Come to Homecoming 2012

Details

Published on 2012-09-17

Register now for Homecoming 2012.  October 20-21, 2012. 

Join old friends and discover new ones at Stony Point Center's 4th Annual Homecoming! We will enjoy a special concert on Saturday evening with talented musicians from various faith traditions: Eastern Light Project; Tasnim Islam; Wally Glickwan on behalf of Rockland County Coalition To End The New Jim Crow; BlissRoot Records featuring Taya Shere, Rakia Shemaya, and Shoshana Jedwab; and Warren Cooper. Our concert will be hosted by Darnell Moore. See below for bios for our artists and MC. We will honor Jim & Louise Palm, Oscar McCloud and Connie Thurber (on behalf of her husband, Newt) who in the late 70's had the vision to invest in what is now Maple, the lodge and conference space in the center of our campus. The weekend includes lunch with our Co-Directors and time to get to know members of our Community of Living Traditions.

Early Homecoming Events are available! October 18 at 8pm enjoy tea at the salon with Chaplain Rabia Harris. We'll have a conversation and see where it leads us.

You can also join us for Shabbat on October 19. Let us create together a Sacred Space for community, celebration and spirit, for a vibrant and musical Shabbat Service, followed by a healthy vegetarian feast! Bring a dish, yourself and an open mind and heart! You don't need to know Hebrew or be Jewish. Let us rejoice and imbibe the Spirit together (7pm Shabbat Services, 8:30ish Meal, 9:30ish: Storytelling and Music).

Download the concert flyer here to promote it in your community!

We look forward to this opportunity to honor our past and look towards our future together.

For pricing and to register, click here. Call 845-786-5674 with questions.

Bios for some of our talented musicians

The Eastern Light Project Located in Rockland County, New York, we are a community of people who through our journeys have become deeply inspired to participate in the creating process of this world. As individuals, our inspirations and passions are diverse, but rooted in the core of all our desires is the passion and commitment to support, encourage, and inspire a way of life that enhances the relationships of all living things that comprise the web of life. In doing so, we wish to inspire a culture of responsibility to the Earth and to each other. http://easternlightproject.com/

Tasnim Islam was born in Bangladesh in 1989, but came to the US with her parents when she was 8 years old. She has resided with her family, which now includes her younger sister, in New York since. Tasnim attended the Bronx High School of Science, and then went to study at Smith College for two years. She is currently finishing her undergraduate studies at the City College of New York to obtain dual degrees in Political Science and Economics, with a minor in Public Policy. Outside of the academia, Tasnim serves in student government, with her current position as Vice President of International Affairs. Previously, she has served in leading roles for other clubs and committees on campus, as she was the former president of Helpings Hands Foundation, and Editor in chief of CCNY Yearbook. Outside of school, she is a founding member of the Institution for Social Advancement and currently acts as the organization’s liaison person. Aside from her involvement in various academic activities, Tasnim has always been passionate about music and has considered singing not simply as a hobby, but another part of her identity. She has been a member of the Bangladesh Institute of Performing Arts (BIPA) since 2000. At Bipa, she has studied Bengali music of all genres and developed her skills as a vocalist through careful training from Selima Ashraf. Tasnim has undertaken various roles there, from performing, to teaching, to assisting in show coordination and hosting, among other roles. Tasnim’s passion for music is an aspect of her that ties her to her culture and heritage, so she does not foresee herself letting go of this passion at any cost.
Tasnim’s relationship with the Stony Point Center community began in 2010, when she became one of the first interns at the Community of Living Traditions summer internship, “Farm the Land Grow the Spirit.” From there, she went on to serve as a coordinator for the internship the following summer. Currently, she enjoys her position as a CLT Council board member. Tasnim considers Stony Point to be like her second home; she can sometimes can be seen strolling around campus on weekends even when she is off duty.

Wally Glickman has written rhymes for most of his life. His first poem was about a double by Cookie Lavingetto breaking up a no hitter for the Brooklyn Dodgers against the Yankees in a world series game sometime in the 50’s. By day he's a mild mannered physics professor at LIU in Brooklyn. (Brooklyn again) His wife Ellie and Wally live in Pomona New York, where he sings, practices tai ch’i and writes rhymes. He has two grown children. Enjoy his website. 

BlissRoot Records featuring Taya Shere, Rakia Shemaya, and Shoshana Jedwab plays passionately in the realms of transformative ritual, mystical movement and embodied vocalization. Taya co-founded the Kohenet Hebrew Priestess Institute and serves as rabbi/spiritual leader at Olney Kehila Congregation in Olney, MD. Her chant albums Torah Tantrika, Halleluyah All Night and Wild Earth Shebrew have been heralded as "cutting-edge mystical medicine music" and rock devotional tribe world-wide. Her record label BlissRoot serves emerging devotional and evolutionary artists. Taya is a practitioner of the body-awareness-based healing art Somatic Experiencing. She teaches ChantDanceBeFree and JourneyDance, merging inspired, organic undulation with dynamic vocal co-creation. Home is lush, rustic land-based community between Washington, DC and Baltimore. She looks for yeses everywhere. holytaya.com

Warren Cooper 

Artist and Activist for Justice, Peace and Healing
Warren Cooper is the curator of a God-given vocal talent that expresses in music genres spanning from Traditional Spirituals to Classical to Sacred and Contemporary Jazz to Gospel and TheoSoul.  The voice that "...inspires the heart and soothes soul..." is one rooted in the redemptive rhythm of Jesus Christ and focused on the proliferation of Peace and Holy Spiritual Healing.  Nurtured in the Christian Tradition as the oldest son of a Presbyterian pastor in an urban congregation, Warren’s formative years were ecumenically focused in the Movements for Civil Rights, Peace and Justice.

A native of Pennsylvania (born in York and reared in Philadelphia) Warren's Music Ministry began in the hymns of the church, and has since been honed through the classical and jazz traditions (at Germantown Friends School and Oberlin Conservatory) and through worship and performance in cathedrals, clubs and theatres around the world.  Through his training as a vocalist, composer, broadcaster and worship professional, Warren has emerged as a unique voice in the prophetic articulation of Redemption, Salvation, Forgiveness, Hope and Healing. 

He is the founding host and producer of OVATIONS, a gospel music radio program that is in its 19th year of broadcast on the Temple Public Radio Network (airing throughout Pennsylvania, Delaware, New Jersey and around the world on internet radio).  He is a Producer, Recording and Performance Artist for Music Media Ministry, a progressive production company focused on stimulating visions of Justice, Peace & Healing through Inspired Art and Transformational Worship. 

Warren’s first encounter with Stony Point Center came in 1999 – “I got out of the car and was immediately aware that I was standing on Sacred Ground…” From that time until now he has served on the Governing Board for 8 years and serves currently with the Friends of Stony Point.  He is also a member of the Council for the Community of Living Traditions, which served as the inspiration for his original Oratory Production A CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE, the source of the excerpts that he will perform.  Selected items from his discography will also be available for purchase after the concert.

“As a Creative and Performance Artist I aspire to fully experience and embody the confluence of Passionate Art and Activist Faith.  My Art must be Passionate to remain Authentic, and my Faith must be Activist because it's not enough to Say you believe...you've got to ACT like you Know it's true.” 

Darnell L. Moore is a writer and activist. His work is informed by anti-racist, feminist, queer of color, and anti-colonial thought and advocacy. Darnell's essays, social commentary, poetry, and interviews have appeared in various national and international media venues.He is an Editorial Collective Member of The Feminist Wire and co-author, with former NFL player Wade Davis, II, of a bi-monthly column on Huffington Post Gay Voices focused on black manhood and queer politics titled "Tongues Untied." He has served appointments as a Visiting Fellow at Yale Divinity School and a Visiting Scholar at the Center for the Study of Gender and Sexuality at New York University and has served as a Lecturer at Rutgers-The State University of New Jersey and The City College at City University of New York (CUNY). Darnell is a board member of the Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies at CUNY and The Tobago Center for Study and Practice of Indigenous Spirituality (which is directed by M. Jacqui Alexander) as well as a member of the International Committee on Queer BDS and Pinkwashing for World Social Forum 2013. Darnell is a recent recipient of the 2012 Humanitarian Award from the American Conference on Diversity for his advocacy in the city of Newark where he served as Chair of the LGBTQ Concerns Advisory Commission under the auspices of Mayor Cory A. Booker. He also is the recent recipient, along with Prof. Beryl Satter, of the 2012 Outstanding Academic Leadership Award from Rutgers University LGBTQ and Diversity Resource Center for their work on developing the Queer Newark Oral History Project. In January 2012, Darnell visited Israel and the Palestinian territories as a member of the first US LGBTQ Delegation to Palestine. He received the BA in Social and Behavioral Science (Seton Hall University), MA in Clinical Counseling (Eastern University), and MA in Theological Studies (Princeton Theological Seminary). He is presently working on a co-edited anthology tentatively titled America's Autumn, which examines the intersections and convergences within America's contemporaneous moments of radical protest, an essay collection, and book on Black queer Christian thought. He hails from Camden, NJ and currently lives in Brooklyn, NY.