Announcing the 2025-2026 Interfaith Leadership Network Fellows

Announcing the 2025-2026 Interfaith Leadership Network Fellows

The Interfaith Alliance team is thrilled to announce the second cohort of the Interfaith Leadership Network (ILN). Launched as a pilot program in 2024, Interfaith Alliance’s Interfaith Leadership Network resources diverse clergy, faith leaders and pro-democracy advocates with the expertise, skills, and connections they need to affect change in their state and local communities. The ILN supports leaders with practical skills, financial resources, expert coaching, and a strong, collaborative network to advance civil rights and inclusive religious freedom across the country.

Each member of the ILN identifies one pressing focus in their community, guided by their perspective and leadership, that they will galvanize the interfaith community to address.

From defending the separation of church and state to countering authoritarian threats and strengthening inclusive democracy, these leaders bring deep relationships, local expertise, and a shared commitment to building communities rooted in dignity, pluralism, and justice. We are honored to support their work and excited to introduce the 2025-2026 Interfaith Leadership Network cohort below.

This cohort represents an extraordinary group of organizers, clergy, and faith-based leaders whose work embodies the power of interfaith collaboration in action. Their leadership is grounded in lived experience, sustained by deep community trust, and animated by a shared belief that democracy and religious freedom flourish when people of diverse traditions work together. We are proud to walk alongside these leaders and to celebrate the vision, courage, and care they bring to this network and to their communities every day.

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1. Shir Lovett-Graff

Shir (they/them/theirs) is the Executive Director for the Attleboro Area Interfaith Collaborative. Originally from New Haven, CT, Shir has worked and organized at the intersection of religion, justice, and education throughout their professional career. They hold a BA in Literature from New College of Florida and a MTS with a concentration in Religion, Ethics and Politics from Harvard Divinity School. They have trained as a chaplain and mediator, and are a co-founder of Matir Asurim: Jewish Care Network for Incarcerated People. Shir is a poet and loves hosting dinners and art-making gatherings. They currently live in Providence, RI.

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2. Carolyn Jones

Carolyn Jones (she/her) is the Program Manager of the Trans Youth Emergency Project, a second year MDiv at Harvard Divinity School, and an abortion doula. She is committed to working at the intersection of interfaith chaplaincy and progressive advocacy, particularly around issues of bodily autonomy.

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3. Tasneem al-Michael

Tasneem Al-Michael (he/him) is a Bangladeshi American political organizer, entrepreneur, and educator based in Dallas, Texas. He serves as the National Network Support Organizing Manager at Indivisible, where he supports grassroots groups across the South and Midwest in building power and advancing progressive change. A seasoned civic leader, Tasneem has raised nearly one million dollars across nonprofits and campaigns, managed multi-state coalitions, and helped elect barrier-breaking candidates at the local level. He is also the Co-CEO of Lote.ai, an agricultural technology startup leveraging Edge-based AI and sustainable innovation to empower farmers and combat climate change. Deeply engaged in community leadership, Tasneem has served on nonprofit boards, taught leadership and debate at a Muslim high school, and co-founded the Greater Oklahoma City Asian Chamber of Commerce. He is pursuing multiple degrees, including law, business, and organizational leadership, with long-term goals of serving in public office and shaping global policy.

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4. Dieu Do

Dieu Do (she/her) is a grassroots immigrant rights activist, community organizer, and campaign strategist based in the Twin Cities with roots in the Iron Range. She is a proud daughter of Mexican and Vietnamese immigrants who came to the U.S. during the American War in Vietnam. Growing up in a rural low-income family, Dieu saw how the lack of fair wages and paid family and medical leave, dignified healthcare, and access to cultural foods impacted her family. These hardships inspired Dieu’s pursuit of justice. She currently serves as a Policy Aide for Minneapolis Council Member Jeremiah Ellison and a member of the Minnesota Immigrant Rights Action Committee (MIRAC). She hopes to continue building progressive political power in solidarity with our communities for generations to come.

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5. Rachel Mikva

Rabbi Dr. Rachel S. Mikva serves as the Herman E. Schaalman Professor in Jewish Studies and Senior Faculty Fellow of the InterReligious Institute at Chicago Theological Seminary. The Institute and the Seminary work at the cutting edge of theological education, training religious leaders who can build bridges across cultural and religious differences for the critical work of social transformation. Ordained in the Reform movement, Rabbi Mikva served as a congregational rabbi for 13 years before returning to the academy. With a passion for justice and academic expertise in the history of scriptural interpretation, her courses and publications address a range of Jewish and comparative studies, with a special interest in the intersections of sacred texts, culture and ethics.

Her most recent books are Dangerous Religious Ideas: The Deep Roots of Self-Critical Faith in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam (Beacon, 2020); a textbook for graduate and undergraduate students, Interreligious Studies: An Introduction (Cambridge University Press, 2023); and Monotheism and Pluralism (Cambridge University Press, 2024). Invited to give the 2025 Silber-Obrecht Lectures, she is expanding them into a volume for Georgetown University Press: What Does It Mean to Be Human? Jewish, Christian, and Islamic Perspectives.

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6. Iqbal Akhtar

Iqbal S. Akhtar is an American academic and public intellectual known for his work in religious studies, international relations, and philanthropy. He is an Associate Professor of Religious Studies and Politics & International Relations at Florida International University (FIU). Currently, he is the executive director of The East-West Foundation, working to promote interfaith belonging through promoting education and research excellence.

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7. Chenele Dixon

Chenele Dixon is a community leader, educator, author, and former legislator from Kimberly, Idaho. She earned her Bachelor’s in English Education from Brigham Young University, a Master’s in Education in 2010, and later became a licensed real estate agent. The author of Something Extraordinary: Parental Leadership in Home Education, she has taught literature and writing in homeschool co-ops, worked as a tutor, ghostwriter, and editor, and now focuses her efforts on civic leadership.

Elected to the Idaho House of Representatives in 2022, Chenele served one term and was appointed to the Idaho Behavioral Health Council, where she continues to work on reducing stigma around mental health and supporting first responders. She also serves as President of the Kimberly Schools Foundation, is on the board of the Unity Alliance of Southern Idaho—a group that builds bridges across the diverse groups in Southern Idaho and is Executive Director of Idaho Solutions—a nonprofit advancing good governance and practical policy solutions. Chenele and her husband, Michael, have two daughters.

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8. Rabbi Fred Greene

Rabbi Fred Greene is a community partner striving to make Congregation Har HaShem a dynamic, inspiring community of belonging in Boulder County. He aspires to provide a 'brave space' for those looking to connect or reconnect to Judaism and Jewish community. As religious life seems out of touch or irrelevant to some, Rabbi Greene's goal is to help make our Jewish experiences meaningful and compelling, all the while helping us reclaim faith, hope, and our own prophetic, moral voice.  

Rabbi Greene has served congregations in New York, Connecticut, and Georgia and is an active member of the Central Conference of American Rabbis. He was ordained in 2001 from the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion (HUC-JIR), has a Master's from HUC-JIR in Hebrew Literature, and a B.A. from Hofstra University in New York. Currently, he is pursuing a Doctor of Ministry in Prophetic Leadership from Iliff School of Theology in Denver.

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9. Amy Lazzaroni

Amy Lazzaroni is beginning her work as a Spiritual Director, drawing on a multidisciplinary background in law, theology, administration, and yoga. She offers spiritual companionship for those who are curious, questioning, or navigating transitions in their faith. As a recovering Southern Baptist, Amy relates especially well with those emerging from fundamentalist religious communities and seeking a renewed or reimagined relationship with the Divine. She holds a Master of Divinity from the Candler School of Theology at Emory University and a Juris Doctor from Stetson University College of Law. She is currently completing her final year of supervised training through Zeitgeist Atlanta’s Spiritual Direction program. Amy is also a Yoga Alliance certified 200-hour Registered Yoga Teacher and a Registered Children’s Yoga Teacher. She recently relocated to Rome, Georgia, where she is an active member and lay leader at Rome First United Methodist Church.

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10. Rev. Bart Fletcher

Rev. Dr. Bart A. Fletcher is an ordained minister and has served God and neighbor for over thirty years in United Methodist churches in Minnesota and Virginia. His current pastoral appointment is in west-central Minnesota, historically a monocultural area, which now bustles with multicultural diversity, including a significant population of Hispanic and Somali immigrants, most of whom have arrived within the past twenty years. Bart and his late wife Claudia are adoptive parents of twelve (now adult) children and grandparents to sixteen. Parenting a multi-racial family increased his awareness of racial disparities and honed his passion to pursue justice with those often forgotten by a majority population. He holds a Doctor of Ministry (2021) from Emory University’s Candler School of Theology, where his dissertation project investigated the intersection between morally imaginative preaching and individual and corporate spiritual transformation.

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11. Amar Peterman

Amar D. Peterman (he/him) is an Indian American scholar and theologian working at the intersection of faith and public life. He is the founder of Scholarship for Religion and Society LLC, a research and consulting firm working with some of the leading philanthropic and civic institutions, religious organizations, and faith leaders in America today. He is the former Assistant Director of Civic Networks at Interfaith America, where he oversaw their Emerging Leaders programing. He currently serves as the Civic Strategies Specialist there. Amar is also the author of “Becoming Neighbors: The Common Good Made Local” (Spring 2026) and is a current PhD Student at the University of Chicago Divinity School. Inspired by the deep wells of his Christian faith, Amar’s writing seeks to help people of faith work towards the flourishing of their communities through the radical, local practice of neighbor love.

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