The following is a guest contribution. Reuters is not responsible for the content and the views expressed are the authors’ alone. Libyan theologian Aref Ali Nayed is a senior advisor to the Cambridge Inter-Faith Programme and a leading signatory of A Common Word.

By Aref Ali Nayed

Being held in the early days of the Obama presidency, this year’s U.S.-Muslim World Forum in Doha last weekend was particularly luminescent with rays of hope. One was the very fact that its host, the influential Brookings Institution think-tank, invited faith leaders to discuss how to improve the dreadful state of relations between Washington and the Muslim world. The basis for discussion was A Common Word, an appeal by 138 Muslim scholars to Christian leaders to join in a dialogue based on the shared commandments to love God and love one’s neighbor.

That a theological and spiritual initiative is of keen interest to policy planners is indeed a fresh ray of light.  Basking in that hopeful light, moreover, I had the rare privilege for a Muslim theologian of listening to the U.S. CentCom Commander General David Petraeus expound there on a “network of networks” that constituted a “security architecture” for our Middle East region.

(Photo: General David Petraeus addresses the U.S.-Muslim World Forum, 14 Feb 2009/Osama Faisal)

General Petraeus argued that security can only be achieved through a multi-layered and multi-faceted network of networks that involved training, tooling and equipping, information sharing, and infrastructure building.

I very much liked the talk of a network of networks and indeed agreed with the need for training, tooling, information sharing and infrastructure building. Alas, I had to keep reminding myself, while looking at the elegantly uniformed speaker, that it is a military network of networks that he was advocating and that all those nice-sounding activities pertained to matters military. It turned out that I very much liked the structure of what General Petraeus was proposing, but definitely not its content!

The training we truly need is training in compassionate dialogue between all of us and in compassionate living amongst each other. The tools and equipment we truly need are those of compassionate communication and understanding. The information sharing we truly need is the honest sharing of, and witnessing to, our loftiest ideals and values and the cooperative shedding of dark stereotypes and caricatures of others. The infrastructures we truly need to build are infrastructures of public and shared spaces in which we respectfully appreciate and cherish each other just as we stand firmly rooted in our respective traditions.

The Obama presidency does NOT need more of the same “security architecture” inherited from the destructive, divisive and corrosive years of the Bush presidencies. Rather, it urgently needs a fresh “compassion architecture” that is constructive, mending and healing. Such a compassion architecture can only be communal and cooperative. All religious, spiritual and philosophical communities, Muslims included, must contribute to it.

(Photo: Aref Ali Nayed at U.S.-Muslim World Forum, 15 Feb 2009/Sohail Nakhooda)

Compassion architecture is built on the theological fact that true security can only come from God’s own compassion towards humanity and the compassion of humans towards humans. Compassion is the condition of possibility of true security.

A Common Word, which was launched in October 2007, is an important  contribution to an alternative compassion architecture. Its signatories, whose number has since grown to 301, include Muslim scholars and thinkers of all theological schools, both genders, all ages and occupations.

The response from Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox Christians has been very  positive and several constructive conferences have already been held with them to explore our common ground. Some Jewish scholars have also made positive and encouraging comments and they will be addressed in a similar document.

For example, Muslim scholars met evangelical Christian leaders last summer at a conference at Yale University, for many the first time either had sat down to discuss faith with the other.  It was a transformative event.  The dark and twisted images Muslims and evangelicals often had of each other came tumbling down. A door for compassionate cooperation opened.

Last November, a Common Word delegation of two dozen Muslim scholars, led by Grand Mufti of Bosnia Mustafa Ceric, met Pope Benedict XVI at the Vatican and held three days of talks with leading Catholic scholars there.  The encounter was soothing and healing after the wounds of the pope’s speech in Regensburg in 2006.

(Photo: Pope Benedict and Grand Mufti Ceric at Vatican, 6 Nov 2008/Osservatore Romano)

Last month, one of Islam’s top Muslim television preachers, Amr Khaled, toured several Muslim countries including Sudan to rally tens of thousands of young people around the theme of A Common Word. The response proved overwhelmingly positive.

Initiatives such as A Common Word are giving rise to a “network of networks of compassion” with multiple nodes and growing complexity and interconnectivity. Much like the internet, this network of networks does not depend on any one node. It is robust and resilient precisely because it is so widespread and interconnected.  Compassion achitecture will rise from a wide variety of initiatives such as A Common Word coming together.

In a ‘stuck’ or ‘jammed’ world situation, A Common World hits the reset button with fresh and purified presuppositions. Now, we watch the lights come on in a fresh way, a way that may very well get our world going again. What better presuppositions to start with than Love of God and Love of Neighbor?

Reorienting and purifying intentions is the most important change to make if the Obama “change platform” is to work. Change requires a shift from self-righteous arrogance to attitudes of humility, concern for others, brokenness-before-God, compassion and understanding.

What humanity needs most today is a prophetic teaching of compassion and love. Inherent in A Common Word is a lofty, scriptures-based exhortation from which many lessons, sermons and much guidance can flow.

(Photo: Amr Khaled preaching in Sanaa, 1 July 2007/Khaled Abdullah Ali Al Mahdi)

Today we are all frightened, in one way or another, physically, politically, socially, and economically. For too many years, fear ran our lives both as actors and acted-upon. During those terrible Bush years, the generals and security agencies thrived on offering their “Security Architectures”. It is time for true change: change from fear to hope, from hate to love, from madness to sanity and from cruelty to compassion. The new day is indeed luminescent with rays of hope!

God knows best!

(Photo: Carnival revelers parade in Düsseldorf, 4 Feb 2008/Ina Fassbender)

Germany’s pre-Lenten carnival festivities got underway on Thursday with an official Turkish carnival association is joining in the fun this year for the first time.

Long sidelined from the usually raucous celebrations, an annual highpoint in Catholic areas such as the Rhineland, Bavaria and Black Forest, residents of Turkish origin in the city of Dortmund have created their own “Guild of Fools”. That means they can have their own float in Monday’s big procession, a troupe of dancers and a symbolic “prince and princess couple”.

“We set up our own association because many Turks in Germany have enjoyed carnival over the years. As an official guild, we want to enable Turks living in Germany to join in,” says the 1st Turkish Guild of Fools Dortmund 09 on their website.

(Photo: Carnival parade in Cologne, 19 Feb 2007/Alex Grimm)

These days, carnival is mainly an excuse for many Germans to parade through the streets dressed up as clowns and go on a six-day beer binge — an aspect that may be problematic for Muslims. But carnival has ancient roots. The partying grew out of the Roman tradition of celebrating the onset of spring which was later adopted by Christians to usher in Lent, the forty days preceding Easter that are a season of reflection and fasting.

In the Muslim calendar, there is no equivalent to carnival before Ramadan, the Islamic month of fasting and prayer, and the Turkish Guild is giving out mixed signals on exactly where the limits are for its members.

A spokesman has told German media the guild may look to its roots by having belly dancers but stressed that members can have just as much fun as other revellers. “Religion is important for many people at carnival and we accept that. We are not pursuing any political or Muslim goals,” he is quoted as saying, adding that alcohol and kissing are part of the fun.

However, the guild’s website says its members should celebrate carnival according to Muslim rules and do without the “sexual liberation,” alcohol or kissing.

Perhaps these contradictions highlight the difficulties faced by Germany’s more than 2 million-strong Turkish community, many of whom lead parallel lives and complain about Islamophobia among Germans.

(Photo: Düsseldorf carnival float caricatures Osama bin Laden, 4 Feb 2008/Ina Fassbender)

In Cologne, a carnival stronghold, there is strong resistance to plans to build a big mosque.

How important is it for Germany’s Turkish community to take a fuller part in German traditions like carnival that have their roots in Christian festivals? Is this taking integration too far?

(Logo from 1st Turkish Guild of Fools Dortmund 09 website)

Today is Reformation Day, the anniversary of the day in 1517 when Martin Luther nailed his famous 95 theses to the door of the church in Wittenberg in eastern Germany and set off the Protestant Reformation. It is a public holiday in the five eastern German states, in Slovenia and — this year for the first time — in Chile.

Chile? Isn’t that traditionally a Catholic country? Even the Catholic parts of Germany don’t celebrate Reformation Day.

Yes, Chile is traditionally Catholic, but now only about 70% so. Like elsewhere in Latin America, Protestant churches — especially evangelicals and Pentecostals — have spread rapidly in recent decades. They now make up just over 15% of the Chilean population, up from 7% in 1970. It’s not a new story, but creating a holiday especially for Protestants is a symbolic step towards recognising the changes in the religious landscape in Latin America.

The holiday is not officially called Reformation Day but Día Nacional de las Iglesias Evangélicas y Protestantes — National Day of the Evangelical and Protestant Churches. President Michelle Bachelet mentioned the Luther link in a speech (here in Spanish) about the new holiday, which she stressed was a sign of equality of faiths in Chile’s secular state. She also called it a form of recognition of the contribution made by the evangelical churches to national progress in all fields, of their preaching of values that enrich our existence and strengthen the culture of tolerance and respect.”

Do you think if other Latin American countries will follow Santiago’s example? Should they?

Apropos Luther, Der Spiegel has an interesting article in English about how Wittenberg — whose population is only 10% Protestant — may be in for a remake to turn it into “a true Protestant Rome” . This is part of the preparations for the 500th anniversary of Reformation Day in 2017. But Calvin Year (“Calvin09″), the 500th anniversary of John Calvin’s birth, is coming up soon and Geneva will certainly play up its claim to that title.

The synod of Roman Catholic bishops that just ended in Rome has reminded the Vatican that it wants concrete issues such as religious freedom for Christians in the Islamic world to be part of any dialogue with Muslims. It’s not as if the Vatican has forgotten this — check out a recent statement by Rev. Christian Troll S.J., a leading Church expert on Islam. All this comes as the Vatican and the Common Word group of Muslim scholars prepare for the Catholic-Islamic Forum due in Rome next week.

The full text of the bishops’ proposal (number 53 of the 55 published only in Italian) reads in English:

“The Church regards with esteem … the Muslims who worship the one God” (Nostra Aetate 3). They refer to Abraham and worship God especially through prayer, almsgiving and fasting. The dialogue with them permits us to know each other better and cooperate in the promotion of ethical and spiritual values.

“In this dialogue, the synod insists on the importance of respect for life, for the human rights of men and women, as well as for the distinction between the socio-political order and the religious order in the promotion of justice and peace in the world. Another important issue in this dialogue will be reciprocity and the freedom of conscience and religion.

“It is suggested that the national bishops’ conferences, where it is deemed useful, create groups to promote dialogue between Christians and Muslims.”

These issues touch the practical side of what the Catholics want out of this exchange with Muslim scholars. For their part, some Muslim participants have been saying they feel some urgency about showing some concrete improvements to their communities. The Common Word dialogue is very much focused on theological level of dialogue, but practical considerations are never far away.

Item: reports from Saudi Arabia say King Abdullah may go to the United Nations in mid-November to discuss his interfaith dialogue campaign. This would be a follow-up to the meeting he hosted in Madrid back in July. This effort seems aimed at promoting better inter-faith understanding at the official or diplomatic level, which is another way to approach the issue.

Christian churches have been taking stock of where they stand on dialogue with Islam. With so much interfaith discussion going on, they’re not all singing from the same sheet and wonder whether they should (or even could). So about 50 church leaders and experts got together near Geneva last weekend to exchange information on their approach to, and experiences concerning, dialogue with Muslims. “With such a succession of meetings where we get together with Muslims, we wanted to have a meeting among ourselves and ask whether we have 2,000 different answers and what that might say about us,” said Thomas Schirrmacher of the World Evangelical Alliance (WEA).

The World Council of Churches (WCC) said the idea for the meeting“emerged from an ecumenical process of response to the Common Word”  initiative on Christian-Muslim dialogue. Held outside Geneva, it brought together representatives from the WCC, World Evangelical Alliance, Roman Catholic Church, Anglican Communion, Lutheran World Federation, World Alliance of Reformed Churches, World Methodist Council, several Orthodox churches and other Christian groups. I have spoken to a few of the participants and received some texts since the meeting to get an idea of how their exchange shaped up.

“The idea was that we come together to share our different experiences with Islam and our different theological approaches to Islam to seek an ecumenical understanding,” said Rima Barsoum, the WCC’s person responsible for relations with Muslims. An “ecumenical understanding” does not mean a common understanding, as became clear at the meeting. Participants described various points of view that no two-day meeting could overcome. Orthodox and eastern churches that live as minorities in Muslim countries have a different perspective from those in the West that know Muslims as a minority. The Vatican’s approach is to focus more on the theological questions while the World Evangelical Alliance has stressed the issue of living together peacefully. “My feeling after Geneva is that there is such a wide spectrum of representation that a common stand would be very difficult indeed,” said David Thomas, professor of Christianity and Islam at the University of Birmingham in Britain.

Catholicos Aram I, the Beirut-based head of the Armenian Apostolic Church(See of Cilicia), displayed that view of minority Christians in the Middle East in his opening speech. “The prevailing misperceptions, ambiguities, polarisations, tensions and collision (of values between Muslims and Christians), hijacked and sharpened by politico-ideological agendas and geo-political strategies, can be transformed only through a shared life in community,”he said. Josiah Atkins Idowu-Fearon, former Anglican bishop of Kaduna, gave a run-down on the often tense relations between Christians and Muslims in Nigeria: “Our biggest problem is that of ignorance: both communities are ignorant of their religion and that of their neighbour.”

Rev. Dan Madigan S.J.warned in his presentation against trying to fit the Abrahamic religions into a standard schema with pre-determined categories. This often leads to parallels between the Koran and the Bible or Mohammad and Jesus, he said, but this was a category mistake. “The most important common belief our traditions share is that the Word of God has been spoken in our world — the eternal divine word that is the essence of God,” he said. However, Jews hear the word of God in the Torah and rabbinic reflection and study. Muslims hear it in the Koran. “For Christians, on the other hand, God’s word is spoken primarily, not in words, but in the flesh … What Jesus is for the Christian, the Koran (not Mohammad) is for Muslims. What Mohammad is for Muslims (the human channel through which the word of God entered the world), Mary could be said to be for Christians. Of course, that Mary role does not exhaust the reality of who Mohammad is for Muslims.”

Rev. Peter Colwell of Churches Together in Britain and Ireland told me Madigan’s comments were “quite a revelatory observation for many participants. I think you’ve got to come out of the Catholic or Orthodox tradition to actually see that.” BTW Colwell has produced a short guide to the Common Word as “a resource for churches and individuals who wish to explore these issues more deeply and who wish take the opportunity the letter affords to develop local inter-faith relations.”

Schirrmacher said several church representatives asked him why the World Evangelical Alliance gave such a quick and positive reply to the Common Word invitation to dialogue while issuing quite a critical note analysing the content of the Common Word statement. “There’s a simple answer,” he said. “The WEA was founded in 1854 on the issue of freedom of religion. For us, agreeing on content and sitting down under the roof of religious freedom to live together peacefully are two different issues. We could sign on immediately to this peace offer — which is what it is, they’re saying they want to live peacefully with Christians in the world –- without taking much time to think about which consequences that may have for the Trinity or whatever. This is tougher for the Catholic Church because they have not conducted the dialogue politically, but from the basis of having the same God and wanting to talk about theological issues. The Orthodox churches, which have always been minority churches and persecuted, had no problem with the evangelical approach because the theological and political issues are separate for them.”

A second meetingwas held in Mechelen near Brussels in mid-week, this time with Muslims. Some church delegates went directly from one meeting to the other. This one was less focused on interfaith dialogue as such, but did mention in its final statement: “As Muslims and Christians we call for mutual learning through opening up of mosques and churches to visitors from other communities and also to learning through engagement of people. This includes scholarly encounter and academic interaction. We need to get into the spirit of religions, as well as their outer clothing. We pledge ourselves to avoid generalisations about the other.”

“We need to get into the spirit of religions, as well as their outer clothing…” – that’s an interesting way of putting it.

The Christian-Muslim dialogue trains continues to roll. The next stop is the Vatican on November 4 and 5, when about 25 signatories of the Common Word will meet Pope Benedict, Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran and other interfaith experts of the Roman Catholic Church.

Over 275 congregations from across the faith spectrum and all corners of America will display banners this month condemning torture. The campaign is the brain child of the National Religious Campaign Against Torture (NRCAT) which groups over 190 religious groups.

President George W. Bush in March vetoed legislation passed by Congress that would have banned the CIA from using waterboarding and other controversial
interrogation techniques that critics say is torture, making the issue a political as well as moral one in this election year.

Presumptive Republican presidential nominee John McCain — who was tortured while a prisoner of war in Vietnam — has strongly condemned water-boarding and has been the author of previous anti-torture legislation, winning praise from centrist U.S. evangelicals among others. But he did not support the legislation vetoed by Bush on the grounds that it was too sweeping.

The banner campaign is one of inter-faith cooperation drawing Islamic, Jewish and Christian congregations and others. The issue is an emotive one but also clearly one where folks of different faiths find common ground.

(Photo credit: Reuters, Emma Goh, Cambodia, dec 2, 2007)

This could be very interesting … or maybe a flop. Islam Channel, a British Muslim TV channel broadcast on satellite and webcasts, plans to host a weekly religion quiz show called “Faith Off” from mid-June. It’s meant to promote better understanding among religions by pitting teams from different faiths against each other. As the Guardian’s religion correspondent Riazat Butt put it, the show will pit “Jews against Muslims, Sikhs against Christians and Hindus against Buddhists, with contestants competing for cash prizes.” Sounds like an interesting idea, but I don’t know if it will make great TV.

Like all quiz shows, its success will depend on how well it’s presented, how interesting the questions are and how knowledgable the contestants are. But one of the recurring religion stories you see is the survey about how little many people know about their own religion. In fact, they’re hardly news anymore.

So I wonder how well contestants will do even with questions about their own faith, let alone anything dealing with another religion. And what about issues where there are differences of opinion within one religion? If the producers weed out all the difficult and contentious questions, is there enough left to make a lively and challenging show?