October 2023 – Interreligious Dialogue in Scotland

Interfaith Learnings – Sr Isabel Smyth SND

The Scottish Catholic Edition 31 web I have been invited to take part in the monthly faith to faith dialogue organised by Interfaith Glasgow and St Mungo’s Museum of Religious Life and Art. The dialogue will focus on how positive and fruitful interfaith dialogue can enrich one’s own faith and spiritual journey. It’s one that I look forward to. There’s still a suspicion and fear amongst some people of faith that interfaith dialogue will somehow compromise or threaten their own beliefs and practices. For me this has not been the case. I can honestly say that my own faith and spirituality have been enriched and transformed by my work in interreligious dialogue and my contact and friendship with people of other faiths.

My interfaith journey began when I studied world faiths at Lancaster university, met and talked with people of other faiths for the first time in my life and then went on to teach world religions as part of my job in preparing students to teach religious education in Catholic schools at a time when the RE syllabus had moved from being focussed on Christianity to include world religions. This meant trying to give students an insight into the faith of others by explaining some of their beliefs, introducing students to their scriptures, visiting places of worship and encouraging the students to engage in dialogue by visiting the International Flat and taking part in meetings of the Glasgow Sharing of Faiths. To give the students an insight into the wisdom and beauty of a faith I tried to teach it with appreciation and respect, from the ‘inside’ so to speak. Just as a stained-glass window can look quite dull from outside a building but different when seen from inside with the sun lighting up the diverse colours so too another faith can, I would suggest, only be appreciated when we have crossed over, tried to stand in the shoes of another and view it and the world from their perspective. John Dunne, a catholic theologian, sees the work of interreligious dialogue as a crossing over into the world of another and coming back to our own to see it with new eyes. It is this crossing over that brings about a transformation in faith and change of perspective. And along the way I have made many interfaith friends which I greatly value and for which I am very grateful.

So, what have I learned? I’ve seen my faith from the perspective of another and realised something of its exclusive and oppressive aspects. I was brought up to believe that there was only one truth and that was to be found in the Catholic Church. How wrong we were to think that we were the only way to truth and salvation and that others lived in ignorance of that truth. I have come to recognise, appreciate, and be inspired by the wisdom and truth that I have discovered in other faiths. So too I am glad to say has the Catholic Church. I also appreciate the diversity to be found within faiths. For me this is what makes interfaith relations interesting and challenging because it is very easy sometimes to think that when we use the same words e.g. God or even religion we mean the same thing. We can’t take that for granted. This is where real face to face dialogue happens and it can’t be done quickly. Recently Interfaith Glasgow in partnership with the Council of Christians and Jews produced a report on Difficult Dialogues. It recorded a dialogue that took place over several years, longer than intended because of Covid. I was privileged to be part of that and it was one of the best experiences I’ve had of dialogue because we really listened to one another and honestly shared our common understanding of shared concepts. It also brought out that there is a variety of understandings of people from within one faith and it’s important not to generalise that what one person believes, and thinks is necessarily indicative of what everyone within the faith believes. Interfaith dialogue is a face to face, person to person activity.

Getting to know another faith, experiencing its hospitality and visiting its place of worship is to recognise the sacredness of all faiths. When we encounter a person of another faith we are standing on holy ground, we’re encountering the sacred, the divine in that person and in that tradition. It is indeed a privilege. And sometimes it’s to recognise that another faith might do some things better than our own or its scriptures and teaching lead us to reflect and gain a new insight into our own faith. Krister Stendhal- Ras when he was at Harvard coined the phrase holy envy in urging believers to find beauty in other faiths and there are many things that I admire and could be envious of. But I’ve also come to realise that there are both liberating and oppressive aspects in all faiths and that in interfaith relations it’s important to compare like with like. It’s easy sometimes to compare the best of our own religion with the worst of another or even the worst of our own with the best of another. There is good and bad religion.

Perhaps above all else my interfaith journey has led me to realise that I am a member of a much wider community than my own. I feel in my being that we believers make up a vast community of people who are striving to live a good life and desire the welfare of all sentient beings as well as our planet. I believe that when we each in our own way commit our lives, perhaps our day to following what we believe to be right together we generate a great energy for good, something Christians would call the Kingdom of God, which while hidden is still powerful. Together we are sowing seeds that we hope will grow and flourish, we are in the words attributed to Archbishop Romero prophets of a future not our own.

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Oct 11 2023

Interfaith Reception 2023

Interfaith Dialogue, Scotland

Friends from Other Faiths Flock to the Eyre Hall in the Curia of the Archdiocese of Glasgow
by Duncan McLaren, Member of the Bishops’ Committee

Members of the Scottish Bishops’ Committee for Interreligious Dialogue were delighted with the turnout of faith leaders on 28th September.

This was our first Interfaith Reception since the Covid pandemic which stopped the annual meeting from taking place for three years.

Over 60 leaders from communities representing the major faiths as well as friends from the other Churches, local politicians and the Director of Interfaith Scotland were welcomed by the new Interfaith Officer, Joe Sikora. He was standing in for the President, Bishop Brian McGee, who had to go to Belfast due to a family bereavement.

FR5 (002) The guests enjoyed a talk by Sr Isabel Smyth SND, the former Secretary of the Committee and a renowned and well-loved promoter of interfaith dialogue in Scotland. She reflected on what she had learned over three decades about interreligious dialogue and talked about how her interaction with other faiths led not only to knowledge about them but how it transformed and increased her own faith. She focused on four things.

Firstly, on the need for gratitude. Gratitude for the wisdom and insight gained from the faith of others, for the widening of her perspective so that my notion of God, faith has expanded beyond what it was in my own tradition, and for the friendships of many of the people she has encountered over the years.

Secondly, she reflected on the need to “honour the pain” that has marked the chequered history of religious encounters, including the exclusive and oppressive aspects of her own religion, and a long-held belief that the Catholic faith contained the only truth and others lived in ignorance.

She also reflected how interfaith dialogue had given her the ability to see things “with new eyes”. In particular the diversity found within faiths which makes interreligious dialogue so interesting and challenging.

Finally, Sr. Isabel reflected on the way forward or “going forth”, as collaborators in a vast project to make the world a better place for everyone to live in justice and peace.

Everyone was relieved to meet up again which could be heard in the conversations, the laughter and the invitations given out so freely. Over a simple meal, the atmosphere was one of genuine dialogue, made all the easier because of the friendships forged previously.

A Shia Muslim guest commented: “I always enjoyed coming here and used to meet with the late Archbishop Mario Conti. We became good friends!”. A Hindu lady who never missed this event in the past said she felt “very much at home as usual”.

It is an occasion such as this that reminds us we are all building, through our interfaith work, peaceful communities which spread that message of living in harmony together throughout society.

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Oct 2 2023

European Bishops Interreligious Dialogue Conference

Bishops, Interfaith Dialogue

The headquarters of the Bishops Conference of France in Paris was the venue for the European Bishops Interreligious Dialogue Conference from 13th to 15th September 2023.

This section of the CCEE is headed by Bishop Brendan Leahy and the conference brought together representatives from all over Europe to focus mainly on relationships between Catholicism and Islam. Time was also given to reflecting on relationships with Buddhism and Hinduism.

Conference listened to presentations and testimonies from academics, theologians and to hear first-hand from representatives of the Muslim and Buddhist communities in France about their experiences of interfaith dialogue and the challenge of building positive relationships between faith communities. Delegates also discussed their own local contexts and discussed potential topics for future conference meetings.

In his welcoming address to the conference Bishop Leahy quoted Pope Francis’ encyclical Fratelli Tutti:

“If we want to encounter and help one another, we have to dialogue. There is no need for me to stress the benefits of dialogue. I have only to think of what our world would be like without the patient dialogue of the many generous persons who keep families and communities together.”

The importance of this dialogue was picked up in the opening presentation by Fr. Laurent Basanese of the Dicastery for Interreligious Dialogue whose address to the conference mentioned dialogue no fewer that 35 times. He also highlighted the need for faith leaders to lead by example, quoting an Anglican Bishop who said at a recent interreligious meeting for peace in the Balkans:

“If religious leaders don’t ‘walk’ together out of friendship, how can we expect our faithful to do so?”

This emphasis on dialogue and walking together set the tone for the conference and was picked up by Archbishop Turini, President of the French Bishops’ Conference. He noted that the objective of interfaith dialogue was to enrich each other and in doing so deepen our own faith. However, the conference recognised that interfaith dialogue is not without its complexities and difficulties.

What was clear was that the experience of Christian – Muslim interaction varies enormously for both communities depending on the history of their encounter which has in some places been much more challenging than in others. There is a balance to be struck between the need for constructive dialogue and the Church’s mission to proclaim the gospel. The first day concluded with evening prayer and Mass in the chapel within the Bishops’ Conference complex.

On day two of the conference Professor Juliette Galonnier gave a detailed presentation from a sociological perspective on the experience of young Muslims in France. The professor highlighted the fact that the use of the word Muslim can be problematic in itself. She noted that the “Muslim” label covers a diverse reality made up of distinct pathways of religious experiences. Looking at it that way, it is most productive to understand Muslims as a community of debate about Islam, rather than seeing them as a homogeneous community holding similar ideas and practices. Consequently, we need to be careful not to generalise when talking about Muslims or Islam but to recognise the individual nature of each encounter.

Later, Dr Michele Brignone of the Oasis Foundation, an organisation based in Milan that studies the interaction and fosters mutual understanding between Christians and Muslims within the global context, gave a detailed account of the wide variety of ways in which social media is being used to communicate Muslim teaching. One of the complexities that the widespread use of social media creates is the question of authority. Which social media teaching is the right one given that there many and diverse answers to important questions. He concluded that social media is transforming the religious experience of Islam giving rise to new characters and influencers.

Day two continued with a meeting with Rector Chems-eddine Mohamed Hafiz, President of the Great Mosque in Paris. In his talk he highlighted the opportunities that good interfaith dialogue presents to Christians and Muslims especially when it comes to engaging together in acts of charity. However, he did not shy away from some of the challenges that try to separate and break the links that bind the Abrahamic faiths together. He echoed earlier comments of the conference stressing the need to work publicly together to face up to these challenges. He highlighted issues of Islamic extremism and also issues of discrimination against Muslims.

The day’s discussions concluded with small group meetings for the delegates in which potential lines of work for the next conference as well as the opportunity to report on experiences of Islamic-Christian dialogue from within our own national contexts.

The day concluded with a short walk to the Chapel of Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal for Evening Prayer.

The last day of the conference began with a brief report from Bishop Leahy on a seminar that had taken place in the Dicastery for Interreligious Dialogue between Catholics and Hindus. However, the bulk of the morning was given over to Professor Dennis Gira, a specialist in Buddhism and the testimony of Lama Jigme Gyatso, Co-President of the French Buddhist union. Just as the diversity of Islam had been highlighted in earlier sessions it was made clear that breadth of the Buddhist experience is something that needs to be taken into consideration as part of any dialogue. It very much depends on where we are, what branch of Buddhism we will encounter. But again, the focus was on the need for dialogue. Dialogue that is based on cooperation and action, religious experience as well as dialogue between academics and theologians.

The final contribution from Lama Gyatso gave an insight into his own personal religious journey to Buddhism before he went on to reflect on the experience of Buddhist in France and the challenges they face being properly accepted and engaged by the authorities in vital areas including prison and hospital chaplaincy.

As is often the case with conferences, the networking that took place outside the main hall over lunch and coffee was just as enlightening. In my conversations with delegates from Sweden, Germany, Austria, Malta, Lebanon, France, Italy and Croatia, I learned huge amounts about the diversity of experience and engagement in interreligious dialogue across Europe.

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