Uniting Neighbors encourages respect

BOUNTIFUL — One person can save a two-way relationship from going sour.

That's what Mark Fournier believes. The Emmy Award winning producer and author says when people meet for the first time, they evaluate the other too often based on superficial judgments and misconceptions.

"This reality will then determine how you treat them," Fournier said. "And they will respond to that."

Just one person needs to change his mind, and the other will respond to that, too.

"Typically I would have to say most people feel their problems are unique and no one possibly can understand when the solutions are right under your nose."

Thursday night at The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints' Bountiful Regional Center, about 1,100 people took in interpretations of Fournier books read out loud with piano music, stage props and song from the Salt Lake Children's Choir.

The Uniting Neighbors meeting also featured talks from members of Alliance for Unity, a group formed last year by religious and community leaders who want to bridge divides among Utah's religious, ethnic and political groups. The Deseret News was one of the event's sponsors.

The United Way of Davis County also sponsored the event. After a 1998 study showed affordable housing, teen suicide and adequate child care among problems in the county, the United Way began a program of training "neighborhood coordinators" who determine the needs of nearby residents. In Layton there are 100 neighborhood coordinators and in Woods Cross there are 50.

"When communities were built across America, people helped each other," said Larry Burdett, executive director of the United Way of Davis County. "We aren't doing that today. We need to get back to the basics."

"I think today we have to be so concerned about one another particularly when we consider what is going on in the world. We're living in a world that is spinning so rapidly." said Elder M. Russell Ballard of the LDS Church's Quorum of the Twelve.

In the unpredictable world of today, it's imperative "to live with each other, be willing to work with each other — regardless of our religious persuasion or culture from which we come," he said.

Elder Ballard credited Alliance for Unity's open and candid dialogue. "I'd encourage this same spirit be developed" in Circles of Unity, he said, referring to small dialogue groups affiliated with the alliance.

Salt Lake Tribune Editor Jay Shelledy cited a report published in the newspaper on the gap felt between members and non-members of the LDS Church.