In celebration of the life and legacy of Martin Luther King Jr., Eboo Patel, founder of the Interfaith Youth Core will open the event delivering a short keynote. He will then be in conversation with Rev. Jacqui Lewis, and Reka Prasad. The discussion will be moderated by Minister Rashad Moore and will focus on the topic of “social justice efforts informed by religious or spiritual practice.” Eboo Patel is a leading voice in the movement for interfaith cooperation and the Founder and President of Interfaith Youth Core (IFYC), a national nonprofit working to make interfaith cooperation a social norm. He is the author of Acts of Faith, Sacred Ground and Interfaith Leadership. Named by US News & World Report as one of America’s Best Leaders of 2009, Patel served on President Obama’s Inaugural Faith Council. He is a regular contributor to the public conversation around religion in America and a frequent speaker on the topic of religious pluralism. He holds a doctorate in the sociology of religion from Oxford University, where he studied on a Rhodes scholarship. For over fifteen years, Patel has worked with governments, social sector organizations, and college and university campuses to help realize a future where religion is a bridge of cooperation rather than a barrier of division. Reka Prasad was born and raised in New York City to parents who emigrated from India. As a first-generation American, she learned how to walk the line between different communities and witnessed the impact of identity on personal development. Over the years, she understood that self-awareness and self-care were the pathways to moving beyond limiting thoughts. As a trained couples and family therapist with an expertise in mindfulness practices, she has made this her life’s purpose. She graduated with honors from New York University in Clinical Social Work and continued her education at the Ackerman Institute for the Family in couples and family therapy. She has conducted research in the field on empowering single mother survivors of domestic abuse and around creating safer schools for LGBTQ students; lectured on couples’ therapy in graduate programs; been hired by large non- profits as an on-site therapist; and offered workshops and webinars on couples therapy, self-care, mindfulness and communication, and self-empowerment through meditation. As a psychotherapist, she continues to work with clients struggling with everything from anxiety to difficulties in their relationships. Prasad is a secular Buddhist, long time meditator, and manage mindfulness programming for NYU, where she teaches mindfulness practices to students, faculty and administrators. She is a passionate proponent for the use of therapy and mindfulness together as transformative tools toward a life of choice, freedom, and greater connectivity. Rev. Rashad Moore  is a doctoral student in Philosophy and Education at Teachers College, Columbia University.  An alumnus of Morehouse College and Union Theological Seminary, Rev. Moore is a passionate teacher, preacher, and scholar. His research interests are centered on the history and philosophy of African-American education, as well as concepts pertaining to joy, becoming, and imagination. Rashad currently serves as Assistant Minister for Ministries at The Abyssinian Baptist Church in the  City of New York. This years’s celebration is titled “Activism by Tradition: Justice Rooted in our Stories.”