A Common Word Between Us and You - Favourable Reaction

Favourable Reaction

• Response by David F. Ford, director of the Cambridge Inter–Faith Programme, 13 October 2007: "This historic agreement gives the right keynote for relations between Muslims and Christians in the 21st century...there are three main reasons why this is so important. First, it is unprecedented in bringing together so many of the leading religious authorities and scholars of Islam and uniting them in a positive, substantial affirmation. This is an astonishing achievement of solidarity, one that can be built on in the future. Second, it is addressed to Christians in the form of a friendly word, it engages respectfully and carefully with the Christian scriptures, and it finds common ground in what Jesus Himself said is central: love of God and love of neighbour....third it opens a way forward that is more helpful for the world than most others at present in the public sphere....it challenges Muslims and Christians to live up to their own teachings and seek political and educational as well as personal ways to do this for the sake of the common good."

• Response by former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair on 13 October 2007: "This is the only way, in the modern world, to make sense of different history and culture, so that, instead of defining ourselves by reference to difference, we learn to recognise the values we share and define a shared future."

• Response by Yale Divinity School's Centre for Faith and Culture 13 October 2009: "What is so extraordinary about A Common Word between Us and You" is not that its signatories recognise the critical character of the present moment in relations between Christians and Muslims. It is rather the deep insight and courage with which they have identified the common ground between the Muslim and Christian communities. What is common between us lies not in something marginal, nor in something merely important to each. It lies, rather, in something absolutely central to both: love of God and love of neighbour...that so much common ground exists – common ground in some of the fundamentals of faith – gives hope that undeniable differences and even the very real external pressures that bear down upon us can not overshadow the common ground upon which we stand together. That this common ground consists in love of God and of neighbour gives hope that deep cooperation between us can be a hallmark of the relations between our two communities."

• Response by Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury: "We are deeply appreciative of the initiative you have taken and welcome "A Common Word between Us and You" as a significant development in relations between Christians and Muslims...to your invitation to enter more deeply into dialogue and collaboration as part of our faithful response to the revelation of God's purpose for humankind, we say: Yes! Amen."

• During a visit to the Middle East by Pope Benedict XVI on 9 May 2009, he made a speech to an assembly of religious leaders at the King Hussein State Mosque, Jordan, and said about "A Common Word": "Such initiatives clearly lead to a greater reciprocal knowledge, and they foster a growing respect for what we hold in common and for what we understand differently. Thus, they should prompt Christians and Muslims to probe even more deeply the essential relationship between God and His world so that together we may strive to ensure that society resonates in harmony with the divine order. In this regard, the co operation found here in Jordan sets an encouraging and persuasive example for the region, and indeed the world, of the positive, creative contribution which religion can and must make to civic society."
  
  He also commented " …. and the more recent Common Word letter which echoed a theme consonant with my first encyclical: the unbreakable bond between love of God and love of neighbor, and the fundamental contradiction of resorting to violence or exclusion in the name of God (cf. Deus Caritas Est, 16)."