Faith-based organizing to be topic

YOUNGSTOWN — The Interdenominational Ministerial Alliance will host Gregory A. Galluzzo, national director of the Gamaliel Foundation in Chicago, during a program at 11 a.m. Jan. 12 at Holy Trinity Missionary Baptist Church, 505 Parkcliffe Ave.

Galluzzo recruited and trained President-elect Barack Obama in the skills of faith-based community organizing.

Galluzzo, a former Jesuit priest, co-founded the Gamaliel Foundation, a community organizing network representing more than a million multifaith, multiracial church-going people who work on campaigns for social justice.

He has been organizing in minority and low-income communities since l971. From 1986 to the present, he has been director of the Gamaliel Foundation. During this time, the foundation has grown into a network of nearly 60 community organizations in 14 states and in the Natal and Western Cape Provinces of South Africa. The foundation has worked in Canada and Romania. It has been invited to work in Honduras and Tanzania. It continues to expand in the United States.

The foundation works primarily with congregation-centered community organizations. These organizations have become powerful forces for change in poor and working-class communities. They also work with religious leaders to strengthen congregations. The organizations within the network frequently combine to work on National Issues affecting housing, transportation and urban sprawl.