It’s so easy to be thoughtless

How would a young Muslim mother, who knew the history of the Crusades, feel having moved into my village and taking her children to play?

Great Bentley, Essex, 2023

In the Marian Persecu�ons Catholics burn protestants at the stake for heresy. Is it ever possible to divorce religion from poli�cs?

Stra�ord, London, 2023

More recently the IRA disregarded the will of God to murder random innocent civilians, and the UDA did likewise.

City of London Police Photos – Permission applied for

Muslim terrorists also commited atroci�es in London but they no more represent Islam than the IRA represent Catholicism.

Tavistock Gardens, London, 2023 / Hyde Park, London, 2023

Atheists I talked to cited three reasons for not believing:

• atroci�es in God’s name;

• experience showing them the church lied in its teaching

• belief that all Gods are man-made

• the need to escape the clutches of an over-controlling church.

Having escaped they felt liberated…….

Cage, Weeley, 2023

The best defence to claims that any Faith Group is terrorist-centric is our own experience of goodness across ethnic and religious boundaries.

As an eight year old in Aden I was looked a�er with love and care by Arella an Ethiopian Muslim. I was also treated with love and respect by Arab shopkeepers as I wandered around the back streets by myself against my parents’ instruc�ons.

Steamer Point, Aden, 1961

I took this 52 years ago. When Mary was walking down a street in Catolica she crossed herself, something I hadn’t seen before. When I asked what she was doing she said ‘Peter I don’t know what you do in England but in Ireland when we pass the house of a friend we say hello’……. That pure, simple Faith has endeared me to Catholicism to this day…

Catolica , Italy, 1971

On finding my stepson had a heart atack the previous day a Muslim stranger in a café spent 15 minutes finding an open Church where I could pray for my stepson a�er he had a heart atack.

Another good example of coopera�on is a local hospital chapel catering for Chris�ans and Muslims, even offering disposable prayer mats.

Muslims kneel and prostrate themselves, five �mes daily in prayer, which may seem strange to us, but kneeling is not unique to Muslims.

St Sabrina’s Church, Brightlingsea, 2023 / Tendring Church, Tendring, 2023

Although we believe God hears our prayers we may feel unworthy or insufficient to move God's heart by ourselves. We may ask others to pray on our behalf and may even ask those who already passed from this life.

Thanking them, and asking them to intercede with God on our behalf is acceptable in all Faiths as long as we avoid asking for miracles of their own making as that would turn them into Gods, and there is only one God.

St Pancras Church, Ipswich, 2023

Muslim reverence for their acts of prayer includes cleansing their skin of the dirt of the world, and removing their shoes (‘this is Holy Ground’) before prayer. For other Faiths it can be a moment of quiet spiritual cleansing.

There is neither Mass nor Communion in Muslim services because Muslims do not believe in Jesus’ divinity.

In Catholic Mass the host becomes the actual body and blood of Christ and is revered and disposed of accordingly. Consump�on is restricted to confirmed Catholics in good standing with God.

Anglicans treat the Bread and Wine and its disposal with the utmost reverence but do not believe in its transmuta�on. They welcome a ny bap�sed Chris�an in ‘good standing’ with God to the table. in its disposal. In Methodist churches, it is a simpler ritual .

St Sabrina’s, Brightlingsea, 2023 / Methodist Church, Great Bentley, 2023

Are we redeemed by God's love, God's mercy, or mysteriously by Jesus’ sacrifice? That is not a ques�on to which I have the answer.

Faiths differ regarding Jesus's parentage and divinity. Biblical texts differ but some support the Muslim view that Jesus is no more the Son of God than Adam was.

Muslims believe that he was neither, but was the son of Mary. That he was a noble messenger, born miraculously as but not divine.

THIS WORK WAS EXHIBITED IN A ONE-DAY POP-UP EXHIBITION

FOLLOWED BY A TALK AND DISCUSSION GROUPS

HERE ARE THE ‘REPORT OUTS’ FROM THE DISCUSSION

Faith is Faith. And some�mes it's your accident of Birth or geography of where you're born that will lead you down a par�cular path.

It’s not beliefs because the belief systems are very, very similar, aren't they? It's just the way that they're communicated. Some finer points around them will differ just as language is different.

The image I’m taking take away is Faith and people's quest for the divine.

Faith may begin as an accident of birth but it is a personal journey and I think as each of us develops to personally we have a personal rela�onship with God which has its ups and it's downs and con�nues to grow if we're fortunate enough throughout our lives.

The interes�ng idea I got from today was when we talked about Souls. In a sense, we all believe that God le� soul in us as our soul is part of his soul, right? I men�oned the idea that this is why I was sort of sacred. That's why killing is a murder and so’s somebody taking take their own life. Suicide is a murder because somebody's killing themselves, you know, taking this soul that was given to them by God as a gi� as a trust that they can't take it out themselves.

Well, I think that what I've learnt this evening and in other discussions is that different Faiths have much more in common than we might imagine. We just need to take the �me to understand each other beter and that's really the thing to take away from this whole process.

I saw the picture of the barrier with the hook and church as Peter did un�l he told me it was St James’ Church. Then I thought they've changed the chairs. So it's where you're coming from, isn't it? I mean I saw it as the barrier and then when I knew which church it was I was concentra�ng on the chairs.

I was just going to say more unites us than divides us. I just had a point as well. Yes. John from the zoom that conversa�on.

I think we appreciated the images you showed us which Illustrated both difficul�es between faiths but much more emphasized the way in which faiths can work together. I was par�cularly interested in that comment that in working together we're working to do God's work in the world today and that seems to be a real mo�va�on whichever Faith you come from.