GLOBAL FAITH IN ACTION
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​A World of Faith Living Together, Beyond Our Differences



Mission: To assist families, congregations, communities, and nations live beyond our differences, in respectful presence of all through dialogue in action.

Vision: To help people of differing religious ideologies and faith practices focus on commonly held beliefs that are trans-formative and life-changing.

Goal: The 13th century Sufi poet wrote: Beyond our differences, there is a field, I will meet you there. Together we will find the field, and meet together in peace.Global Faith in Action (GFIA) is an interfaith/intrafaith* Dialogue in Action organization. We contend that religious dialogue in action is the bridge to the transformation of families, communities and our world. Today we live in a global village. Wichita, Kansas, home of Global Faith In Action, is one of the most diverse communities in the Midwest. People from all over the globe bring cross-cultural and religious practices to Wichita. Temples, mosques, synagogues, and churches dot our landscape. The same phenomenon has occurred throughout much of our world.

In response to our changing world, interfaith organizations are now found in many metropolitan and even rural areas of our globe. A multitude of methodologies for interfaith and intrafaith dialogue have been developed. Global Faith in Action has chosen to focus on a methodology we call Dialogue in Action. Our premise is that too often traditional methods of dialogue create awareness but seldom result in “action”, the kind of action that results in reconciliation, healing and the transformation of relationships. For this reason Global Faith In Action has chosen to design, consult, and practice the Dialogue in Action methodology.

The 13th century Persian Sufi poet, Rumi, wrote Beyond our differences, there is a field, I will meet you there. It is Global Faith in Actions mission to assist families, congregations, communities, and even countries experience the many fields that lie beyond our differences – fields of respect and mutual understanding. A field where people of differing religious ideology and faith practices can come together and focus on commonly held beliefs that are trans-formative and life changing, such as the golden rule Do unto others as you would have them do unto you (Scarboro Mission Link)


Global Faith In Action will search for fields where we can meet and experience action. The field could be around your very dining room table, where visitors of differing religious practice would fellowship together and discuss what actions could be taken to create fields of hope, reconciliation and healing. The field could be a diverse group of persons traveling to Kenya, Turkey, home of the Sufi poet Rumi, or to Haiti, and experience community within the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere.




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Sam Muyskens – Founder, Global Faith in Action

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Sam is a Dutchman who grew up in small, rural Dutch communities in Minnesota. He graduated from Dakota Wesleyan University with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Music Education. Sam earned his Master of Sacred Music, Master of Music Education and Master of Divinity degrees from Southern Methodist University. Sam has been an ordained United Methodist Minister for 48 years. He has taught high school music, had his own business as a piano technician, and been a Minister of Music in Arizona, Illinois, and South Dakota as well as a South Dakota State Penitentiary Chaplain. In 1979 Sam accepted an appointment as senior pastor of West Heights United Methodist Church, in Wichita, Kansas. Thirteen years later he became the Executive Director of Inter-Faith Ministries, and grew the organization into an internationally recognized organization. Sam has lectured and traveled throughout the world. He traveled to India as the guest of the Gobind Sedan Institute of Comparative Religions. In November of 2009 he was one f five interfaith executives invited to the White House to advise the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships on the need for “inter-religious understanding.” In December of 2009 he made a presentation on “Interfaith Dialogue in Action” at the Parliament of World Religions in Melbourne, Australia. Sam is the founder and President of Global Faith in Action. Sam has traveled to Haiti some 40 times on behalf of the ASAP Haiti Project which he and other Haitian and Wichita residents founded years ago.
Rev. Sam Muyskens,  has focused on the Dialogue in Action methodology for over 40 years. As a Minister of Music, Minister of Youth, Prison Chaplain, Senior Pastor, and retired Executive Director of Inter-Faith Ministries Wichita, Rev. Sam has found that action centered dialogue is effective and trans-formative. He is quoted as saying, while recently attending a consultation with White House staff, Dialogue in action is more than sharing our beliefs, even more than being respectful of differing religious beliefs – it is relationship building, it is life changing. 
* An Interfaith/intrafaith organization is one that is not only fostering understanding between people of different religions, but equally important relations between the chasms of misunderstanding within a specific religion.
Global Faith In Action is a 501 ( c)( 3) non-profit organization.



GFIA Board Members

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Surinder Moore Compassion plays a huge role in Surinder’s life. From her lifelong vegetarianism to her numerous volunteer roles in local nonprofits (including co-funding Global Faith in Action), she strives to put her compassion into action. When Surinder joined AGI in 2009 as program manager she'd served as volunteer and grant writer for Kansas-based nonprofits, so it felt like a natural continuation of her work. In her role at AGI, she pulls from a diverse background, including being a UK expat, 10 years in the financial industry in Texas, and being fluent in Punjabi. After dedicating nine years to AGI, Surinder was appointed, Executive Director.


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Rabbi Michael Davis A third generation Reform rabbi, has been the spiritual leader of Congregation Emanu-El in Wichita, Kansas, since August 1995.  Before accepting the position at Congregation Emanu-El, he served as rabbi of Temple Beth El in Port St Lucie, FL and Temple Sinai in Forest Hills, NY.  In Wichita, Rabbi Davis conducts workshops and has been a frequent guest lecturer at Wichita State University, Newman University, Butler Community College, Bethel College, as well as numerous churches, schools and hospitals. Rabbi Davis is currently an adjunct faculty member at Southwestern College.  He has served as president of the Board of Inter-Faith Ministries and of the National Conference for Community and Justice (NCCJ), Kansas Chapter, and served on their boards for many years.  He currently a founding board member of Global Faith in Action. Rabbi Davis is also a chaplain for the Wichita Police Dept and the Sedgwick County Sheriff's Dept.
Rabbi Davis graduated in 1976 from Indiana University with an A.B. in Religious Studies. He studied rabbinic's at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in Jerusalem and Cincinnati (1979-1981) and at the Academy for Jewish Religion (1986-1991), earning his smicha (ordination) in 1991.  He is the proud father of four children.
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Jonathan Flesher  graduated from Wichita State University in 2006 and was Ecumenical Campus Minister at WSU from 2013-2017. A former project coordinator for GFIA, he has been with the organization for 7 years. He has organized multiple dialogue events, concerts, fundraisers and newsletters, and has helped lead two volunteer trips to Haiti. Jonathan has a passion for seeing people of different backgrounds create new experiences and cause change in our community.


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​William (Bill) Vann is a sought after preacher, teacher and author. He has taught men’s seminars across the country. Pastor Vann is the senior Pastor at Iasis Christian Center in Wichita, Ks. Prior to pastoring he served as Vice-Chairman over youth services for the states of Kansas, Colorado, and Missouri for the Pentecostal Assemblies of the World Inc. For over twenty years he has been involved in the design, support and implementation of programs to strengthen and encourage young people. In the last five years he has directed his emphasis towards the plight and hopelessness that is plaguing young men in our society. Vann specializes in young men between the ages of eleven and twenty that live in urban environments. These young men come from a diversity of ethnic and economic backgrounds. Although Vann focuses his concentration in the lower economic tier, he believes that every young man has seed potential to become great. However, without someone to cultivate that potential many young men fall prey to societies prophesy. Vann has dedicated the last ten years of his life to helping young men reach their full potential and become productive citizens and responsible fathers.Bill is the husband to his wife Michelle for over twenty-seven years and they have two adult children Brandon and Brianna.He holds a certificate of Ordination from Aenon Bible College, Bachelors in Business Administration and a Masters in Leadership from Southwestern, a Doctorate in Theology, as well as, certifications from the Urban Leadership Institute. He has also been a guest lecture on the “Men Let’s Talk Network” of Atlanta, Ga.


Haiti Sponsorship Coordinator & Office Manager

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Maria Jacobia started volunteering with GFIA three years ago as the coordinating dinner dialogue coordinator. Since then she has also added the titles Sponsorship Coordinator and Office Manager. Her duties include managing our social media accounts, updating our websites and other everyday office tasks. Maria also developed our new GFIA website. Additionally, she works in the school district as a dietary aide, volunteers for Heartland Hospice and is the Market & Community Outreach Coordinator for Alternative Gifts International. Maria’s background includes many years of volunteer experience. She attended Manchester College in Indiana for a couple of years before leaving to start her own personal journey of discovery. Then she started working with On Earth Peace in New Windsor, Maryland. After that, she joined the Brethren Volunteer Service where she served as a photography assistant in the main office of Habitat for Humanity in Americus, Georgia. Next, she traveled to Phoenix to work in a food bank. In Phoenix she met her first husband Joe and later moved to Wichita with him to start their family. After he passed away in a tragic accident, she continued to preserve through life’s most challenging times and still gave most of her time to her community. Maria’s joy beyond volunteering is her six children between age 13 and 27.  She believes that our collective strength comes from each of our differences and aims to work tirelessly as an advocate for peace and unity
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A Piece of Chalk is How We Got Started

​​In 1993, a Haitian born young professional visited Sam in his office, and with tears in his eyes said, My fathers school in Haiti is going to close. Sam asked, Why is it to close? thinking he would hear how people are dying of starvation, and teachers and students are fainting from hunger. But Sam soon learned that the Haitian people are too proud to even let hunger close down a school. Education is their greatest hope to a better life. Their crisis was The school had run out of chalk. Teachers could not teach without chalk. When a school has no pencils, paper, or books – all a teacher has to teach with is the information held in their own heads, a piece of chalk and a chalk board. When visiting a Haitian school it is exhilarating to hear the chanting of words, numbers, equations, etc. back and forth between the teacher and students.It should be of no surprise that Sam Muyskens is a man of action. When the young Haitian visitor left his office he immediately called Harold Millard, a seasoned traveler with the Kansas West Conference United Methodist Volunteer in Mission program. Within a few weeks Harold and Sam were on their way to Haiti with boxes of chalk. The school was re-opened, and before Harold and Sam left Haiti they had purchased gasoline smuggled into Haiti from the Dominican Republic, for $18.00 a gallon, filled the tank of a borrowed truck, and hired a driver who drove to the Haitian coast and loaded the truck with donated food stranded in the harbor because there were no gasoline filled trucks to transport the food. The food was delivered safely to Lambert, Haitian lives were saved, a long-term relationship was developed, and the small school remained open.


For twenty-three volunteer doctors, nurses, contractors, laborers, teachers, and religious leaders have traveled to Lambert, Haiti. Together we have worked along side the Haitian people. The school has grown and now serves over 600 students including a satellite school in Borde. The project has also helped create a medical clinic, initiate a micro-lending project for women, plant thousands of trees, and with the help of Rotary International, Wichita Rotary Clubs and the Cap Haitian Rotary Club in Haiti, we have installed a solar powered water system for the school and community, created a solar powered computer lab, and introduced cooking with solar ovens.
Today the school has books, pencils, paper, computers, and they have chalk!
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  • Home
    • About
    • Contact
  • Haiti Sponsorship & Stories
    • Donation Page
  • Membership
    • Our Members
    • Compassion Charter
  • Beyond Tolerance
    • Dinner Dialogues
  • GFIA News & stories
    • MEMORIES WITH SAM
    • Past Events >
      • Panel Discussions on Racism
      • Keep Our Children Safe
      • College Events
      • Harmony Concert
      • Other events