The idea came to Jenny Jozwiak in summer 2006, while she was sitting in the car. Positive Focus, the Brooklyn photography collective, had asked her to create a community project that would showcase the many facets of New York.

With Danny Simmons’ “Project Diversity,” a multimedia exhibit on the Brooklyn experience, fresh in her mind, “Diversity of Devotion” was born.

Subtitled “Celebrating New York’s Spiritual Harmony,” the exhibit displays the work of 32 photographers from across the country in 40 photos depicting the breadth of spiritual observance in four of the five boroughs, Staten Island excluded, during two weeks last fall and winter. An opening reception will be held Thursday, Sept. 6 at 6 p.m. at the Safe-T-Gallery in the DUMBO section of Brooklyn. The exhibit will be on view through Sept. 23.

“This project is about celebrating the differences and then realizing we’re not so different,” said Jozwiak, a professional travel photographer who was born Jewish but identifies as a Buddhist. “I wanted to show that at least in one city in the world people can practice their religions and not be persecuted, that in New York we’re trying to hold up what true democracy is: freedom of religion.”

The 330 entries from nearly 70 photographers were whittled down by a blind jury. The winning photographs represent 20 separate beliefs and sects, including multiple denominations of Christianity, Islam, Sikhism, Voodoo, Santeria and six photos covering the Jewish spectrum.

One of Jozwiak’s photographs, “Efraim: The Wandering Jew of The Lubavitch Center,” was taken outside 770 Eastern Parkway. The subject is Efraim Wolf, a homeless Lubavitcher who gets by by sleeping in community leader’s cars, with their permission and taking donations.

“He’s fallen on some hard times, but he has this really kind face and very beautiful eyes,” she said. With his long dreadlocks and atypical garb, “There is a stark contrast between him and the regular practitioners,” she said.

Marcia Bricker Halperin, whose photo “Woman Saying Shema” was chosen for the top five, found her subject, Bonnie Charkey, at the lay-led egalitarian minyan she attends at Congregation Beth Elohim in Brooklyn on Saturdays.

“Her kavanah [spiritual concentration] was so intense that I felt moved to take a picture of her at that moment,” she said.

Positive Focus is looking for exhibit space for the show in Queens, Manhattan and The Bronx. The Brooklyn Public Library has agreed to host the exhibit sometime next year.

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