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of all the biblical words I carry
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closest to my own heart the most
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important is the succinct teaching of
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Jesus in The Gospel of Mark what is the
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greatest commandment he's asked Jesus
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answers without hesitation here o Israel
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the Lord Our God the Lord is one and you
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shall love the Lord with all your heart
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soul mind and strength and you shall
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love your neighbor as
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yourself I'm a life long Methodist and
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I've spent most of my life studying and
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teaching about the religious traditions
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of India the faith of Hindus Muslims and
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siks as we well know with the new
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immigration these are not only the faith
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traditions of people Halfway Around the
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World in India but of our neighbors here
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in Chicago or in Boston where I live so
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as a Christian I often ask myself how I
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put it all together how do I how do we
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think about the one we call God and the
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many ways of faith that we call the
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religions this is not just a question of
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the theological Ivory Tower but it's a
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question that takes us right into our
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cities and neighborhoods right into the
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workplace where we encounter neighbors
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of other faiths in my hometown in
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Boseman Montana I didn't grow up with
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Muslims as neighbors but I certainly
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have Muslim neighbors now all and Leila
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and shahab my Muslim colleagues at
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Harvard zba and aat my students this
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semester Salma Lizzy and Imam basuni at
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the Islamic Society down the
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street Islam is increasingly part of the
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religious landscape of the us as Muslims
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have come to America from South Asia the
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Middle East Africa they've come with
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dreams of prosperity and security and
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with their religious faith
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many were surprised to find we have our
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own homegrown African-American
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Islam over the last 40 years we've seen
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the growth of diverse Muslim communities
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here at first the Islamic Center might
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have been a bowling alley in Hartford
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Connecticut or a former U-Haul
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dealership in pcket Rhode Island or a
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former movie theater in downtown
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Chicago but our Muslim neighbors
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eventually made their way through zoning
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boards and City councils responding to
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sometimes skeptical and sometimes
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hostile neighbors to build beautiful
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Islamic
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centers during the past 5 years I've
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watched a large new New England red
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brick mosque rise at one of the busiest
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intersections in Boston as soon as the
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shell was up my friend zalma wearing a
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hard hat over her job showed me around
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inside and when the Minette was capped
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with a copper final I was there with a
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thousand Muslims cheering as the crane
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lifted up the copper cap to the top of
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the minet and when the prayer Hall first
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opened for evening prayers during
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Ramadan I went with my students to be
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present in America we understand all too
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little about Islam and much of what we
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think we understand is shaped by acts
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and images of violence no wonder some
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people are still fearful of what they do
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not know
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a Gallup survey recently found that 87%
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of Americans think Muslims are very
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committed to their religious beliefs but
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56% confess to knowing little or nothing
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about Islamic beliefs and
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39% admit to having negative Prejudice
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toward
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Islam throughout the 1990s Muslims
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Christians and Jews began to make
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connections across town
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or across the street our work to build
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relationships was made all the more
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difficult and all the more important
00:04:08
after September 11th
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2001 by midafternoon of that terrible
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day I had already received email
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statements from all of the major
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American Islamic organizations
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denouncing the attack both as Muslims
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and As
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Americans but those voices were not
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really heard then or in the years since
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then too often only extremist images and
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extremist voices make the front page so
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how do we really hear What Muslim
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leaders have to
00:04:43
say so it was a profoundly important
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moment when not long ago 138 Muslim
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leaders from across the whole spectrum
00:04:53
of Islam Sunni and Shia salafi and Sufi
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from Nigeria to usbekistan Indonesia to
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Canada wrote a letter to the Christian
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world called a common word between us
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and you this letter was addressed to
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leaders of Christian churches all over
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the world and in turn to all of us who
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are Christians it was an unprecedented
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move boldly reaching out to Christians
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in a world in which Mutual negative
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stereotypes of one another are common
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and reaching out together in a world in
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which Muslim ecuminism is quite
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new the Muslim letter
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began Muslims and Christians together
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make up well over half the world's
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population without peace and Justice
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between these two religious communities
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there can be no meaningful peace in the
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world the basis for this peace and
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understanding already exists it is part
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of the very foundational principles of
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both faiths love of the one God and love
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of the
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neighbor these principles are found over
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and over again in the sacred texts of
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Islam and
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Christianity the letter recognizes how
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important the love of God and neighbor
00:06:19
is for Christians and it emphasizes the
00:06:22
importance of this in the Quran as
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well and I quote God says in the Holy
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Quran so invoke the name of thy Lord and
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devote thyself to him with complete
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devotion and of the necessity of Love of
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neighbor the prophet Muhammad said none
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of you has Faith until you love for your
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neighbor what you love for
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yourself thus they write in obedience to
00:06:49
the Holy Quran we as Muslims invite
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Christians to come together with us on
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the basis of what is common to us which
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is also what is most most essential to
00:07:00
our faith and practice the two
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Commandments of Love now these are not
00:07:06
footnotes or sidebars in our respective
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faiths these are really at the heart of
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who we truly are and without minimizing
00:07:14
real differences between Islam and
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Christianity there is much common ground
00:07:19
and finding this Common Ground they say
00:07:21
is quote not simply a matter for polite
00:07:25
ecumenical dialogue between Christians
00:07:28
and Muslims Muslims but this is a matter
00:07:31
of our very survival our common future
00:07:35
is at
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stake the letter closes with a sense of
00:07:39
urgency acknowledging quote that those
00:07:42
who nevertheless relish conflict and
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Destruction for their own sake or reckon
00:07:48
that ultimately they stand to gain
00:07:50
through them those people exist to them
00:07:53
we say our Eternal souls are also at
00:07:56
stake if we fail sincerely clearly to
00:07:59
make every effort to make peace and come
00:08:03
together in
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harmony now when we receive a letter of
00:08:09
such deep significance we have to
00:08:12
respond and there have been individual
00:08:15
and denominational responses to a common
00:08:17
word you can see them online at www
00:08:22
commonw
00:08:23
word.org and there have been churchwide
00:08:25
resp responses but these take longer and
00:08:28
now there is an ecumenical response from
00:08:30
the National Council of Churches of
00:08:32
Christ representing a wide spectrum of
00:08:35
protestant and Orthodox churches in the
00:08:38
US I was involved in that process
00:08:40
through four drafts and believe me it
00:08:43
was thoughtful and prayerful work there
00:08:47
can be no doubt of the importance of
00:08:49
this kind of collective responses from
00:08:51
the churches for Muslims around the
00:08:54
world have felt that in America respect
00:08:56
for Islam has been assaulted by a
00:08:59
growing American
00:09:02
islamophobia our letter also underlines
00:09:05
how important it is that we move Beyond
00:09:07
polite conversation to deep relationship
00:09:11
as Neighbors in a world plagued by
00:09:13
violence and poverty indeed our very
00:09:16
souls are at
00:09:19
stake of course we differ in the ways in
00:09:22
which we speak of the one God we as
00:09:25
Christians include in our understanding
00:09:27
of God the call of Christ to engagement
00:09:30
and to
00:09:31
reconciliation and the power of the Holy
00:09:33
Spirit to teach us new things about God
00:09:36
and about
00:09:37
ourselves so together Christians and
00:09:40
Muslims we say must ask the questions
00:09:42
that lead us deeper how do we understand
00:09:46
God's Oneness as communities of faith
00:09:48
that call upon God's name what does it
00:09:51
mean to respond to God's love in the
00:09:53
world of suffering and strife and
00:09:56
division we see who is our our neighbor
00:10:00
in a world in which Christians Muslims
00:10:02
and people of other faiths and secular
00:10:04
people as well live together in the same
00:10:08
Societies in a world of deep and
00:10:10
fracturing differences of majorities and
00:10:14
minorities and of urgent human needs how
00:10:17
do we respond to our obligation to love
00:10:20
our
00:10:21
neighbors in our letter we conclude
00:10:25
therefore our churches commit themselves
00:10:28
to to actively seek together with you
00:10:32
ways to take up the challenge you have
00:10:34
presented to us in a common
00:10:37
word and as part of that active seeking
00:10:40
a working group of the Islamic Society
00:10:43
of North America and the National
00:10:45
Council of churches has set a common
00:10:48
agenda to encourage local churches and
00:10:50
mosques to engage with each other in new
00:10:53
and positive ways to educate each other
00:10:56
about
00:10:57
ourselves to Foster the healing of
00:11:00
painful memories that our two
00:11:02
communities have of one another and to
00:11:05
establish a mechanism for response in
00:11:08
times of violence or
00:11:12
emergency in a world in which religious
00:11:14
truth claims often divide us these
00:11:17
letters stake out Common Ground where
00:11:20
our truth claims unite us at the very
00:11:23
core of our
00:11:25
faith building on this Common Ground
00:11:28
rather than focusing on the theologies
00:11:30
and politics that divide us provides a
00:11:33
way ahead for both Muslims and
00:11:35
Christians in a deeply fractured
00:11:39
World alas these letters back and forth
00:11:41
may not make the Chicago Tribune or the
00:11:43
Boston Globe but they are the kind of
00:11:46
news that will begin to reshape
00:11:49
relationships between the two largest
00:11:52
and most widespread religious traditions
00:11:54
on
00:11:57
Earth
