Below is some of my initial written correspondence with Bob Donaldson, a PC(USA) elder who helped develop the Abrahamic Heritage overture coming to the 217th General Assembly of the PC(USA). That overture is an attempt to establish a basis for dialogue between Christians, Jews, and Muslims. PFR does not support the overture in its current form, and you can see our official views by reading our advice on that overture at www.GA2006.com.  Bob wrote to me, responding to PFR’s advice on the overture, and that started a nice little dialogue of our own.  Bob and I both thought the rest of the church might benefit from seeing our correspondence.Please keep in mind that, for both of us, these are quickly-written letters about a serious subject. They were not word-smithed or edited. And we are barely scratching the surface.  This post contains two of Bob’s letters, and one of mine (in between his). My response to Bob’s second letter is in a second post.  I encourage you to post comments on the second post and discuss this issue, peacefully and honestly!  What do you think the General Assembly should do? And why?

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Bob’s letter, which he wrote after reading PFR’s Advice on the Abrahamic Heritage overture he developed:

Dear Michael,

I read the thoughtful position paper on the Overture.  However, I think that it misses the point in the fourth paragraph.

As I read it, the Overture is addressing the who we worship, not the how.  If we get into the how, it will become a futile effort.

Just as you and I represent ourselves to be Christians, I sincerely doubt that, if we had time to explore how you and I worship, we would be in complete agreement.  Does this mean that we are not to be counted as members of Christ’s flock?

Also, if all three religions profess one true God, how can there be a difference?

Pope Pius II (1458-64) had occasion to write to Ottoman Sultan Muhammad II (Also known as Mehmet the Conqueror, 1451-81).  At one point in the part of the letter dealing with religious questions, the Pope wrote:

“There are many points of Agreement between Christians and Muslims: one God, the creator of the world; a belief in the necessity for faith; a future life of rewards and punishments; the imortality of the sould; the common use of the Old and New Testament; all this is common ground. We only differ about the nature of God.” (R.W Southern, “Western Views of Islam in the Middle Ages” [Harvard Univ. Press., 1962], p. 99, also cited in Rollin Armour, “Islam, Christianity, and the West: A Troubled History [Orbis Books, 2002], pp. 109-110).

As Presbyterians, why can’t we at least move to try to establish a basis for dialog with our Muslim bretheren?

There is no doubt that the wording of the Overture can be improved.  Wouldn’t that be better than rejecting it out of hand.  We desperately need to establish a basis of dialog and need to be careful that we don’t diminish our faith in doing so.

I will appreciate your comments.

Yours in Christ,

Bob Donaldson

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My Response to Bob’s letter:

Dear Bob,

This is a difficult subject and, like you, I believe it is one that requires a good deal of our attention, and that we need to make every effort to establish a good basis for dialogue with Muslims (and Jews).  I think the best thing for us to do would be to have a conversation about this. But let me offer a few brief comments in response to your earlier note.

The two things you indicated  as being different about Muslims and Christians are extremely important things that are at the very center of the Christian faith, namely the “how” of worship (through Christ) and the nature of God (as the Father of our Lord Jesus). De-centralize these, and we are no longer Christian.  So the question for me is, how can we, as Christians, engage in peaceful dialogue with Muslims? 

I am convinced that the answer is not to say that Muslims, too, worship the God and Father of Jesus, like we do. In fact, for Muslims who take their faith seriously, that would be rather offensive, far from a good basis for peaceful dialogue. That platform for inter-religious dialogue has been tried, and it was found to be based on a peculiarly Western and modern (and many would say “liberal”) understanding of the nature of religious belief, namely that we are all groping after the same thing (”God”) but in different ways or forms and with different holy books arising from different cultures, etc. We are all basically the same, “unity and harmony,” and the form of our religious beliefs ought not separate us.

It has seemed to many, and I think rightly so, that such an approach is ironically rather imperialistic — imposing secular and modern Western assumptions about the nature of religious belief onto those who genuinely believe that God (or Allah) has discernibly revealed himself in a very distinctive way, i.e. orthodox believers don’t think we are groping in the dark and have invented our own forms, but that God has shown us how and through whom to worship.  In other words, this older platform for inter-religious dialogue doesn’t respect orthodox Christians or orthodox Muslims (and most Christians and most Muslims are orthodox, in the sense intended here).

The other, more fruitful approach would be to respect our differences and admit that our differences, while not preventing us from proselytizing each other, ought to prevent us from killing each other. This is admittedly easier for Christians, because the teachings of Jesus lend themselves to peace more readily than some dominant strands of the Koran, but many Muslims do tell me that they believe their orthodox faith leads them to peaceful co-existence with us [note: see my clarification of this comment in the next post].  And so we talk about differences peacefully, rather than denying our differences as an attempt to be peaceful.

I guess I’m just saying here that peace begins with respect of the other, and respect of the other means respecting the other’s differences, rather than making presumptions that may turn out to be more harmful than helpful.

Those are my off the cuff thoughts at least.

God bless you brother.

Michael Walker

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Bob’s Response:

Michael,

Thank you for your interesting reply.

I certainly agree with your first premise, “that we need to make every effort to establish a good basis for dialog with Muslims (and Jews).” It behooves all of us to focus on establishing a dialog in good faith.  Given that, where do we begin?

I firmly believe that Overture 40 is the place to start.  Why?  Because endorsement by the PCUSA of its premises provides a credential that will:
    - underline our sincerity,
    - indicate that we are being proactive in promoting peace, and
    - provide a vehicle to initiate dialog on a broader basis.

I am a bit puzzled by your term, “de-centralize” in the second paragraph.  Perhaps you can clarify that.  And, in particular, how that concept would result in our no longer being Christians.  “Who can separate us from the love of Christ?”

How can we suggest that Muslims, by worshiping the same God that we do, are not, in fact, worshiping the Father of Jesus Christ?  Certainly they recognize that this is the case.  They acclaim that Allah is the Father of all.  They just don’t accept the divinity of Jesus.  Why does any dialog for creating peace with Muslims have to dwell on this difference?  It seems to me that the intent of Overture 40 [Abrahamic Heritage] is to get past that difference.  In my dialogs with Muslims (and there are numerous ones in progress), they have discussed this difference and do not take offense.  Moreover, they continually stress that they accept Jesus as a prophet and point to Surah XIX Maryam (Mary) in the Qur’an that is about the mother of Jesus.

Rather than making assumptions about the nature of religious belief where opinions may vary drastically (as you and I are discovering), the Overture emphasizes points on which there is total agreement; orthodoxy is not an issue.

Finally, a look at history does not show that “Christians” have been peaceful.  If it is so easy, and if your Muslim friends tell you - as mine tell me - that their faith leads them to peaceful co-existance with us, then the passage of the Overture will send them a strong signal that we believe that too.  What a great foundation to build on!

The downside consequences of not approving the Overture are something that I do not even want to contemplate.

I assume that you will be in Birmingham.  I wish that I was going to be there to meet you, to continue this interesting dialog in person and to see how this all plays out.

I will look forward to your further comments.

Yours in Christ,

Bob

For my response to Bob’s letter, see part two of this series on the Abrahamic Heritage correspondence.