotes that feature on the pop-up banners that were created originally for the National Inter Faith Week exhibition in 2009 at Highcross.

New College doesn't have the sort of obviously mixed student body as you find in city centre schools. There's not a large number of students from religious or ethnic minority communities. Many of the students wouldn't normally go to parts of the city where they'd see a gurdwara, a mandir or a mosque; nor can it be assumed that they'll have seen a public religious festival, such as Diwali or Vaisakhi. When I went round the different groups, asking which religion their quote comes from, the first response was almost always Christianity - said with certainty and conviction. Any that they didn't think was Christian was almost always Buddhist. 

When preparing for these sessions, I'd spent some time trying to find other quotes for today, but the more I thought about it, the more it seemed to me that it would be good to pitch caring about the planet as caring for other people. So the second part of the exercise was to get the groups to discuss how living according to these principles would change things in the world around us (assuming , of course, that they would affect change). Then I got them to recommend three changes they would like to see made in how we live, that would change the way people can share the planet with each other.

Many of the students were surprised (and interested) that the Council of Faiths has such a strong presence in social media. We picked up several new fans for our facebook page today.

Five one-hour sessions with Year 10 sudents: tough gig.

GEOGRAPHY STUDENTS LOCATE WELCOME CENTRE

A couple of students from the University of Leicester pop in at the Welcome Centre this afternoon. Kathryn Styan and Sahil Thaper are first year Geography students, who've been set a project to identify sources of evidence and gather proof that shows whether or not Leicester truly is a multicultural city. The students have to use their own initiative to locate and collect evidence. Kathryn and Sahil used theirs to find us! They leave with a couple of sets of our brochures, introducing the eight member communities on the Council of Faiths and some of our social media flyers. I persuade them to stop long enough for a photo. They can use this blog entry as evidence of what they've done.

FAITHS FORUM EAST MIDLANDS: GOING, GOING ... ...

To Loughborough this afternoon, for a meeting with Patricia Stoat, CEO of the Faiths Froum for the East Midlands and Athea Ghosma, FFEM's Development Officer (there they are, shivering outside their office in Moira Street, Loughborough).

Supporters of FFEM were disturbed to learn recently that its funding expires on 31 March - as is the case for every regional faiths forum throughout the country. As I walked to the meeting up from the train station, I tweeted,

In Loughborough, meeting CEO Faiths Forum for East Midlands. FFEM's funding ceases ntext month. More evidence of government vision #fail

FFEM has been in existence hardly more than a couple of years. Indeed, in common with a number of other sorts of organisations (such as REDP) the East Midlands was the last of the nine English regions to get one. In this short time it has already done some good work in creating a sense of collective identity for inter faith organisations across the region. But it was clear to all who took an interest that it had only begun to plant the seeds for more helpful and creative things to come. Now all that potential has been snuffed out. Or has it? Now read on ...

After being ushered into Patricia's office, I feel I have to begin by expressing my sadness, disappointment and anger at the decision about their funding. But as our conversation progresses, it start to dawn on me that perhaps FFEM isn't quite as dead and buried as it might at first seem. The office is closing at the end of February, giving them one month to pay all bills etc. And a very nice office it is too, refurbished and kitted out (modestly but befittingly) to allow them to do their job well. It seemed odd to me that it's slap bang in the middle of a housing estate, next door to a chippie - but that's more so because I'm used to such organisations being sited far from real life locations. So, come 1 April, FFEM won't have premises, paid staff or any funding. But it might not give up the ghost just then.

Although it's all up to the decision of their Board when it meets at the end of this week, there's the possibility of an afterlife for FFEM. Using the social media model, FFEM could continue as a hub of influence, collecting and collating information from the several inter faith bodies in the East Midlands, placing it in a central virtual location. Given my own interest and faith in social media, not to mention my frequent and regular (or, as some might say, "obsessive") practice of it, I can really see the point of this and could see immediately how it would work. Now if we can just get other inter faith folk in Derby, Kettering Lincoln, Northamption, Nottingham, Wellingborough etc blogging, facebooking and tweeting like I do ...

INTERFAITH FORUM FOR LEICESTERSHIRE: RELIGION & THE MEDIA

At County Hall, Glenfield (seat of Leicestershire County Council), for a meeting of the Interfaith Forum for Leicestershire. The topic this evening is "Religion and Media". I'm doing part of the presentation: one third of it, to be precise. First John Florance (BBC Radio Leicester) speaks on the topic in relation to broadcast media, then Nick Carter (Chair of Prospect Leicestershire and the Leicester Multicultural Advisory Group - LMAG) on print media. John (centre) and Nick (right) are in the photo above, with Resham Singh Sandhu, who chairs the meeting. I'm on last, speaking in relation to social media.

We have a good turnout (filling the Sparkenhoe Committee Room, with around 50 attendees) despite considerable competition this evening. Just a few doors away, top TV celebrity historian Michael Wood is giving a talk about his BBC series, The Story of England, which narrates the country's history through the story of Kibworth, a Leicestershire village that predates the Domesday Book. If I weren't in here speaking, I'd be in there listening to him!

Athea, from Faiths Forum for the East Midlands, brings the latest edition of their quarterly newsletter, Know Faith! issue 05, hot off the presses. It has good coverage of Inter Faith Week 2010, including our exhibition at Highcross and our feature in The Wave.

John Florance is Producer and Presenter of the Breakfast Show, on BBC Radio Leicester, Sunday mornings, 0600-0900. He gives a potted guide to the history of BBC Radio Leicester, including the birth of the BBC's Asian Network, which began in Leicester in the 1970s and still shares its premises. It's a statutory duty for local radio stations to have a programme on the topic of faith and ethics. John's show has a largely Christian audience, composed of older people up early to get to church. This doesn't stop the programme from carrying news and features about the diverse faith communities of Leicester. He lauds the good communication and positive relationship between the faith output and the newsroom. He is aware of the station's responsibility to promote good relations and better understanding among local faith communities. John also produces the "Thought for the Day" slot (he's asked me this evening if I would do a few of these - only 90 seconds long, thankfully!) He makes a few practical suggestions about getting heard on BBC Radio Leicester. Most importantly, tell him what's going on, rather than moan about it after it's over - and been missed. He also gives a few tips on how to write, submit and follow up on a good press release. He ends by acknowledging that those who genuinely know Leicester don't see it as a multicultural paradise - but one in which lively, courteous debate (some of which can - indeed should - be conducted on local radio) helps iron out the wrinkles among and between communities of differing background, practices and traditions in our city.

Nick Carter was editor of the Leicester Mercury for 16 years, having left the post two years ago in January 2009. During his tenure (says our Chair this evening), the paper covered faith community issues more sensitively and sympathetically than it does today. This evening he briefly considers how the place of faith in mainstream British society has changed radically, since he started as a junior reporter with an evening newspaper in Slough in 1975 (when religious news was made up of little more than church social events and traditional Christian festivals) and how the mainstream media has not kept pace with this change. He proposes that the media (especially local media) has a responsibility to dispel misinformation and lack of understanding. In this day and age, it's easier than ever for such opinion to find a platform, which makes the responsibility of "traditional" media all the more serious. The media as a whole has failed to understand the changing nature of religion, of communities and of their potential audience and customer base. They are now struggling to catch up - and for the most part, they have missed the boat as their audience has fragmented. Nick makes a plea for inclusion in the media of "soft news" - without setting the threshold too high, before faith issues are admitted into the mainstream as "hard news" when crises emerge. Without the background of "soft news" that would promote understanding and sympathetic coverage of faith and cultural issues. this is not as negative or pessimistic as it might first appear as he has a number of observations and suggestions for practical improvements.

My contribution is on social media, speaking about Leicester Council of Faiths' foray into Twitter, YouTube, Flickr, iPadio and - of course - blogging. I also give a puff to Amplified Leicester. I talk the audience through each of these (including my amusing anecdote about King Abdullah of Jordan reading my blog - unprovable either way, of course) and give a little live demo of a few in action. I come across like an enthusiastic twelve-year old at Show and Tell: "I've got a blog!" "We're on YouTube!" "Have you got as many facebooks fans as we have?" At the end of their presentations, John and Nick get a quarter of an hour of reflective, interesting questions; I get none. I think I've pummelled the audience into submission (but later this evening and early next morning, I get a lot of visitors to the blog).

I finish the evening here by recording half a dozen short video interviews with some of the attendees for our YouTube channel.

my management group

At the Welcome Centre this morning for a meeting with my Personnel Management Group. Although our Chair, Manjula Sood, has to offer her apologies for this meeting, still we have the benefit of a diversity of backgrounds, traditions in the members here today: Bahá'í, Christian, Jewish, Sikh. Major topics on our agenda today include: National Inter Faith Week; working relationships with Leicester City Council, Leicester Partnership and NHS Leicester City; our venture further into social media; involvement in writing the booklet series, "Engaging with Faith Communities in Leicester"; engagement in the developing Centre of Excellence in Community Cohesion. That's a lot to fit into two hours - exhaustingly so!

AMPLIFIED LEICESTER PANEL LINEUP CONFIRMED

This is the last day on which I can confirm the line up for the panel I've been asked to curate for Amplified Leicester in March next year. My topic is "Amplified Communities of Faith or Belief". The title, my name and that of the Council of Faiths has been included on the A5 flyer promoting the programme for 2010-11, but I've been asked to firm up the panellists and a description of the kind of contributions they will be asked to make.

I get confirmation of the last member this afternoon: Richard Hopper, Secretary of Leicester Secular Society. Richard has just launched a Facebook page for the society, which currently has 50 fans. Effectively, the Secular society is dipping its toe in the waters of social media. Richard joins the other two members of the panel, Matt Hughes (IT manager at Samworth Enterprise Academy, with special responsibilities to pupils and staff in relation to social media) and Sughra Ahmed (Islamic Society of Britain, who helped organise a series of flashmob iftar meetings in Victoria Park, helping feed homeless people and destitute asylum seekers, all coordinated through Facebook).

Find out more about Amplified Leicester:
http://ampleic.ning.com/

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DEAR BLOG!

Today, this blog is one year old. I started it on (Sunday) 15 November 2009, the first day of the first Inter Faith Week in England, just so we'd have a record of that event. I took that as an excuse to reboot the Council of Faiths website, launch our fan page on Facebook and start our Twitterstream all on the same day. Here we are, one year on and they're all still going strong. The stats counter for this blog tell me that I've posted 365 entries on it (this one will be 366) making an average of precisely one a day; I couldn't have made it work out better if I'd tried!

DIVERSITY HUB

At Diversity Hub this afternoon, for a meeting to discuss them making progress with their online presence. What starts as being focused purely on their Facebook page extends to include a wider social media strategy encompassing Twitter, blogging and (maybe) Flickr. I come with Ian Davies and Chris Florance and we stay on for an hour or so after the meeting, to help set up some of these accounts.

AMPLIFIED LEICESTER: TECH SURGERY

Amplified individuals use social media and the web to enhance their abilities to sense their world, create shared resources and act collaboratively. We meet fortnightly at Phoenix Square Digital Film and Media Centre. This morning, Ash Brown hosts an informal "Tech Surgery" bringing together those who need help with social media and those who can advise them. Folk bring along their laptops, iPhones, Blackberries etc. Tables are devoted to twitter, Facebook, MySpace, You Tube and my favourite (of course) blogging. I get the chance to talk with Ash for a good bit late in the session, when we discuss the affordances, constraints and effectivities (they're E301 words - look 'em up if you're that bothered, faithful reader) associated with different forms of blogging available (principally Wordpress v Blogger).


Content is the most important thing for me. I'm not all that competent with design elements (in fact, I feel pretty backward at all that). I like Blogger and use this format because it allows me to forget about design and just get on with the writing.


Today I've persuaded Alastair (my firstborn) to attend. I've been encouraging him to come to events like this for a while, so he can make some good contacts for more effective deployment of his artistic skills. He's an excellent musician (with a degree in guitarcraft from the Academy of Contemporary Music), a witty writer and MC. I know all parents think their children are the bee's knees, but I'm happy to say that I'm right on the money about him.

I have a chat with Dipika Hindocha, who is volunteering with the Get Inspired 2010 project. She's looking at ways of using the Amplified network to publicise the forthcoming event. Sounds to me like she's got plenty to give back here too.

Amplified Leicester: is privacy dead?

At Phoenix Square this morning, for the first session of Amplified Leicester in its new, expanded, public format. Josie Fraser (photo above) speaks to the topic, "Is Privacy Dead?" I arrive late. There seems to be an inverse law in operation governing my timekeeping in relation to how much I want to be at something.

Josie describes herself as a UK-based social and educational technologist working as an independent consultant. Her focus is on social networks, software and media, digital literacies, online communities and identities. She helps people communicate and helps them manage risk.

One of the distinctive qualities of an Amplified event is that its success can be partly gauged by how many people are fiddling with their mobiles, handhelds and laptops while the speaker is on. Whereas at most events, you'd be asked to turn off your phones, here you're expected not only to have them on, but be paying attention to them. As long as you can assume that people are live-blogging or tweeting about the event they're at, of course, rather than ordering the boxed set of Battlestar Galactica on blu-ray off Amazon.

This morning Josie discusses the management of online identity with special reference to social media. By turns alarming and amusing, her presentation leaves us all amazed at what some people see fit to put online about themselves!

At last I discover why my Foursquare check-ins are no longer appearing on Facebook. It seems that Foursquare has proved so popular that Facebook is developing its own geolocation app - which may be launched this very day.

For the first time this morning, I meet Keith Perch, Editor of the Leicester Mercury. When I introduce myself, he asks me why we haven't met before. And wouldn't you know it, I don't have a single one of my Council of Faiths business cards on me. I give him one for REDP though. He gives me his, asks me to drop him an email and says we should arrange a sitdown together.

Find out more about Josie Fraser and what she does (she has 5,923 followers on twitter!):
http://fraser.typepad.com/socialtech/

Find out more about Amplified Leicester:
http://ampleic.ning.com/

Leicester on the map

To a lunchtime meeting convened by Ben Ravilious, whom I've got to know through our attendance at CreativeCoffee Club. The topic is the establishment of "Leicester on the Map", a project to promote the good name of Leicester - but with a few novel twists. I'm a few minutes late in arrving and the discussion has already started by the time I take my place at the table. Around the table there are a dozen or so people, including a few I know and would expect (or rather, would hope) to see at a meeting of this kind: Sarah Harrison, City Centre Director; John Coster from Citizens' Eye among them.

From a certain point of view, this is a legacy arising from Amplified Leicester. In keeping with that project, Leicester on the Map would make extensive use of social media - a Facebook page, use of a hash tag on twitter etc. Many of us who are present today bring an extensive address book of contacts and our own networks. I get to speak a little about the Council of Faiths venturing into the realm of social media for the first time and how our positive experience might bode well for this new enterprise.

This is not be another "One Leicester" or another "Big It Up", not a campaign sponsored by any official agency. The idea is that it should be more of a popular movement, a groundswell from the bottom up - and not something led by any individual or identifiable collection of individuals.