Is Interfaith Cooperation Possible?

[GuestFellow]

My hopes and prayers would be for some kind of interfaith cooperation, whereby Muslims, Christians, Hindu and all others could work together.

Hi Eric,

I think Interfaith Cooperation is possible. In order to achieve this, it is best to focus on what these religious group have in common rather than differences. It is difficult because within these religious groups, there is some conflict. For example, in the Muslim community, we have some Muslims racist to other Muslims and put nationalism first.

It is possible to have people from different religious beliefs working together but at the same time, to overcome the problems within these religious groups.

 

[Eric H]

Greetings and peace be with you siam

tango

are you not filled with pride and arrogance?---Islam calls us to humility to do God's will. This means to understand and keep in mind that God is all-powerful and all-knowing. Therefore, if God wants to spread Islam there is nothing human beings can do about it and if God wants to spread other than Islam, there is nothing human beings can do about it either. Our duty is to do God's will and leave the rest in his hands. And God's will is to have right belief that promotes right intentions that create right actions for the benefit of all of God's creations. If you cannot trust in God, you don't have right belief---only pride and arrogance.

Remember----God is Unity.

What an amazing response, and Street Pastors is very much about putting aside our own differences, and trusting in God. I believe we do about one percent, we just put our trust in God, and God does the rest. When we hand over all our trust to God, I experience a peace that transcends all my understanding, especially in time when I should feel fear and anxiety in times of confrontation.

Blessings and peace be with you

Eric

 

[Muslim Woman]

Salaam

just to clarify, muslims are allowed to help non muslims in a worldly sense but not make prayer for them

Salaam; as long as non -Muslims are alive , Muslims are allowed to pray for them . If one dies without repentance for associating partner with God , then it's forbidden to pray for his/her salvation.

And God Almighty knows Best.

 

[tango92]

Salaam




Salaam; as long as non -Muslims are alive , Muslims are allowed to pray for them . If one dies without repentance for associating partner with God , then it's forbidden to pray for his/her salvation.

And God Almighty knows Best.

thanks for the correction

tango

are you not filled with pride and arrogance?---Islam calls us to humility to do God's will. This means to understand and keep in mind that God is all-powerful and all-knowing. Therefore, if God wants to spread Islam there is nothing human beings can do about it and if God wants to spread other than Islam, there is nothing human beings can do about it either. Our duty is to do God's will and leave the rest in his hands. And God's will is to have right belief that promotes right intentions that create right actions for the benefit of all of God's creations. If you cannot trust in God, you don't have right belief---only pride and arrogance.

Remember----God is Unity.

before i respond properly, i would like to ask if youve just reverted to islam or if youve been practising for a long time?

1. you cant judge my intentions (thats up to Allah swt)
2. i dont seem to understand why it is i dont trust in God swt ? all im saying is, islam is the truth and christianity is not. why should i help inadvertedly promote christianity?
3. muslims should seek to better the world on their own without being forced to work with non muslims so that the best possible image of islam is presented. of course this changes with the context of the "good" you are aiming for.

if you can prove to me logically that "getting down with the chrisitians on da streets yo" isnt helping promote their beliefs please do so.

lastly to all readers of this thread, as muslims we are not seeking to promote the Love of God swt in every and whatever way. we seek to promote the religion that Allah swt gave to us, that includes belief in Allah and love for him swt.

if your intentions are just "i wanna help these guys", then they should be "i wanna help these guys for the sake of Allah swt".

 

[Muslim Woman]

Salaam

thanks for the correction

You are welcome , bro.


***

To Eric: by , interfaith cooperation , do u mean to work together to get rid of evils of the society or have regular dialogues between different faith groups or both ?

During the time of Prophet Muhammed pbuh , Jews and Christians often visited him and discussed about religions . I guess , it's ok to say they had interfaith dialogues.

The most evil matter in the society is disobeying God. So , personally I believe , the more we talk about similarities about different faiths and how we can obey God Almighty , people will get to know about each other more and it will bring positive changes in society ( hopefully).


O mankind! We created you from a single (pair) of a male and a female, and made you into nations and tribes, that ye may know each other (not that ye may despise (each other). Verily the most honoured of you in the sight of Allah is (he who is) the most righteous of you. And Allah has full knowledge and is well acquainted (with all things).

49:13

 

[siam]

tango

When I wrote the post, I was thinking about the incident of the treaty of Hudaibiya that the Prophet(pbuh) made with the Meccans. Though the people with him were not happy with the terms, the Prophet(pbuh) trusted in God. We cannot know the intentions of others because we cannot see their hearts. However, if we decline to do good simply because of someones "label" then it seems to me, we have let pride/arrogance interfere with doing God's will? As to what is the Truth?---that's a no-brainer---As the Quran says, "Truth stands out clear from falsehood." Promoting goodness is promoting Truth. Why not trust in God and let him use you as he sees fit instead of putting up conditions to do God's will?

 

[Eric H]

Greetings and peace be with you tango92;

. muslims should seek to better the world on their own without being forced to work with non muslims so that the best possible image of islam is presented. of course this changes with the context of the "good" you are aiming for.

Almost imossible to do but… if we strive to put God first, others second, and our own needs third

if you can prove to me logically that "getting down with the chrisitians on da streets yo" isnt helping promote their beliefs please do so.

I am a Catholic, and I should be far more dogmatic than you, I belong to the one true church, the authority of the pope comes from Jesus, God.

A few hundred years ago where I live Christians were killing each other, because the other lot had the wrong truth. Since then we have grown to tolerate each other, now I find it a great blessing that I can pray with Chistians of other denominations, I can pray for them and work with them openly.

I have the great privalege in being able to go to other Christian churches, and they bring people to God in ways the Catholic Church does not seem able to do. I have been on this forum for five years now, and I recognise the great faith Muslims have, it seems that Islam brings people to God in ways that the Christian faith is not able to.

I do not understand God and his plans for me, let alone his plans for people of all other faiths and no faiths. As Siam has said, if it is God’s will that you should be a Muslim, why should I go against God, I will surely fail.

In the spirit of praying for a greater interfaith understanding

Eric

 

[Eric H]

Greetings and peace be with you Muslim Woman;

To Eric: by , interfaith cooperation , do u mean to work together to get rid of evils of the society or have regular dialogues between different faith groups or both ?

I am not sure what I mean !!! :hmm:

I do not have the authority of the Catholic Church, or Street Pastors, to say the things I have said, I am speaking purely as an individual.

I could be totally wrong to have such thoughts, but I am trying to understand the greatest commandments. Jesus said, All the law and the prophets of God hang on these two commandments; and he gave us the parable of the Good Samaitan.


Luke 10:30-37 Jesus answered, "A certain man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he fell among robbers, who both stripped him and beat him, and departed, leaving him half dead. By chance a certain priest was going down that way. When he saw him, he passed by on the other side. In the same way a Levite also, when he came to the place, and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a certain Samaritan, as he traveled, came where he was. When he saw him, he was moved with compassion, came to him, and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. He set him on his own animal, and brought him to an inn, and took care of him. On the next day, when he departed, he took out two denarii, and gave them to the host, and said to him, ‘Take care of him. Whatever you spend beyond that, I will repay you when I return.’ Now which of these three do you think seemed to be a neighbor to him who fell among the robbers?" He said, "He who showed mercy on him." Then Jesus said to him, "Go and do likewise."

Now you have to feel sorry for the priest and Levite, if they stopped to help the wounded man, they would become ceremonially unclean, and they would not be able to perform their religious duties for a period of time.

It could be said that the priest and Levite were putting God and their religion first, by keeping ceremonially clean, these laws came from Jesus, from God.

But Jesus seems to reverses our religious priorities, and we should care for the person in need. If Jesus was to give us this parable today, I could see him saying the priest and the deacon passed by, but the good Muslim stopped to help the wounded man. The parable of the greatest commandments seem to challenge us in ways we would not like to be challenged.

In the spirit of praying for justice for all people

Eric

 

[Muslim Woman]

Salaam/Peace

if they stopped to help the wounded man, they would become ceremonially unclean, and they would not be able to perform their religious duties for a period of time.

why ? Is that law still applicable ?

 

[tango92]

As the Quran says, "Truth stands out clear from falsehood." Promoting goodness is promoting Truth. Why not trust in God and let him use you as he sees fit instead of putting up conditions to do God's will?

hmm i see some strange christians ideas coming out of you. if you can give me an incident of the prophet pbuh performing a similar good action hand in hand with the people of the book then i will reconsider my position. as a msulims i define Gods will to be what is in the quran and shahih hadith. if we say "well good actions are good right?" we fall pray to shaytaans trap of defining our own criteria for right and wrong.

in other words. what appears good on the outside may not be when we analyse closer. and i beleive the mindset of a muslim should always be to look deeper than appearances and judge accordingly whilst keeping our priorities in order. this is a middle path, which is what Islam is all about.

 

[Eric H]

Greetings and peace be with you Muslim Woman;

]Salaam/Peace



why ? Is that law still applicable

The laws regarding being ceremonially unclean were given to the Israelites, they do not apply to Christians. I am not sure how they relate to Judaism today, there are a number of passages about being unclean, here is just one..


Leviticus 22.
1 The LORD said to Moses, 2 “Tell Aaron and his sons to treat with respect the sacred offerings the Israelites consecrate to me, so they will not profane my holy name. I am the LORD.
3 “Say to them: ‘For the generations to come, if any of your descendants is ceremonially unclean and yet comes near the sacred offerings that the Israelites consecrate to the LORD, that person must be cut off from my presence. I am the LORD.
4 “‘If a descendant of Aaron has a defiling skin disease[a] or a bodily discharge, he may not eat the sacred offerings until he is cleansed. He will also be unclean if he touches something defiled by a corpse or by anyone who has an emission of semen, 5 or if he touches any crawling thing that makes him unclean, or any person who makes him unclean, whatever the uncleanness may be. 6 The one who touches any such thing will be unclean till evening. He must not eat any of the sacred offerings unless he has bathed himself with water. 7 When the sun goes down, he will be clean, and after that he may eat the sacred offerings, for they are his food. 8 He must not eat anything found dead or torn by wild animals, and so become unclean through it. I am the LORD.

In the spirit of praying for justice for all people

Eric

 

[Eric H]

Greetings and peace be with you tango92;

I am sorry that I can’t give you any Islamic answers, and I can only talk as an individual with no authority, possibly I am committing spiritual suicide, because I know my thoughts do not sit comfortably with many Catholics.

I can remember when I first started as a Street Pastor, friends said I should not do it, others said I should wear body armour, carry a knife, do karate, they said it must take a lot of courage.

But we do not go out in our own strength and courage, we strive to go out in God’s strength, we trust in prayer, and we trust God hears our prayers. I am a Catholic, and there can be people from eight different denominations praying for us, I have to trust that God hears all these prayers, and when two or three are gathered in the name of Jesus, then he is with us, this is our belief.

There have been a number of instances, but one often comes to mind. There was a car full of youths parked in the middle of the road, about a dozen of their mates were fooling around in the road by the car, many had cans of beer. My lady partner talked to the driver, and asked if he could park the car by the kerb, he started the car and moved it safely. She said to the drunken lads, could you come of the road, a couple of aggressive characters towered over us, inches from our faces. She looked up to them and said, I am not afraid, all of a sudden everything changed, they dropped their aggressive nature, we got invited to their party, and we saw a good side to these lads. They talked about their work, girlfriends, college, they seemed different people.

I can only say that I should have been feeling anxious, and fearful in situations like this, but I have experienced an inner peace that transcends all my understanding. Often in these situations I am with just one lady partner, these ladies are remarkable, some are in their sixties and seventies. If we had not taken that risk of approaching a confrontational situation, we would never have known there was a good side to these lads.

It feels like pushing the boundaries by praying with other Christians, and trusting in God. It would push the boundaries further if we could somehow do this in an interfaith way. Yet the same God hears all our prayers, I am sure God can cope with our differences, because he created us that way, but can we cope with our differences?

In the spirit of praying to the One God who hears all our prayers

Eric

 

[Zafran]

Salaam

I posted this before about Muslim scholars reaching out to christians after the pope incident - known as the common word

http://www.acommonword.com/

check it out

peace

 

[أبو سليمان عمر]

Interfaith will never work for many reason the main one is islam calls to tawheed which is the most important thing in islam to where the other faith call to shirk hence there is no way possable also how can i accpet someone who rejects his Creator that will me silly of me

 

[tango92]

Greetings and peace be with you tango92;

I am sorry that I can’t give you any Islamic answers, and I can only talk as an individual with no authority, possibly I am committing spiritual suicide, because I know my thoughts do not sit comfortably with many Catholics.

I can remember when I first started as a Street Pastor, friends said I should not do it, others said I should wear body armour, carry a knife, do karate, they said it must take a lot of courage.

But we do not go out in our own strength and courage, we strive to go out in God’s strength, we trust in prayer, and we trust God hears our prayers. I am a Catholic, and there can be people from eight different denominations praying for us, I have to trust that God hears all these prayers, and when two or three are gathered in the name of Jesus, then he is with us, this is our belief.

There have been a number of instances, but one often comes to mind. There was a car full of youths parked in the middle of the road, about a dozen of their mates were fooling around in the road by the car, many had cans of beer. My lady partner talked to the driver, and asked if he could park the car by the kerb, he started the car and moved it safely. She said to the drunken lads, could you come of the road, a couple of aggressive characters towered over us, inches from our faces. She looked up to them and said, I am not afraid, all of a sudden everything changed, they dropped their aggressive nature, we got invited to their party, and we saw a good side to these lads. They talked about their work, girlfriends, college, they seemed different people.

I can only say that I should have been feeling anxious, and fearful in situations like this, but I have experienced an inner peace that transcends all my understanding. Often in these situations I am with just one lady partner, these ladies are remarkable, some are in their sixties and seventies. If we had not taken that risk of approaching a confrontational situation, we would never have known there was a good side to these lads.

It feels like pushing the boundaries by praying with other Christians, and trusting in God. It would push the boundaries further if we could somehow do this in an interfaith way. Yet the same God hears all our prayers, I am sure God can cope with our differences, because he created us that way, but can we cope with our differences?

In the spirit of praying to the One God who hears all our prayers

Eric

having repeated myself many times, I no longer wish to do merely under a slightly different context

i will reply to the bold however: how do we define islam

roughly. islam = peace

have you ever heard reverts talking about "inner peace" after coming into islam? well whilst one or 2 christians may have convinced themselves they experience this, all true beleivers of islam experience this by very definition that they have become muslim. we are not strangers to trusting in God in difficult times. indeed amongst the righteouss believers is one who fears nobody except God.

 

[أبو سليمان عمر]

Islam means submission/Surrender so it means to submi/surrender yourself to Allah the one who created you as we can see everything is in the state of islam (submission) except our minds and actions but if we look at the sun it is in the state of islam it goes and comes as it is supose to nothing can change that it is in complte submission and many more exmple

 

[siam]

Tango

"hmm i see some strange christians ideas coming out of you"---You are probably right---in that, serving God (with humility) is an example that all the Prophets in the Quran have showed us---and therefore would be part of any of God's Guidance. Nevertheless, I found the statement amusing since I felt it was YOUR idea that resembled mainstream Western Christianity. The "chosen people" idea that "God is on our side" originated in Judaism but was embraced by Western Christianity and expressed itself as white man's burden/manifest destiny and such. Even before that, as Eric said, Western Christianity has had a history of creating an adversary (Heretics, Jews...etc) in order to prop up its dogma (we are right/superior---they are wrong/inferior). Today, in the Catholic Church, there is debate whether Islam is more of a threat than secularism---with the Church declaring that they must "fight" secularism (and feel that encouraging Muslims to join this "fight" would be a good idea). Such ideas are wrong because they create divisions instead of Unity, they promote pride and arrogance instead of humility---and particularly because they lead to the delusion that the "quantity" of believers is more important than the quality of the practiced deen.
If one's faith/Iman needs to be propped up by creating an adversary---then that faith has no substance.
Nevertheless, I feel it would be foolish to ignore the wisdom and goodness in Judaism, Christianity and any other religion/philosophy simply because it is not labelled "Islam." In our history, we have embraced learning and co-existence. Likewise, it is foolish to refuse to do good simply because a particualr organization is not labelled "Muslim". God does not care about man-made "labels". As the Quran says, Prophet Abraham(pbuh) was a Muslim because he was "one who submits" (to God)---implying a state of being---not some exclusive label.

I am concerned about the quality of our religion because some Muslims use the 5 pillars as a license to do bad. ---The idea that if you pray a lot...give tons in charity..etc you are "off the hook" because your bad deeds will be forgiven--so you do bad---just pray a lot........and everything will be ok.......We must do better than this......

The purpose to do good should come from a feeling of gratitude for God's blessings. This attitude of gratitude should promote the sharing of God's blessings with others.......

It has been an interesting discussion Tango....thankyou

 

[أبو سليمان عمر]

saim asalamu alaykum

yes this is true but remeber that a msulim who sins is better then a non muslim who does alot of good

 

[siam]

Umar

"a muslim who sins is better then a non muslim who does alot of good"

As you defined in a previous post---"Muslim" is one who submits (to God's will). How do we know if a person is doing that or not if we do not know what is in their hearts?---Only God knows this and therefore he is the ultimate Judge of who is or is not a Muslim. It is best if we judge ourselves. If we go around arbitrarily declaring that "we are better than they"---we fall into what Al-Gazzali calls "Iblisi Logic". Iblis arbitrarily declares he is better than man because he is made from fire and man is only made from clay. His arrogance and pride leads him to disobey God's will.

In Protestant Christianity, salvation is guarenteed---One simply has to declare ones belief in dogma. In Islam, right belief, right intentions, and right actions work together as a package for a wholistic human experience that helps us be Muslim---"submitters" to God's will.

One can have humility and be non-judgemental and at the same time have confidence, commitment and faith in one's religion.

Arrogance/Pride have no place in a heart filled with compassion and mercy. And when we overcome our differences to do good and help others (all of God's creation---regardless of labels) we can only grow in compassion and mercy----and that is a way to Unity.

 

[أبو سليمان عمر]

naam but as umar ibn alkhatab said if we judge by whats appernt and Allah will judge whats in a person heart

also that doesnt change my point THAT A MUSLIM (means someone who submitted) who sins is better then a non muslim ( one who has not submitted) who does alot of good