Draft document – for consultation

Increasing participation in Faith Forums within the Barking Episcopal Area

Introduction

Significant opportunities currently exist in the Barking Episcopal Area for us to become involved or extend our involvement in regeneration initiatives (including the Thames Gateway and 2012 Olympics, among others). The route into these opportunities is increasingly via local and regional Faith Forums and these new opportunities for Church involvement exist to a significant extent because of our multi-faith context both in the Barking Episcopal Area and nationally. These opportunities also present us with a challenge; how to be engaged in regeneration and faith forums in a way that is distinctively Christian? This paper seeks to suggest some answers to that question and to encourage each of us in the Barking Episcopal Area to make the most of the opportunities that currently exist to be involved in and to influence the regeneration of our Area.

Faith Forums – What are they?

The National Inter Faith Network for the UK says that “local inter faith organisations bring groups and individuals of different faiths together in such activities as:

  • learning more about each others’ perspectives through talks, visits to each others’ places of worship;
  • working on particular projects and events;
  • tackling prejudice and discrimination through awareness raising, diversity training and educational programmes;
  • raising awareness about the importance of peaceful and respectful coexistence in a multi faith society;
  • advising local government, the Police, hospitals and other public services on religious issues and the needs of users of different faiths;
  • assisting on local multi faith civic ceremonies and events; and
  • responding to any local incidents such as attacks on places of worship or cemeteries.”[1]

The term ‘inter faith activity’ is generally understood to express meaningful interactions between people from different faith communities and between faith communities and wider civil society. The Chief Rabbi, Sir Jonathan Sacks, has helpfully distinguished between “face-to-face” and “side-by-side” relationships:

  • “face-to-face”: relates to dialogue which leads to faith communities having a better understanding of one another, including celebrating the values held in common as well as acknowledging distinctiveness; and
  • “side-by-side”: relates to collaborative social action (including participation in local democracy) involving different faith communities and wider civil society, which brings about positive and concrete change within local communities.[2]

Both are likely to be present in most faith forums but in some there may be a stronger preference for one over the other. In relation to engagement with government and regeneration initiatives through faith forums, it is likely that side-by-side relationships will have priority.

Benefits & opportunities

At all levels of government – local, regional and national – the contributions faith communities make to community life are increasingly being recognized.The Government, for instance, claims that its“vision for Britain is one of strong, confident communities where people of all different backgrounds get on well together” and, asa result, building cohesion is a priority with the lead responsibility for this being with the Department for Communities and Local Government.

Why are local, regional and national government now increasingly recognisingthe contributions faith communities, including the Christian community, make to community life? In their consultation document "Face-to-Face and Side-by-Side": A framework for inter faith dialogue and social action(Dec 2007) the Government gave three reasons:

  1. They have in recent years seen an increase in dialogue between different faith communities which is breaking down barriers, building understanding and strengthening relationships.
  2. They have also seen the positive changes that collaborative social action has brought about within our local communities.
  3. This growth in ‘active faith’ has seen faith communities putting into practice their values and teachings to enrich and benefit wider society.

Face-to-Face and Side-by-Side explored how Government should support inter faith activity and the circumstances in which inter faith activity is helping to make a positive difference within local communities. But government activities and initiatives are already in place on the ground providing opportunities for churches to become involved in local/regional strategies, regeneration initiatives, service delivery and inter faith dialogue, among others.

As an example, the Local Government White Paper Strongand Prosperous Communities(Oct 2006) made it clear that the Government wants to see more local inter faith work and suggested that every local authority should have an inter faith forum, and that these forums should be linked closely into Local Strategic Partnerships.

The opportunities provided by such initiatives are not being fully seized by churches generally, or Anglican churches in particular, for a variety of reasons and this paper seeks to provide guidance and ideas on ways to make best use of these opportunities by increasing our engagement.

Why should churches engage with other faiths?

In answering this question from our understanding of scripture and tradition, it is important to recognise that the contexts in which Israel, Jesus and the EarlyChurch lived and ministered were multi-faith and that encounters recorded in scripture with people who were not Jews are generally encounters with people of another faith.

From this perspective, it is possible to see that:

  • Jesus taught in Luke 10: 25-37 that we are both to be good neighbours to those of other faiths and to receive from those of other faiths. Jesus himself crossed cultural and religious boundaries in order to speak with the Samaritan woman (John 4: 9) and showed understanding both of the cultural and religious boundaries between Jews and Samaritans (John 4: 9 & 10) and of aspects of Samaritan beliefs (John 4: 19 - 24). Jesus recognised great faith in people of other faiths (Matthew 15: 21 – 28 and Luke 7: 1 - 10) and responded to that faith with acts of healing and help.
  • Paul visited the worship places of other faiths (Acts 17: 23), quoted from the writings of other faiths (Acts 17: 28; 1 Corinthians 15:33; Titus 1:12)[3], used rhetorical approaches learnt from Greek oratory, and described his approach to those of other faiths as being to become like a Jew to the Jews, like those under the law to those under the law, and like those not under the law to those not under the law (1 Corinthians 9: 19-23).
  • God has revealed himself in the natural world (Acts 14:17), in people's consciences (Romans 2:15) and even in their religiosity, however far removed that may seem from a Judeo-Christian point of view (Acts 17:22-31).God is at work in people of others faiths; acting in their cultures in ways similar to his actions for the people of Israel (Amos 9: 7 and Isaiah 19: 19-25) and enabling the actions of their leaders to be of benefit to the people of Israel (Isaiah 45:1-6). Similarly, the central message of the story of Jonah is to do with God’s concern for the people of another faith who were the enemies of the people of Israel.

Dialogue is central to inter faith initiatives and is also a key aspect of scripture and tradition. Jesus, for example, is “the self-communication of God,”[4] ‘the Word of God’:

“It all arose out of a conversation, conversation within God, in fact the conversation was God. So God started the discussion, and everything came out of this, and nothing happened without consultation.

This was the life, life that was the light of men, shining in the darkness, a darkness which neither understood nor quenched its creativity.

John, a man sent by God, came to remind people about the nature of the light so that they would observe. He was not the subject under discussion, but the bearer of an invitation to join in.

The subject of the conversation, the original light, came into the world, the world that had arisen out of his willingness to converse. He fleshed out the words but the world did not understand. He came to those who knew the language, but they did not respond. Those who did became a new creation (his children). They read the signs and responded.

These children were born out of sharing in the creative activity of God. They heard the conversation still going on, here, now, and took part, discovering a new way of being people.

To be invited to share in a conversation about the nature of life was for them, a glorious opportunity not to be missed.” (John 1: 1-14)[5]

Jonathan Sacks notes that conversations with God characterise the relationships of those closest to him:

“Abraham says: God, why did you abandon the world? God says to Abraham: Why did you abandon Me? And there then begins that dialogue between Heaven and Earth which has not ceased in 4,000 years. That dialogue in which God and Man find one another.”

“Only thus,” Sacks says, “can we understand the great dialogues between God and Abraham and Moses and Jeremiah and Job.”[6]

Drawing on the philosophical thought of Martin Buber and Emmanuel Levinas, Rowan Williams has written that, “all human identity is constructed through conversations, in one way or another.”[7] First, we have to become aware of someone other than ourselves. Jonathan Sacks says, “we must learn to listen and be prepared to be surprised by others … make ourselves open to their stories, which may profoundly conflict with ours … we must learn the art of conversation, from which truth emerges … by the … process of letting our world be enlarged by the presence of others who think, act, and interpret reality in ways radically different from our own.”[8]

Second, by these conversations we become aware of ourselves. As people, we are not autonomous constructions. Instead, our individual identities are gifted to us by the people, events, stories and histories that we encounter as we go through life. If there was no one and nothing outside of ourselves we would have no reference points in life, no way of knowing what is unique and special about ourselves. In conversations we become aware of how we differ from others and therefore what is unique about ourselves.

Finally, in conversations we also become aware of what we have in common with others. Conversation is something that you can only do with someone else. Therefore, Charles Taylor has argued that, opening a conversation is to inaugurate a common action. A conversation is ‘our’ action, something we are both involved in together. In this way, conversation reminds us of those things that “we can only value or enjoy together” and is, as Rowan Williams has said, “an acknowledgement that someone else’s welfare is actually constitutive of my own.”[9]

For these and other reasons the General Synod as long ago as 1981 endorsed the Four Principles of Inter Faith Dialogue agreed ecumenically by the British Council of Churches:

  • Dialogue begins when people meet each other
  • Dialogue depends upon mutual understanding and mutual trust
  • Dialogue makes it possible to share in service to the community
  • Dialogue becomes the medium of authentic witness

The RomanCatholic Church has helpfully described four different categories of interfaith dialogue:

  1. dialogue of life – this is the everyday exchange springing from a spirit of openness and neighbourliness.
  2. dialogue of action – this involves partnership in issues of shared concern.
  3. dialogue of theological exchange – this reflects the specialist theological discussions aimed at deepening mutual understanding between faiths.
  4. dialogue of religious experience – this is the sharing of spiritual experiences of prayer and devotions of people of different faiths.[10]

This range of different types and levels of dialogue gives us considerable choice in the way in which our engagement and dialogue with those of other faiths occurs. However, in relation to engagement with government and regeneration initiatives through faith forums, it is likely that our dialogues will primarily be dialogues of action.

Countering objections

There are many reasons why churches choose not to engage with inter faith or government initiatives. Some of these are set out below with suggestions for alternative perspectives:

Loss of distinctiveness?

Sometimes there is a worry that our Christian distinctiveness will be lost through inter faith involvement. There can be a concern that those involved in inter faith activity are seeking to say that all faiths are equal or that, ultimately, all faiths are the same.

The Inter Faith Network for the UK is very clear that this is not the case: “Although some core values and principles are common to many faiths, inter faith understanding and cooperation is not about mixing up the faiths or assuming that they are all the same. It is about building good relations between the different faiths in a way which respects the integrity and the distinct historical tradition of each one.”

Multi-faith worship?

In some settings there could be pressure to have some form of multi-faith worship. Again, the Inter Faith Network for the UK provides helpful guidance on this issue. They state that, generally, local inter faith bodies do not hold events which would be described as ‘worship’ because “when spoken joint prayers are used, there can be a danger that people find themselves voluntarily or involuntarily joining in what appears to be worship of a divinity who is not recognisably as they understand the divine and feeling pressed to do so even though they would prefer not to be.”[11]

More common is either shared silent prayer/meditation or a pattern of sequential offerings of spoken prayers and reading from members of different faiths to which others listen, but in which they do not actively participate; rather, prayer is offered individually by members of the gathering in a way which respects the integrity of each tradition. Where multi-faith civic ceremonies (i.e. events that are not ‘worship’ events) are held, for example on Holocaust Memorial Day, it is these approaches that are generally used.

Multi-use premises?

When discussion of worship spaces in regeneration initiatives is on the agenda it is very likely that, due primarily to limits on the amount of community space included in such developments, multi-use spaces will be proposed. Although not necessarily insurmountable, there are significant practical issues involved with multi-use spaces when worship at different times by different faith groups is being included in the use of the space. Faith forums will no doubt want to take a view on the desirability and practicality of multi-use premises when use of community spaces in regeneration areas is discussed. Similarly, planning guidance which seeks to suggest that locating worship centres in commercial centres rather than in residential areas may also need to be challenged. In 2006 the Barking & Dagenham Faith Forum produced a useful paper entitled ‘Sustainable Communities, Regeneration & Urban Spirituality’that was originally submitted to the Barking & Dagenham Partnership,Corporate Equalities Board &Local Development Framework and which discusses these and other issues.[12] This paper could be used to initiate discussion in other faith forums.

Compromised through government money?

There can be a concern that by accepting government funding, Christian groups will be forced to compromise aspects of their faith. Faithworks has addressed this issue by saying that Christian organisations should not focus solely on ‘rights’ - to free speech, non-discrimination, ‘equal playing fields’ etc. - but also on ‘responsibilities’:

“Alongside our rights, however, we also have responsibilities. We must ensure that our services are delivered in a non-discriminatory way, for example. We must ensure that we measure our effectiveness. We must be accountable, in all the right ways, to funders, to clients and to other stakeholders. We have a responsibility to demonstrate that what we are doing is working.”

However, these responsibilities can be met in ways that “protect our ethos and our values and avoid falling into the trap of being shaped and moulded to look like government, act like government and deliver like government.” The way to do this, they argue, is not by refusing to engage but by clarifying how our distinctive ethos and values are evident in the delivery of our work:

“Our outcomes and outputs must reflect our values and our ethos. Otherwise we have lost the distinct identity that we claim gives us value.”

Faithworks have published a free downloadable guide, Ethos, effectiveness & excellence[13]which gives guidance on how to do this in ways that both describe the effectivenessand quality of our work and let people (both inside and outside ourorganisations) know that our work isfounded on our faith.

Can’t speak prophetically from the ‘inside’?

Sometimes people worry that involvement with government will limit our ability to speak distinctively and prophetically to government. However, Government recognition of the contributions faith communities make to community life comes with an understanding that the values and behaviours we demonstrate, such as altruism, respect for others, ethical behaviour and community solidarity, underpin good citizenship.