Diocesan News
‘New book catapults us into the diverse Ireland we live in today’
Archbishop launches 8th Braemor Studies book
Our society can too easily allow itself to become self–polarising, enabling the majority to exclude, confine and restrict ‘The Other’, the Archbishop of Dublin, the Most Revd Dr Michael Jackson, said at a book launch yesterday evening (Wednesday March 14). Speaking at the launch of Generous Love in Multi–Faith Ireland by Suzanne Cousins in the Church of Ireland Theological Institute in Dublin, the Archbishop said Inter Faith understanding and engagement in Ireland had a long way to go. However, he said there were many examples in the Church of Ireland of positive Inter Faith engagement.
Also speaking at the launch was Shaykh Dr Umar Al–Qadri, the Head Imam of Al–Mustafa Islamic Education & Cultural Centre Ireland. He said that while Islam is 1,400 years old and Christianity is over 2,000 years old, they have yet to reach a stage of full peace and understanding of each other. But things are changing and he said Muslims are encouraged to engage in positive inter–faith dialogue.
Generous Love in Multi–faith Ireland: Towards mature citizenship and a positive pedagogy for the Church of Ireland in local Christian–Muslim mission and engagement is published by Church of Ireland Press and is the eighth in CITI’s ‘Braemor Studies’ series. The aim of the book, the author says is “to identify hindrances to Christian–Muslim engagement in Church of Ireland parishes and dioceses, with a view to stimulating the future development of a contextualised teaching resource on Christian–Muslim engagement for use by clergy and laity in the Church’s changing mission context. The envisioned pedagogy is a practical, Bible–based resource, in which all members of the Church can be confident, enabling the Church to have a positive praxis of intentional presence, generous engagement, witness and service towards its Muslim neighbours”.
Archbishop Jackson said there are many reasons why people should be engaged in Inter Faith understanding and there are many reasons why people resist it. Quoting the Director of the Church of Ireland Centre in DCU, Professor Anne Lodge, he said diversity in Ireland is bedevilled by ‘the containment of contamination’.
“The way the model works is that those who hold power at any given time tend to use that power not to expand the open pasture of inclusion but to exclude and to confine and to restrict The Other. Such restriction means that the very voice and contribution of The Other to civic life and civic values begins to look irrelevant and in turn becomes impossible. The wilful exclusion of pertinent and factual information about The Other may give us that swelling feeling of not being contaminated. But that same feeling pushes our backs into a wall. It is a wall built of the bricks of self–imposed limitation that truncates our development of understanding and freezes our experience of generosity. And generosity is a two–way street,” he explained.
Archbishop Jackson said that Ms Cousins makes the point that incomprehension breeds insecurity and that our fallacy is that we can use ignorance to copperfasten certainty. He highlighted her invitation to engage in partnerships of difference. But she says dialogue is not an end in itself stating: “dialogue is like baptism – we step in, but we have to get out or we rot”. He said that the book invites the Church of Ireland to have a look at its Anglican self and asks questions about the relationship between mission and Inter Faith encounter. He added that the book catapults us into the religious world in which we live in Ireland in its diversity, complexity and humanity of encounter.
In response, Dr Al–Qadri said that Generous Love in Multi–faith Ireland is an important piece of research work, adding that the issue of Muslim Christian relations is highly topical. He said that Muslims and Christians account for between 60 and 70 percent of the world’s people and imagined a world where there could be peace (which he said largely exists) and mutual understanding between the people of the two faiths. “These two communities could lead around the world in a movement of peace and understanding,” he commented. “Unfortunately, even though Islam is 1,400 years old and Christianity is even older, we have not reached that stage yet.”
Dr Al–Qadri said there is Scriptural encouragement for Inter Faith engagement and the Prophet Muhammad engaged with diversity and with Christians. Similarly the parables of Jesus also encouraged Inter Faith engagement.
“The Church of Ireland has chosen this book which is an encouragement to me as an Islamic theologian. It says loudly that it is important to engage with the Muslim community. The same is happening in the Muslim community… There is a lot to do and we need to do much more.” he said announcing that he too has a book coming out focusing on the Islamic primary sources which encourage engagement with diversity and pluralism. “We look forward to working together with the Church of Ireland and other communities for a better, more peaceful island,” he concluded.
Ms Cousins said that the book was written for the Church of Ireland and starts with the question – ‘What is the Spirit saying to us?’. “It encourages listening. So, I pray that the book will help us in the Church to abandon fear, listen and learn from earlier voices such as that of Elie Wiesel, who spoke of the perils of indifference. Indifference in inter–faith matters is surely not an option for us who models our lives and mission on that of Jesus Christ,” she said. “We can learn from each other, from what each diocese and individual parishes are doing to promote good relations and understanding and to challenge the negative narratives of fear, suspicion and non–love that are common in our society.”
She said that the publication of the book was not the end of a process of research and writing but the birth of a new chapter of creative engagement on the ground. For her and her parishioners in North East Donegal, that means new projects to help welcome resettled Syrian refugee families through Failte Isteach and family befriending.
Representing the General Synod Literature Committee, Dr Kenneth Milne said that the Church of Ireland must contribute to the public discourse. “That means that people must write and they must be published,” he stated, adding that Church of Ireland Press had a role to play in that.
Generous Love in Multi–faith Ireland is available through the Church of Ireland’s online bookstore at https://store.ireland.anglican.org/store/product/142/generous-love-in-multifaith-ireland and through the Book Well in Belfast for €6/£5.
The Archbishop’s full address is available here.
For further information please contact:
Diocesan Communications Officer, Dublin & Glendalough
087 235 6472
Mrs Lynn Glanville
dcodublin@gmail.com