There’s currently a bit of a fuss going on in London because a vicar invited a group to have Muslim prayers inside his church.
This is a fuss blown out of all proportion. What the Rev Giles Goddard, the vicar of St John’s Waterloo has done is unremarkable and the trouble seems to be coming from those who are also troubled by his offering to affirm gay couples, as much as anything to do with the Muslims.
It seems important to state that I’ve offered Muslims the opportunity to hold worship in St Mary’s.
A couple of years ago one of the local mosques was being refurbished and they needed somewhere to meet for Friday prayers for six weeks. A group from the mosque committee came to me to ask whether there was any possibility of them using St Mary’s Cathedral.
I met with them and did indeed offer our space to them.
In the end, they didn’t take up the offer as they were worried that we didn’t have enough floorspace for them. (Not the first time I’ve cursed the immovable pews).
The things worth noting here are these:
- Every Christian I spoke to about this wanted it to go ahead as part of the basic hospitality that we think is part of our faith.
- Every Muslim I spoke to at the time spoke to me about precedents from history when Christians had been offered sanctuary in mosques and protection from Muslim communities whilst they worshipped there.
- There was never controversy over this at all.
Related to this is the fact that I’ve twice asked Islamic Scholars (one Shia and one Sunni) to give a reading from the Qur’an during our carol service here in St Mary’s. Being surrounded by members of different Islamic communities in this part of Glasgow, the diverse congregation gathered to celebrate Christ’s birth in St Mary’s seemed both delighted and entranced to discover that members of another faith held the birth of of Jesus to Mary in the highest honour. Again, on each occasion when this happened there was delight and joy all around and not the slightest hint of controversy. The most recent occasion involved a sung recitation from the Qur’an and then a translation. The sound still rings in my ears when I see local Muslims in the street.
It is worth noting in passing that the Islamic group that Giles Goddard invited into St John’s was unusual in that it welcomes men and women to pray together – something a lot of good Anglicans might be inclined to say was a good idea.
And another thing. I’ve heard on the grapevine that a mixed group of young people, Muslim and Christian was present in Liverpool Cathedral one year on Ash Wednesday when Justin Welby was the Dean. To some surprise, the Muslim young people came forward to receive the ashes on their foreheads along with everyone else.
I believe that the quick thinking Dean (now the Archbishop of Canterbury) said something like: “May the God of Abraham which is both my God and yours bless you and keep you safe this day” and firmly put the ash on all their heads. Such things are the everyday stuff of ministry. Entirely uncontroversial and a delight and a parable of the way things should be, to all involved.
Anyone wanting to throw stones at Giles Goddard over this might find that they bounce off and hit the Archbishop of Canterbury instead.
And those who want to stir up trouble between faiths, motivated by latent homophobia, should look deep into their souls before they next try to look the God of love in the eye.
Comments
95 responses to “Welcoming Muslims into church”
My last Church gave a room to Muslims, for free to read the Qur’an.
Over 32 years ago a Derby church where I was on placement allowed the local Muslims to use their church room for prayers.It’s too long ago to recall the exact circumstances , and it was not without some painful discussion- but hospitality prevailed .’When I was a stranger you welcomed me’
Not long ago there was a similar issue in the USA. The chapel at Duke University has allowed the campus muslim group to meet for prayers on Friday for a number of years. Duke also has recruited and pays the salary for the imam who leads the students and also id a professor of Islamic studies at Duke. But recently the Muslim students had requested that the call to prayer be allowed to be sung and amplified from the chapel’s bell tower. There was considerable opposition and the university reversed the decision to allow the students to broadcast the call from the tower. You can see the topic raised a lot of ire with some episcopalians/anglicans at The Lead;
http://www.episcopalcafe.com/duke-university-reverses-decision-to-sound-islamic-call-to-prayer/
Yes – I remember that controversy, now that you mention it.
A broadcast call to prayer is highly intrusive, however, and unavoidable. You wouldn’t want a sung political party broadcast tannoyed five times a day in your location either – especially if it was from a party with whom you disagreed.
Bells. That’s all I’m saying.
It was to be sung once a day on Friday.
In the UK, Sutton v Bowden is the definitive precedent. Essentially, the church has no jurisdiction in deciding the use of a private or institutional chapel, even if done with the owner’s consent and in the proper legal form.
Churches are an entirely different matter. Section 29 of the document entitled: ‘DIOCESE OF SOUTHWARK – Guidelines on civic services / events involving people of different faiths’ is relevant.
29. No reading or other contribution from any participant should include any element hostile or contrary to the Christian faith as the Church of England has received it.
30. It is not appropriate for somebody of another faith at a civic service in a Church of England church to lead the congregation in prayer.
31. It is not generally appropriate for a representative of another faith to preach at a civic service in a Church of England church, though a person of another faith might be invited to offer reflections from a community perspective.
Theologically, let’s see how that characteristic *welcome* of Christ was extended to a Samaritan woman to promote inter-faith dialogue during a discussion of their respective monotheistic beliefs:
‘Woman,” Jesus replied, “believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. *You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews.* Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.” (John 4:21 – 24)
Despite what Giles Goddard might have called their ‘shared heritage’, His welcome didn’t make Him reticent in declaring the relative ignorance of Samaritan worship. His welcome didn’t treat her as too fragile for truth.
In a place consecrated to the worship of God through Christ, Giles Goddard’s public ministry should have endorsed Christ’s interfaith approach. Instead, he capitulated to a liturgical form that reverted to complete ignorance of Christ.
He’s wrong, both ecclesiastically and theologically.
This wasn’t a civic service or event wherein members of other faiths had been invited to participate. So this section of the document that you quote is irrelevant. What you need to be quoting, to be relevant, would be a section that forbids a service of worship of another faith in the buildings of the Diocese of Southwark.
It sounds to me that what Jesus said to the woman was that he was inaugurating an era where it didn’t matter where you worship; neither the place sacred to his own ancestors nor the place sacred to hers, because true worship was going to be be beyond physical locations. Which, in my mind, makes the concept you’re promoting of a physical place dedicated to the worship of God obsolete. Your emphatic pronunciation here moves you right back to the squabbles between the Samaritans and the Jews prior to the coming of the Christ, as if you didn’t understand at all what Jesus said.
Three points:
1. In respect of consecrated church buildings, for civic services /events, the diocese has imposed explicit restrictions on the participation of other faiths. It’s a logical inference that these would be even greater for a service of worship of another faith. The reason for the restrictions is the same in both cases and therefore applicable to both.
2. It’s ironic that you split hairs over the applicability of the guidelines to how worship might be conducted in each case, only to highlight that Christ ushered in an era in which how God is to be worshipped is incredibly important.
3. Despite worship transcending location, it does not transcend doctrine. Christ still highlights the distinction that you’ve belittled. He declared to the woman at the well: ‘You worship you know not what’. That shows His forthrightness about the historic distinction that the Samaritans (and Muslims) would not acknowledge: ‘salvation is of the Jews’ revealed in his own Messiahship as the Son of David.
I can’t see any reason why guidelines on civic services should be seen as implying anything to do with inviting a group from another faith to pray in a building. The two circumstances are entirely different.
Kelvin,
Whatever authority instigated his apology, Giles Goddard has stated on the Thinking Anglicans blog: ‘But it appears that Canons F15 and F16 may be deemed to apply, and the undertaking that I have given refers implicitly to those Canons.’ Of course, you’ll see the two circumstances as entirely different, but the document that I quoted delivers its guidance as implications of the same canon, F16.
That said, I can’t see any further purpose in debating this matter. Let’s all move on.
Even in the relatively conservative Diocese of Aberdeen this is “old hat” back in 2013 St John’s Crown Terrace hosted Muslim prayers daily http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-21953899
Yes. Isaac Poobalan and that congregation did a good thing.
y’know, I have no objection, in principle, to the sounding of the profoundly moving Islamic call to prayer. Problem is that so many places (including the Masjid in my neighborhood) use horrible analog recordings of the Adhan on outdated amplification equipment so that they sound even worse than the overhead announcements on the subway. If they’d just invest in some good digital equipment,they could use one of the superb recordings available on YouTube.
When I did some teaching at an Islamic school one of the older students sang the call to prayer each time. it would be great if they could arrange to stream the call via the internet from places like that school to those Mosques who don’t have anyone suitably confident or skilled.
When I worked in prison chaplaincy, the room designated as the Chapel was the only room big enough to hold Muslim Friday prayers, so that’s where we held them. The Imam was very happy with the arrangement and so were the Christian ministers, but the local bishop told me that this couldn’t really carry on.
However, since the Chapel was never consecrated as a Christian space, it did continue, and I never felt any bad effects from it.
Indeed, many prison managers sought to have meetings in our Chapel as they said it was ‘so peaceful’, despite the pounding bass notes from the music in the gym directly beneath.
I did have a temporary struggle with myself about whether Muslim prayers could make a place ‘peaceful’ – but then realised that’s entirely up to God.
It seems to me that hospitality is at the roots of Christianity so offering hospitality to Muslims who need space is not really a huge thing – unless we are scared of Islam.
I cannot imagine where else in a state prison a prayer service would take place but in its chapel, or what business the leadership of any one denomination that uses it would have interfering with any other. In Canadian prisons, I’m not even sure you can leave religiously-specific iconography (like a cross for example) in the chapel between services.
A previous church where I was incumbent had a community of Ishmaeli Muslims praying every Friday and Saturday in the church hall. If the church community wanted the hall they used the church. This has been going on since the 1980’s!
…and for the life of me, I can’t see why that should be a problem. Apparently for many people it never would have been a problem. However, the very ugly reactions by a relatively small group of Muslims to a long period of exploitative use of their countries and their resources has turned the entire discourse into an argument about whether or not Islam is evil. Almost boggles the mind. I doubt very much if Christian bishops would feel it necessary to investigate the sharing of a Christian worship space with a Hebrew congregation.
So what’s going on in the head of the bishop of Southwark?
http://www.southwark.anglican.org/news/pr/pr.php?id=3577
A statement concerning recent events at St John’s Waterloo
13 Mar 2015
A spokesperson for the Diocese of Southwark said,
“The Bishop of Southwark takes very seriously his responsibility to uphold the teaching of the Church and to work within its framework of legislation and guidance. It is quite clear that Islamic prayer should not take place in a consecrated building.
This is why he has asked the Bishop of Kingston to investigate fully what happened. It is inappropriate to seek to make further public comments on this matter until this has happened.”
Ends.
Interestingly, there is even a negative response from this end of the world – by Mr.David Ould, a minister in the Sydney diocese who writes for the oddly-named ‘Stand Firm’. This site is also homophobic, sexist and xenophobic.
I can’t be xenophobic, I have friends from Xenon! 😀
Xenon is, I assume, somewhere near Krypton.
@Geoff McLarney (re prisons) – it wasn’t his business, of course, it was a multi faith chaplaincy but the largest room in in had been designated the ‘Chapel’ long before I arrived. Common sense dictated that the largest room should be used for large meetings of any description! Everything in it was movable and adaptable, to the extent that we held 2 Good Friday meditations either side of Friday prayers, all in the same room.
This argument has been going on for years in one form or another – I think there are still churches who won’t let their rooms out for yoga groups because yoga encapsulates a non-Christian philosophy. For me, the ethos of hospitality and fair sharing of resources overrode any other consideration. To be honest, I was uneasy to start with working in a ‘multi faith’ setting because I didn’t know a lot about non-Christian faiths, but it greatly enriched my own faith learning from others about theirs.
The decidedly conservative Methodist church I grew up in in Texas hosts yoga classes.