THE
GENESIS
Our faith in humanity is challenged on a daily basis, along with many underlying questions on subjects such as integration of men and women in their society, cultural identities, religious identities, extremism, art, money, politics, etc.
After Charlie Hebdo terrorist attacks in Paris, Nabila and Fred started to ask some questions about religions and cultural identities around them. Most of the people could not really answer them, what Islam is about, what a religion is, what the different cultures were.
This lack of knowledge and education is not only experienced in France but is a global problem. According to Pewforum, 84% of the world population believe in a religion. Each of us brings in his/her own cultural identity.
We are in need for a tool to understand each other better: a factual and multimedia education tool on cultural identities and religious identities. Factual, because it is nowadays easy to tell fake stories. That is why we have decided to work with scholars and experts from the beginning.
This is how FAITH THE PROJECT was created in 2015 with four main missions being DOCUMENTATION, EDUCATION, PROTECTION and PROMOTION.
Education is for us the only viable answer to indoctrination, fanaticism and violence. By knowing and understanding each other, respect and intercultural dialogue can be enhanced.
FAITH is HUMANITY
We all believe in someone.
Sometimes in something.
It can be yourself, your dog, your cat, your lover, your family, your Pokemon, your boss, your company, egality of sex, justice, freedom, love, etc.
Homer wrote that every human needs to believe.
Our faith is the reason why we are waking up every morning, why we are kissing strangers who might become our wives and husbands and also the reason why we are having children.
Ancient rulers in Bagan (Myanmar) believed that only faith could last. Their homes were made of wood and stupas in brick which later was what was left of it.
In Myanmar, locals pray Nats. These spirits are worshiped like saints in Roman Catholic Church.
The Greatest Nats were human who often met with violent deaths. The other Nats relates to nature and animals.
All these stories say the same thing. We are all born with a preprogrammed language and cultural identity (which includes religion or spirituality). In a global world, whether you want it or not, you have 100% chance of meeting a stranger (to you) in the street and to understand each other, you have to understand both programs.
, we
FAITH is DIVERSITY
We have thus decided to depict a long missionary journey that we have taken along the ancient Silk Roads from Istanbul to Xi’an in China.
The purpose of this initiative was to observe and show the diversity of cultural identities and religious identities in the different countries crossed and how they are melting together.
The first step covered Turkey and Iran in February and March 2016. The second stage was crossing Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan in November and December 2016.
The last one was in China in March and April 2017.
FAITH is LEGACY
We want to be actors in accepting our diversity, our differences and in changing the perception of others. The world has never experienced so many walls, barriers, even during World Wards or the Cold War. Yet we have never experienced such a wave of terrorist attacks, destroying not only our day-to-day relationship but our material and immaterial heritage.
We want to take this opportunity to tell our stories, their stories and protect our traditions, their traditions.
FAITH iN HUMANITY
« We all look at the same things but we do not see them in the same way. Just because we wear different glasses »
– Yasar