Radio 4 Oliver McTernan - 10/09

BBC Radio 4 10th September 2010 Despite widespread condemnation from Christian leaders across the United States and a warning from the head of NATO forces in Afghanistan that his actions “will spark war against all Christians”, the American evangelical pastor, Terry Jones, seems determined to go ahead with his plan to commemorate the September 11th terrorists attacks tomorrow by burning copies of the Koran on his Church lawn. But Jones is not the only Christian cleric to hit the headlines this week because of his negative attitude towards Islam. A senior Vatican official has called on European Christians to have more children in order to stop Europe becoming “Islamised” by what he describes as waves of Muslim migrants. Father Piero Gheddo warned that because of the low birth rate among the indigenous population it was only a matter of time before Europe was dominated by Muslims. Although these views are by no means mainstream I find such headlines deeply disturbing and as such I think they should prompt us to ask the question what is our attitude towards people of other faiths? Do we respect and promote their right to believe and act differently or do we fear that their presence in our midst may undermine the beliefs and values that we cherish most? We often speak of the world as a globalised village in the sense that what happens in some far off distant place can have a very real impact on our own lives. The recent flooding in Pakistan is a good example of this. When people are in trouble it doesn’t matter what their faith or culture may be. Most of us feel impelled to do something to help. We empathise with them as fellow humans. But it is equally true that such deeply shameful actions as Terry Jones threatening to burn copies of the Koran on his church lawn or the Vatican cleric calling for more babies in order to stop Europe from being “Islamised” can have a profoundly negative impact within our own society. Many of my Muslims friends here and elsewhere in the world regard Jones as a self publicist but that makes his actions nonetheless offensive and hurtful and all the more so because he is planning such a sacra-religious act at the feast of Eid – a time when Muslim families and communities come together to celebrate their faith. All of the world’s major faiths share common beliefs and values but it would be wrong to fudge over the fact that there are also profound differences that need to be acknowledged and addressed if we are to avoid the risk of belief in itself becoming a source of conflict. We don’t need to study our history but we’ve only at what’s happening right now in various parts of the world to realise the dangers of this. The globalised reality of our lives underscores the need for us to re-evaluate our own attitudes towards the diversity and pluralism that exist not just around the world but also on our own door step. It was the French Catholic existentialist philosopher, Gabriel Marcel, who argues that real faith should make us more open to accepting and promoting the right of others to believe and to act differently. He believed that the “intense conviction” that comes with faith and which is so much part of a believers make up should enable us to empathise with another’s convictions that are different but equally intense. It’s the ability to empathise which seems to come so natural when see others suffering from a human disaster which should motivate us to defend the right of others to make truth claims different from our won and to act upon them, provided that such actions are not detrimental to the rights and well-being of others.