Eboo Patel, author of “Acts of Faith,” spoke to students Tuesday night about coming of age and finding themselves, themes that appear in his book.

Patel came not only to discuss his book, but to talk about his movement in the Interfaith Youth Core and religious pluralism.

“Acts of Faith” was chosen by the Common Reading committee to be NIU’s 2013-2014 Common Reading Experience book. First-year students take part in the common reading experience, where one book is selected and read to make students’ first year at NIU more engaging.

“Staff, faculty, students and community members from DeKalb come together and go through lots of different book choices about what we can bring to campus and what will be best fit for our students,” said Kelly Smith, assistant director in First- and Second-Year Experiences.

Building bridges was among the topics touched on by Patel. He spoke not about physical bridges, but of bridges of cooperation between different groups, specifically those of faith. Patel said bridges are possible between any two groups that are willing not to put aside their differences, but to agree to disagree and come together.

“I love engaging with students who are energetic about building bridges and about starting new things,” Patel said.

Audience members also had the chance at the end of the speech to ask Patel questions. Among the members who joined in was a fifth grade girl who asked what she could do in her own school to promote interfaith.

“One thing you can do is to be proud of your own identity and heritage, and I’m sure that you are,” Patel said in response. “I know that’s the case, I just want to affirm that for you. Be proud of who you are, be proud of what you do at home.”

After the speech, Patel participated in a book signing event.

“My favorite part were the questions [afterward], because he basically targeted the audience and gave a lot of really good advice. I really appreciated a lot of his answers,” said Gladys Sanchez, junior special education major.