{"id":14113,"date":"2025-11-07T18:17:20","date_gmt":"2025-11-07T18:17:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/?p=14113"},"modified":"2025-11-07T18:17:20","modified_gmt":"2025-11-07T18:17:20","slug":"interfaith-america-magazine-20-augsburg-students-care-for-their-minneapolis-community","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/2025\/11\/07\/interfaith-america-magazine-20-augsburg-students-care-for-their-minneapolis-community\/","title":{"rendered":"Interfaith America Magazine: ’20 Augsburg students care for their Minneapolis community’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Interfaith America Magazine recently published an essay<\/a>\u00a0about the ways Augsburg’s Interfaith Scholars have connected with the needs of local communities.<\/p>\n

\n

20 Augsburg Students Care for Their Minneapolis Community<\/h4>\n

By Michon True Smith
\nNovember 3, 2025\u2014Interfaith America Magazine<\/a>
\nReprinted with permission<\/em><\/p>\n

On a\u00a0cold\u00a0Minnesota evening\u00a0last November,\u00a0nearly 20\u00a0Augsburg University<\/span>\u00a0students\u00a0gathered at\u00a0the hundred-year-old\u00a0Central Lutheran Church in\u00a0inner-city\u00a0Minneapolis.\u00a0After\u00a0touring\u00a0the site, the students\u00a0settled in a conference room to learn more about the everyday concerns\u00a0facing\u00a0marginally\u00a0housed neighbors.\u00a0Tyra and Darrell from\u00a0Street Voices of Change<\/span><\/a>\u00a0shared their lived experiences as formerly unhoused neighbors and their advocacy for housing rights now as leaders of the organization.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Like many faith-based organizations,\u00a0Central Lutheran Church grounds its faith practices in a social justice framework\u00a0and is a proud\u00a0site for\u00a0Augsburg\u2019s\u00a0Health Commons,\u00a0<\/span><\/a>a network of\u00a0nursing-led drop-in centers led and organized by\u00a0Augsburg\u00a0nursing faculty members, nursing and physician assistant volunteers, students, and community members. The visit\u00a0that night\u00a0was\u00a0intended\u00a0to\u00a0help students learn how faith-based organizations are serving neighbors of\u00a0all\u00a0faiths\u00a0experiencing homelessness by providing clothing, spiritual, and health care services. The people who come to the Health Commons are from diverse cultural and socioeconomic backgrounds. Many live on Minneapolis\u2019s streets or are marginally housed.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

These students\u00a0were participants in Augsburg\u2019s Interfaith Scholars<\/span><\/a> program, a year-long cohort of students who engage in interfaith dialogue and action. This year the program had 18 students with agnostic, Buddhist, Christian, Muslim, Native, secular humanist, spiritual\/non-religious, and witchcraft worldviews. The theme of the class was “Religious Pluralism and Ethics and Practices of Care.” Professor Najeeba Syeed chose this theme for the class because it “allows students to explore what really matters to them through the lens of learning from and connecting with others with different faith traditions or worldviews.”\u202f\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Back on campus, Interfaith Scholars worked on projects related to their own ethic of care.\u00a0Mahamed Yusuf, a sophomore biology major and a member of Augsburg\u2019s Pre-Med Student Association, saw an opportunity to address barriers faced by unhoused neighbors. With funding from Interfaith America\u2019s\u00a0Advancing Religious Pluralism<\/span><\/a>\u00a0grant, Yusuf led a group to raise awareness and funding for basic hygiene supplies for unhoused neighbors. The scholars led a campus-wide fundraising event\u00a0raising\u00a0nearly $400, assembled hygiene kits, and donated them to multiple shelters around the Cedar Riverside neighborhood in which Augsburg is\u00a0located.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Mahamad later reflected, “With this single event, we advocated for the unhoused women in our neighborhood, bringing awareness to their lack of care, and in the process, provided kits to more than 300 individuals. One thing that has stuck with me during this process is that when delivering the kits to these shelters, every one of them told us about the lack of these necessities for the community.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

“Our Cedar-Riverside neighborhood continues to face high levels of housing insecurity, with limited access to help. Realizing the dire need for basic hygiene has motivated me to bring this initiative into the Interfaith Scholars program. Through this involvement, I learned the power of advocacy, bringing awareness to the homeless crisis in our city. I hope to inspire new initiatives providing care for those who need care in our community. I have seen firsthand how small acts can ripple into a sense of advocacy and care. This project is a reflection of our values and our commitment to the health equity of our community. In the future I hope to continue to provide kits to the Cedar-Riverside unhoused community, reaching many other individuals and serving them with a commitment rooted in dignity and compassion.”\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

In addition to raising awareness of the needs of unhoused neighbors and engaging Augsburg students in direct service, the project raised the visibility of interfaith work on campus.\u202f After helping assemble the hygiene kit, several students expressed a desire to get involved. One noted that he “really enjoyed serving the community and the notion of uniting people of various backgrounds to serve the community.”\u202f<\/span><\/p>\n

With funding from the Advancing Religious Pluralism grant, Interfaith Scholars completed other projects related to students\u2019 ethics of care including:\u00a0hosting a campus-wide\u00a0Narcan\u00a0training\u00a0(a\u00a0training\u00a0to help individuals in life-threatening opioid emergencies), creating an advocacy group for students with disabilities, and raising funding for therapeutic tattoos to cover scars related to self-harm.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

While Mahamed Yusuf has now completed his time as an Interfaith Scholar, he has submitted a grant to continue this work next year. He said, “As a Muslim student leader, this project is a reflection of the Islamic ethics of care and a mission grounded in service, dignity, and interfaith compassion.”<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Michon True Smith is the managing director of Interfaith at Augsburg University<\/a>. She has worked in the nonprofit sector for close to 20 years, telling the stories of organizations and people served, and raising funds through grant writing and events. She has supported organizations making a difference in an array of community needs, including education, housing, and equitable services for people with disabilities and immigrants. <\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Interfaith America Magazine recently published an essay\u00a0about the ways Augsburg’s Interfaith Scholars have connected with the needs of local communities. 20 Augsburg Students Care for Their Minneapolis Community By Michon True Smith November 3, 2025\u2014Interfaith America Magazine Reprinted with permission On a\u00a0cold\u00a0Minnesota evening\u00a0last November,\u00a0nearly 20\u00a0Augsburg University\u00a0students\u00a0gathered at\u00a0the hundred-year-old\u00a0Central Lutheran Church in\u00a0inner-city\u00a0Minneapolis.\u00a0After\u00a0touring\u00a0the site, the students\u00a0settled in <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":14114,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[241],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14113","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"wps_subtitle":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14113","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14113"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14113\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14116,"href":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14113\/revisions\/14116"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14114"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14113"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14113"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.augsburg.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14113"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}