All history as reconstruction of the past is of course myth

via Ruth Gledhill

PS: Click this link to read his lecture at London School of Economics. Quite interesting!

Here are a couple of extracts from the video; not! from the lecture!

‘Certainly the way in which western democracies currently operate – one need only look at the enormous time, attention and money devoted to an entire year’s worth of electioneering in the USA, not to mention the fact that, though the new President of the USA will have effective power over the whole world, it’s only Americans who get to vote – calls into sharp question the normal western assumption of recent years, that if only we could export more western-style democracy to more parts of the world all problems would be solved. I believe, on the contrary, that as the Archbishop said about law, human dignity and shared goods and priorities, so it is with democracy. Democracies, like all other rulers, need to be called to account, as Kofi Annan said in his retirement speech, both in what they actually do and in what they actually are.’

‘This stand-off between secularism and fundamentalism takes many forms. There is, for example, the well-known fresh attack on religious belief of all sorts launched in the name of empirical science by Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, Sam Harris and others. I say ‘in the name of’, but actually the rhetoric used by those three goes way beyond empirical science itself and into the realm of good old-fashioned mud-slinging. Just as the media refused last week to engage with what the Archbishop actually said, so Dawkins and others refuse to engage with real theologians, not to mention real communities of faith that are making a real difference at places where the world is in deep pain, a pain which the great advances of science have if anything exacerbated (through weapons technology and the like) rather than alleviated. Just as European science in the nineteenth century was anything but politically neutral, but must be understood within the Enlightenment-based projects of imperial and technological expansion, leading inexorably to the First World War, so the present anti-religious scientific protests must be understood within the multivalent culture of late modernity.’

‘I now have a threefold proposal. (i) The confusions we have observed are indications of an increasing instability which has generated the present stand-off between secularism and fundamentalism, as the two sides in the Deist divide now perceive themselves as fighting for their lives against a suddenly awakened foe. (ii) The chilly winds of postmodernity, blowing their deconstructive gales through the entire eighteenth-century settlement, are threatening the Enlightenment systems themselves and the secularism and fundamentalism to which they often seem reduced. (iii) Out of this postmodern moment there might yet emerge, as the Archbishop has been suggesting, new paths towards a wise and civil society in which the genuine values for which the Enlightenment was striving can be preserved and enhanced while the excesses to which it has given rise can be avoided.’

‘Establishment’ is a way of recognising that we are still essentially a Christian country, both in the sense that our history and culture have been decisively shaped by the Christian faith and life and in the sense that at the last census over 70% called themselves ‘Christian’. As the Archbishop said last Monday, this means that the ‘established’ church has a special responsibility to take thought for, and speak up for, the small minorities, and to ensure that they are not squashed between an unthinking church and an uncaring secular state. Hence his perfectly proper concern for the particular sensitivities of Muslims, as indeed of Jews and others. And most Church of England leaders would insist today that if some way could be found to share our ‘Established’ status with our great sister churches, we would be delighted. But let’s not fool ourselves. To give up ‘Establishment’ now would be to collude with that secularism which postmodernity has cheerfully and rightly deconstructed. Rather, the challenge ought to be to make it work for the benefit of the whole society. To aim at that would be to work with the grain both of the Christian gospel itself and of the deep roots of our own society and traditions.’

Dear Friends,
The astonishing misrepresentation of Archbishop Rowan in virtually all newspapers over the last few days, and the scorn and anger which this has fuelled, have caused many people within the church to ask what on earth is going on. The issues are complex, but let me try to highlight the key points. Obviously it would be good for people to read the whole lecture, which is available on line at his website together with further clarification.

There will shortly be an excellent summary and discussion of the whole issue by Andrew Goddard available on the Fulcrum website.

I’m sorry that this message will probably get to you too late for inclusion in Sunday morning worship, but I hope it will help the conversations that many of you will undoubtedly have in the next few days.
First, the lecture which +Rowan gave was the start of a series organised by and for the legal profession, about the nature of law. He was not making a public statement about his belief in Jesus (people have asked me ‘why doesn’t he speak about Jesus?’ and the answer is ‘he does, a great deal of the time, but this wasn’t that sort of occasion’). He was addressing some of the most serious and far-reaching questions which face us both in Britain and throughout western culture, and was doing so with the sensitivity and intellectual rigour which the occasion, and his audience, rightly demanded. We should be grateful that we have an Archbishop capable of such work, not demand that his every word be instantly comprehensible by the casual uninformed onlooker. If I ask someone to fix my car, or my computer, I don’t expect to understand everything they say about the technicalities; rather, I’m glad someone out there knows what’s going on and can do what’s necessary.
Second, the fundamental issue he was addressing is the relation between the law of the land and the religious conscience of the citizen. For 200 years it has been assumed that these operated in separate spheres: the law regulates my public life, faith or religion operate in private. This was always a dangerous half-truth, since many of the great world faiths, including Christianity itself, actually claim that all of life is included within religious obedience. As some of us used to be taught, if Jesus is not Lord of all, he is not Lord at all. In recent years various governments, including our own, have pushed the other way, to suggest that the secular state is itself master of all of life, including religious conviction. That’s why we’ve seen an airline worker sacked for wearing a cross, while in France the government has tried similarly to ban Muslim women from wearing their traditional head-covering. Because we haven’t had to address these issues before, our society has tended to slide round them by emphasizing words like ‘multiculturalism’, which often doesn’t actually mean that we celebrate our different cultures but rather that we subordinate them all to whatever the secular state wants. That is as much a problem for Catholic adoption agencies, as we saw last year, as it is for Muslims who want to follow their traditional teaching about (for instance) the prohibition of interest on loans while living within a society where the mortgage system is endemic. +Rowan was going to the roots of these problems and coming up not only with fresh analysis but fresh solutions, particularly what he calls ‘interactive pluralism’. The question of how we live together as a civil and wise society while cherishing different faiths is a deep and serious one and can’t be pushed away just because people take fright at certain misunderstandings. His point was precisely that neither the secular state nor any particular religion can ‘monopolise’.
Third, +Rowan was very clear in his lecture to rule out exactly those points which the screaming tabloids have assumed he was affirming. We all know the standard images of Sharia law – beatings, beheadings, oppression of women, etc. He distanced himself completely from all that, though you’d never know it from the media. He knows, just as well as do his critics, that Sharia is complex, that it varies from place to place, that it demands interpretation, and so on. His point was, rather, that there are some elements of Muslim law which can and should be accommodated within our legal structures. Ironically, Gordon Brown, who was quick to offer a knee-jerk rejection against the lecture, himself altered the law last year to enable devout Muslims to obtain mortgages. That’s the kind of thing +Rowan was advocating in similar spheres.
Fourth, it does now appear that +Rowan was ill-advised to go on ‘The World at One’ before his lecture was given and to say things about Sharia law which only really made the sense they did within the context of the larger, careful argument which he gave that evening. Even within the lecture there might have been ways of saying what needed to be said. Perhaps, as some Muslims themselves have found, it might be better to avoid the ‘Sharia’ word altogether, because of its extremely negative image in this country. (Think, by the way, of what the word ‘Christian’ means in a country that has been bombed to bits by the ‘Christian’ west.)
Fifth, what the whole sorry affair highlights is that our society is extremely touchy not only about Islam (and not only because of terrorism), but also about the whole, normally unspoken, set of assumptions about society, law, culture, freedom and religion by which we have operated. We live at a time of massive cultural change, and we shouldn’t be surprised that attempts to understand what’s going on and do something about it are deeply threatening. This is somewhat like what happens when a couple are having their first session with a marriage guidance counsellor after years of unspoken puzzlement, and find some of the questions threatening. But unless we can ask the difficult questions, and try to address them wisely and maturely, we will drift into worse problems by far.
Sixth, therefore, as you pray for +Rowan through all of this, pray too for wise and reasoned discourse to emerge, in which the key points he made are allowed to stand out and function as signposts in the murky world of our present public life. And please pray for all of us who will be in Synod this week, and for me as I give a lecture at the London School of Economics this coming Thursday night, on ‘God in Public’. I didn’t know how apposite it was going to be.
Warmest greetings and prayers

+Tom

Source

From Chiesa.

An open letter signed by 138 representatives from all Muslim schools to Pope Benedict XVI and other Christian leaders.

Indeed, this is a historic statement, and it deserves to get published.

To read the letter, click here (from The Cambridge Inter-Faith Programme).

One of the signatories is Dr Aref Ali Nayed, a senior adviser at the Cambridge Inter-faith Programme at Cambridge University. For more information, click here.

Jazak Allah Khair, Aref Ali Nayed.

Probably the most important contribution of German converts to Muslim life in Germany is their demand for German-language services and lectures in mosques. Today, to my knowledge, only seven of over 90 mosques or praying rooms in Berlin rely mainly on the German language. In these mosques, German converts to Islam are very active.

…

Most practicing Muslims do not like the phrase “German Islam” because they promote the understanding that there is only one Islam. Yet, if German Islam means embracing this religion in a way that fits German culture and daily life, converts to Islam are at the forefront of creating this formula.

….

Apart from their contributions to the life of Muslim communities, German converts are living proof that Germany is moving towards being a well-integrated society. In Germany, many politicians talk about “non-integrated immigrants.” Needless to say, integration is inevitably a two-way street. When two parties have true contact, both of them will find themselves transformed in the process.

Source

Jazak Allah Khair Manas and iMuslim

“Seek Peace and Pursue it.” (1 Peter 3:11)

(The cover is from nature, Volume 425 Number 6957 pp435-543)

You don’t know how relieved I was to read this document.

Here is another document, Alliance of Civilizations, debunking the ‘Clash of Civilizations’ thesis.

Some extracts from the report:

4.4 The partition of Palestine by the United Nations in 1947, envisaging the establishment of two states - Palestine and Israel - with a special status for Jerusalem, led to the establishment of the state of Israel in 1948, beginning a chain of events that continues to be one of the most tortuous in relations between Western and Muslim societies. Israel’s continuing occupation of Palestinian and other Arab territories and the unresolved status of Jerusalem - a holy city for Muslims and Christians as well as Jews – have persisted with the perceived acquiescence of Western governments and thus are primary causes of resentment and anger in the Muslim world toward Western nations. This occupation has been perceived in the Muslim world as a form of colonialism and has led many to believe, rightly or wrongly, that Israel is in collusion with “the West”. These resentments and perceptions were further exacerbated by Israel’s disproportionate retaliatory actions in Gaza and Lebanon.

4.5 In another critical context, the Middle East emerged as a vital source of energy crucial for prosperity and power. Cold War powers vied for influence in the strategic and resource rich countries of the region, often in the form of military and political interventions that contributed to stunting those countries’ development and eventually backfired on the powerful countries with repercussions that continue to be felt today. One of these events was the 1953 coup in Iran, the aftermath of which demonstrated both the limitations and the dangers of foreign interference in a country’s political development.

4.6 The Soviet invasion and occupation of Afghanistan in 1979 opened another line of confrontation. As part of the Western policy of supporting religious opposition to contain Communism, the US and its allies, including some Muslim governments in the region, bolstered the Afghan resistance - the “mujahedin” - eventually forcing the Soviet retreat in 1989. After a period of instability, the Taliban regime seized control of the country and supported Al Qaeda, fomenting deep hostility against the West and setting in motion a chain of events which were to scar the start of the new Millennium.

4.7 The terrorist attacks perpetrated by Al Qaeda on the United States in September 2001 drew near universal condemnation irrespective of religion or politics and demonstrated the depth of this extremist group’s hostility. They provoked a forceful retaliation against the Taliban regime in Afghanistan. Later, these attacks were presented as one of the justifications for the invasion of Iraq, whose link with them has never been established, feeding a perception among Muslim societies of unjust aggression stemming from the West.

4.8 In the context of relations between Muslim and Western societies, the perception of double standards in the application of international law and the protection of human rights is particularly acute. Reports of collective punishment, targeted killings, torture, arbitrary detention, renditions, and the support of autocratic regimes contribute to an increased sense of vulnerability around the globe, particularly in Muslim countries, and to a perception of Western double standards. Assertions that Islam is inherently violent and related statements by some political and religious leaders in the West – including the use of terms such as “Islamic terrorism” and “Islamic fascism” - have contributed to an alarming increase in Islamophobia which further exacerbates Muslim fears of the West.

4.9 Conversely, violent attacks targeting civilian populations in the West, including suicide bombings, kidnappings, and torture, have led to an atmosphere of suspicion, insecurity and fear in the West. Many in the West also perceive double standards on the part of Muslim leaders. Indeed, while Western military operations are widely condemned by Muslims, this is not the case with intra-Muslim conflicts. Sectarian violence between Shias and Sunnis in certain Muslim countries and the atrocities committed against civilians in Darfur, for instance, has not led to widespread condemnation in the Muslim world.

4.10 These reciprocal perceptions of double standards contribute to the climate of suspicion and mistrust that undermines relations between Muslim and Western societies.”

and:

5.1 With regard to relations between Muslim and Western societies, we must acknowledge the contemporary realities that shape the views of millions of Muslims: the prolonged Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the violence in Afghanistan, and the increasingly violent conflict in Iraq.

5.2 We must stress the increasing urgency of the Palestinian issue, which is a major factor in the widening rift between Muslim and Western societies. In this regard, it is our duty to express our collective opinion that without a just, dignified, and democratic solution based on the will of all peoples involved in this conflict, all efforts – including recommendations contained in this report – to bridge this gap and counter the hostilities among societies are likely to meet with only limited success.

5.3 Our emphasis on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is not meant to imply that it is the overt cause of all tensions between Muslim and Western societies. Other factors also create resentment and mistrust, including the spiraling crisis in Iraq, the continued instability in Afghanistan, issues internal to Muslim societies, as well as terrorist attacks on civilian populations in many countries. Nevertheless, it is our view that the Israeli– Palestinian issue has taken on a symbolic value that colors cross-cultural and political relations among adherents of all three major monotheistic faiths well beyond its limited geographic scope.

5.4 Achieving a just and sustainable solution to this conflict requires courage and a bold vision of the future on the part of Israelis, Palestinians and all countries capable of influencing the situation. We firmly believe that progress on this front rests on the recognition of both the Palestinian and Jewish national aspirations and on the establishment of two fully sovereign and independent states living side by side in peace and security.

5.5 Reaching this objective will require Israel not only to accept but to facilitate the establishment of a viable Palestinian state. The peace accords involving Israel, Egypt and Jordan demonstrate that such constructive steps taken in line with international law are workable. Moreover, the terms of reference agreed to by all parties at the Madrid Conference in 1991, the peace initiative by President Clinton in 2000, and the peace proposal by the Arab League in its meeting in Beirut, Lebanon in 2002, make it clear that the framework for a broad-based accord does exist and the political will can be generated.”