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Christian-Muslim-Jewish friendship thread

228 replies

niminypiminy · 10/06/2013 11:17

I've had a talk with Crescentmoon about starting a thread where Christians and Muslims can hold out our hands in friendship to one another. I feel like we have so much to offer one another, and I certainly would love to learn more about Islam, and to understand the ways in which my Muslim sisters live out their faith. Would anybody else like to join?

I'm niminypiminy, and I'm a member of the Church of England, and work, and have two children. I realise that I'd don't even know if there is an equivalent in Islam for the different denominations (aside from Sunni and Shia, which I'm not at all confident I correctly understand the difference between). I'm going to be offline for a couple of days, so can't get back to reply, but if anybody would like to use this thread to come together as Christians trying to live out our faith, and to prayerfully and open-heartedly welcome and understand each other... Smile

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madhairday · 10/06/2013 12:28

Lovely idea niminy and crescentmoon. I would love to join in. I'm a Christian, married to a CofE vicar (well pioneer minister but it's complicated ;) ) and would love to learn more about Islam and chat together. I worked in a school where the intake was 95% Muslim so have very fond memories of celebrating Eid and learning about the culture a little more, though I'm still shamefully ignorant really.

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Wishiwasanheiress · 10/06/2013 12:37

If be interested. CoE. I'd like to learn about it to understand some politics etc in media. Not studied Muslim religion since school so feel very out of date. Don't trust wiki!

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sammythemummy · 10/06/2013 12:59

Im glad you're asking real life Muslims about Islam, I feel there is so much misconception out there.

Hi Im Muslim with 1 dd, i see myself as a very active Muslim, ive recently become a sahm so adjusting to that.

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stressedHEmum · 10/06/2013 17:40

I don't really know much about Islam, but I think that Christianity and Islam have very much in common and that we should be able to accept and reach out to one another in love. we all worship the same God and venerate the same prophets and holy men.

The world would be a much better place if people tried to be a bit more understanding and loving of each other.

I am an elder in the Cos, I am very active in outreach, mission, pastoral and charity work. I have 5 kids, 1 graduate about to embark on a PhD, 1 going off to uni and 3 who are HE. 3 of my boys are on the autistic spectrum and I have 1 DD.

crescentmoon is such a lovely person that I feel very close too after all the time on the Daily Gratitudes thread. I would love to explore Christian/Muslim links further on this thread.

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toriap2 · 10/06/2013 17:48

I would be interested as my daughter has many Muslim friends and as I Christian she asks lots of questions that I struggle to answer. It would be nice to learn more about the Muslim faith as her friends know more about Christianity than I know about Islam

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JakeBullet · 10/06/2013 17:50

I am Catholic and would also like to join in this. We have much we can support each other with.

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superbagpuss · 10/06/2013 17:51

what a great idea
I'm c of e, used to house share with a Muslim so we had lots of interesting conversations and think talking to each other is the best way Grin.

not to hijack thread but would be nice to talk to Jewish people too as we all have the lineage as far as religious history goes

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zulubump · 11/06/2013 15:59

I would love to join too. I'm a Christian also and a fairly recent one. I have one dd aged 5 and one ds aged 3. Dd likes to ask a lot of questions so I can see we might have some interesting discussions about religion as she grows older! I bought her a book a while ago called "Different kinds of Beliefs". I do want support my kids to finding their way to their own belief.

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Tuo · 11/06/2013 18:03

Lovely idea for a thread. Count me in! Smile

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cloutiedumpling · 11/06/2013 19:35

And me!

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thegreenheartofmanyroundabouts · 12/06/2013 09:06

Me too!

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SilverSixpence · 12/06/2013 10:22

Great thread, id love to join too. I am Muslim and have a dear friend who is Christian who I have known since school. I do feel I have more in common with Christians especially as religion in general seems to be under threat in today's world.

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crescentmoon · 12/06/2013 11:02

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Message withdrawn at poster's request.

sashh · 13/06/2013 03:54

Can I just share this link about how well people can share things, wish you all luck and take my atheist self off for coffee.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-21953899

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MrsTerryPratchett · 13/06/2013 03:59

That's a lovely article, sashh. I'll join you for atheist coffee, if that's OK. Good luck and friendship to the thread.

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niminypiminy · 13/06/2013 10:06

Sassh thank you for sharing that story! It's a beacon of hope.

It's great to see that so many people want to be part of this Smile. I've had a busy few days and have to work in a bit but I just wanted to say that I am holding everyone here, and our friendship and reaching out to each other, in my prayers today.

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crescentmoon · 14/06/2013 08:05

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superbagpuss · 14/06/2013 08:09

crescent moon
we can eat any food
no need to be circumzised (sp?)

anyone can be a christian, you don't need to be born into it

I'm sure there are others

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Italiangreyhound · 14/06/2013 09:48

Can I join you, please? I am a Christian of 30 years, mostly in the C of E (Evangelical and at times pretty charismatic) but of late going to a Free Church for geographical reasons.

I am mum to an 8 year old and hope to adopt.

crescentmoon what a great question. I am going to sit back and see what others say before I jump in!

Bless you all.

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stressedHEmum · 14/06/2013 10:04

Hi, crescent Smile

someone much cleverer than me will come along and explain things better than I ever could but -

in Matthew chapter 5, Jesus says that he did not come to destroy yhr Law and the Prophets but to fulfil them. When you take that in conjunction with the bit in Acts about Peter's vision re clean and unclean food and all the missions to the Gentiles, what it means, in practice, is that a Christian is not bound by the Old Testament.

We don't have to follow the Law of Moses because it is fulfilled in Jesus and summed up in his instructions to love God with everything you have and to love your neighbour as yourself. If we do this, while accepting Jesus as Lord and believing that God raised him from the dead, we are doing everything that God asks of us.

All the wee, niggly Laws about not cutting down fruit trees, wearing clothes of a single fibre and excluding menstruating women from our midst are no longer required. All those things were given to Jews young in their faith and were a way of setting them apart for God and of guiding them, but they were also a bit of a curse because the showed the Israelites, time and again that they could never be good enough. Their lives were governed by so many laws that no matter what they did, they would be breaking at least one of them.

That all pointed to their need of a Saviour to make them right with God. The Prophets talked about this all the time - about the need to repent, about the coming Saviour who would relieve them. I think, though, that many of Jesus contemporaries didn't understand the kind of Messiah that God had in mind for them, looking more for a national, political messiah than a personal one.

The commandments, or Laws, that Jesus gives us take the place of the Law of Moses and the writing of the Prophets, and set us free from the legalism of Mosaic law, but their not as easy to follow as they sound!

I hope at least some of that makes sense. as i say, someone better than me will be able to explain more clearly, but that's a start.

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stressedHEmum · 14/06/2013 10:05

Italian, I think that you may be better able to give an answer than I.

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sparklingsea · 14/06/2013 14:29

What a lovely thread. I was brought up Christian and my husband is Muslim. The differences between our creeds has very little, if any impact on our daily lives. As human beings our similarities are far greater than our differences despite our very different religious and cultural backgrounds. I like to think that we are an example of Christian and Muslim harmony, bringing up our children as citizens of the world, I hope that neighbours, colleagues, friends and family can see our differences are no big deal at all.

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sparklingsea · 14/06/2013 14:30

What a lovely thread. I was brought up Christian and my husband is Muslim. The differences between our creeds has very little, if any impact on our daily lives. As human beings our similarities are far greater than our differences despite our very different religious and cultural backgrounds. I like to think that we are an example of Christian and Muslim harmony, bringing up our children as citizens of the world, I hope that neighbours, colleagues, friends and family can see our differences are no big deal at all.

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crescentmoon · 14/06/2013 22:52

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Message withdrawn at poster's request.

ummefatima · 15/06/2013 00:22

This is such a beautiful idea. I would love to be a part of this. Hi I've been a muslim for the last 35 years now. I know that there are so many similarities between Christianity and Islam. And having gone to school in the UK I had the privilege of celebrating both the Islamic celebrations and the Christian ones, but would absolutely love to learn so much more Smile

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