AN INTERFAITH Friendship walk will attempt to bring together members of all faiths in an event designed to build and strengthen relationships.

Starting at the Oxford Synagogue on Richmond Road on June 28, those on the walk will move through the city carrying balloons, stopping at different faith buildings.

Stop-offs on the walk include the University Church of St Mary the Virgin and the final destination, the Oxford Central Mosque on Manzil Way.

The mosque will then serve a free meal served designed to reflect the some of the diverse backgrounds of the attendees, with the main course being prepared by the Mosque communities and a dessert made by Oxford's Jewish community.

Organisers claim as many as 500 people of different religious backgrounds are expected to attend the annual event and have encouraged people of all or no faith to attend for all or just part of the walk.

Penny Faust, one of the event's organisers, said: "The walk is important because faith communities across the world are depicted at being at odds with one another, there is focus on divisions. In Oxford there are very strong interfaith relationships between groups and the walk allows people sees this."

In its current guise, the walk has been held each year for more than a decade. Organisation of the walk is overseen by the Oxford Council of Faiths.

The council represents 27 different faith groups, many of which will be attending the walk.

The walk comes at a sensitive time for race relations, in the wake of the an anti-Semetic attack on the Chabad Student Centre in Cowley Road last month.

The mutual goal is to increase unity through shared prayer with a focus on community and the hope that this will strengthen mutual support, respect and understanding between the increasingly diverse faith groups in the Oxford area.

In 2015 the event organisers, the Oxford Council of Faiths, received the High Sheriffs Community Integration Award because of their 'contribution to interfaith and inter-communal respect, and goodwill'.

The walk begins at 6.15pm on Thursday, June 28, at 21 Richmond Road, OX1 2JL in the Oxford Jewish Congregation Synagogue. The walk ends at the Central Mosque on Manzil Way, OX4 1DJ, at 8:00pm.

For information on the walk or the council, visit https://oxcof.org.uk.