The descendants of Joseph Meyerhoff have been actively sup-porting the Institute for Christian & Jewish Studies since its inception. An initial grant of $75,000 by Harvey (Bud) Meyerhoff in 1987 from the Joseph Meyerhoff Family Charitable Fund, together with similar grants from the Abell, Merrick, and Jacob and Hilda Blaustein foundations, provided the primary base of support needed to begin the work of the Institute. Their trust and confidence enabled a daring dream to emerge as an ambitious educational reality. Gifts and grants from the family have exceeded $900,000 and have been used to fund trips to Israel, to support an endowment campaign, and, most recently, to encourage the ICJS's Jewish Scholars Project.

Terry Meyerhoff Rubenstein, one of the original founders of the ICJS along with Charles Obrecht, Richard Berndt, and Bernard Manekin, is the granddaughter of Joseph Meyerhoff and the daughter of Bud Meyerhoff and his late wife Lyn. Terry helped to lay the foundations for an organization that would work to foster greater understanding between Jews and Christians. As executive director of the Joseph Meyerhoff Family Charitable Funds, Terry sees community involvement and community rela-tions as a central Meyerhoff theme. When asked about the Institute's work to better educate Jews about Christianity, she responded, "Some Jewish traditions have embraced greater understanding, but many Jews continue to misunderstand and fear Christians. If you don't understand someone, fear is apt to overshadow reality. These fears work against the building of a healthy community."

Lee Meyerhoff Hendler, the second daughter of Bud and Lyn Meyerhoff, is currently president of Chizuk Amuno Congrega-tion and a member of the ICJS Board of Directors. As a religion major at Duke University in the newly formed Department of Religion, she approached religion from an academic perspec-tive. "Religious ideas and expressions have always fascinated me. When I visited a series of Baltimore churches during a childhood Sunday school program, I was struck by their beauty, but I also saw differences between Judaism and other faiths that I didn't fully understand." Lee attended ICJS events and participated in the second ICJS Israel Study Trip. She is deeply committed to the Jewish Scholars Project. "You can't be a serious Christian without understanding your relationship to Judaism. Modern American Jews must also understand what Christianity means. I understand I have things to learn from Christianity. The Jewish Scholars Project is a radical achieve-ment. The work is groundbreaking. The ICJS gives Jews a chance to define themselves -- not in opposition to the other, but standing alongside the other -- a chance to understand Christianity in Jewish terms."

The Children of Harvey and Lyn Meyerhoff Fund was estab-lished in 1979 by Bud and Lyn to provide a vehicle to introduce their children to philanthropy and to help them understand both the responsibilities and joys of being able to give money away intelligently and productively. Not only has the fund produced positive results, it has been invaluable in keeping the Meyerhoff children focused on family and on the melding of sometimes disparate interests into a strong and vital commu-nity resource. This fund has continued to support many of the initiatives of the original family foundation.

To continue the history of the Harvey M. Meyerhoff family philanthropic tradition, The Grandchildren of Harvey and Lyn Meyerhoff Fund recently was established by Bud Meyerhoff as a supporting foundation of the Associated. The fund, which is run by four adult grandchildren of Bud and Lyn Meyerhoff, focuses on youth and young adults in the Baltimore area, and involves the fourth generation of the Meyerhoff family in Baltimore philanthropy.

"Generational philanthropy provides a real opportunity for fam-ilies as fortunate as ours," says Terry Rubenstein. "Children and grandchildren need to be brought along in the process. Money is a loaded issue. Some families cannot pass their wealth along until they are dead. Our parents and grand-parents were wise and generous. Now we are bringing up the next generation."

Through the support of the ICJS endowment and other proj-ects, the Meyerhoff family seeks to ensure that the pioneering work of the Institute will continue. "America owes an enormous debt in its founding to deeply religious ideals. Our founding fathers were remarkably courageous individuals who had a political vision of freedom rooted in sacred text and a sense of God's intentions for us. We have lost this sense of how reli-gious values undergird American life. The ICJS helps us to talk seriously and productively about a way religious belief defines our life," says Lee Meyerhoff Hendler.

The Meyerhoff family support for the ICJS is intended to en-sure that future generations of Jews and Christians, without fear and with mutual understanding, will form a community where religious pluralism is a strong and secure value in the American landscape -- just as our ancestors intended.