CHRISTIANS who dismiss other faiths as idol-worship with no spiritual depth are breaking the Ten Commandments, says a report published last week.
Generous Love, written by the Anglican Communion Network for Inter Faith Concerns, has been sent to every diocesan bishop in the Communion.
A foreword by the Archbishop of Canterbury says that dialogue with other faiths is “imperative”.
The report warns against under-estimating non-Christian faiths because, it says, the Bible, the basis of Anglican theology, was formed by people who lived among many different religions.
Reading the Bible alongside people of different faiths brought it to life. “Hearing the stark imperative that ‘you shall not bear false witness against your neighbour’, and recognising the spiritual profundity of parts of the Hindu scriptures, we can ponder how we collude with a distorted view of the other if we dismiss Hinduism as merely polytheistic idolatry,” the report says.
It was also “profoundly humbling” to read the Bible alongside Muslims. And Anglicans, called to “read, mark, learn and inwardly digest” the scriptures, could find themselves challenged by the Buddhist tradition of “prolonged and intense attention” to internalise the sutras.
Also, if Christians wanted to understand themselves properly, they need to have a right understanding of their relationship with Judaism, the report said.
The approach of Anglicans to interfaith issues was “to place at the centre of our experience a deep, strong and Christlike friendship with people of other faiths”.
Other religions were no longer “against us”, “but present to us and us to them, human beings whose energy connects with ours and ours with theirs, those who are fellow guests in God’s house with us.”
“The spaces in which we meet one another do not ultimately belong to host or guest; they belong to God, as do the so-called ‘neutral’ spaces of public life. None of the places, situations or societies where we meet and greet are the exclusive territory of any one group; they are entrusted by God to be shared by everyone, since all humans are made in God’s image.”
Generous Love: the truth of the Gospel and the call to dialogue, an Anglican theology of inter faith relations, published by the Anglican Consultative Council, St Andrews House, 16 Tavistock Crescent, London W11 1AP. £2.50 inc. pp or free from www.nifcom.anglicancommunion.org/documents/index.cfm
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