Dialogue with Mecca

Oblivious to the political troubles of the Middle East (see THE WORLD), a group of Roman Catholics, Moslems and Jews gathered in Paris last week for an amicable discussion of how they might attain common understanding.

"Friendship, comprehension and mutual aid" is the high-minded goal of France's Fraternity of Abraham -- quite possibly the world's only interfaith organization that includes Moslems and Jews as equal partners with Christians.

The fraternity is an outgrowth of an interfaith meeting in Paris last spring, organized by Jesuit Theologian Jean Danielou and Father Michel Hayek of Lebanon, lecturer on Christian-Moslem relations. To their delight, both Moslems and Jews accepted invitations to attend. "The discussion was often hot," Hayek recalls, "but no one threw any chairs." A series of subsequent discussions proved so rewarding that three months ago the leaders formed the Fraternity of Abraham--named after the Old Testament prophet revered by all three religions.

Jesus to Mohammed. Endorsed by Paris' Maurice Cardinal Feltin, the fraternity now has several hundred members, including the Grand Rabbi of Paris, Meyer Jais, and the rector of Paris' Grand Mosque, Si Hamza Bouba-keur. The association meets once every three weeks and, while carefully skirting political issues, freely exchanges theological views. Last week, members of the executive board agreed to set aside a five-minute period in mid-June on their faiths' respective sabbaths during which imams, rabbis, priests and ministers throughout France would preach "understanding among the three great monotheistic religions."

The success of the fraternity points to the fact that the ecumenical dialogue between Christians and Jews is now inviting participation from Moslems. The trend received much of its impetus from the Second Vatican Council's declaration "On Non-Christian Religions," which approvingly cited the common bonds of Islam and Christianity--Moslems, for example, venerate Jesus as a prophet. The Vatican's Secretariat for Non-Christian Religions created a special section to encourage dialogue with Islam, and Vienna's ecumenical-minded Franziskus Cardinal Konig has lectured at Al Azhar University in Cairo. At Baghdad's Al Hikma University, Jesuits are opening an institute for the study of Islamic culture.

Protestants are also stepping up the dialogue with Mecca. The World Council of Churches supports a continuing program of grass-roots-level contact with Moslems. It recently conducted an interfaith conference in Ceylon that was attended by Moslems; in Africa the Council helps finance seven minister-scholars who are specifically assigned "to inform African Christians about their Islamic neighbors."

Renovating Islam. Potentially, the most fruitful ground for discussion, ecumenists suggest, is not theology but the search for common religious solutions to pressing worldly problems. A notable advocate of this approach is the Benedictine monastery of Toumliline, in Morocco's Middle Atlas mountains, which for eleven years has sponsored annual meetings of Moslem and Christian thinkers from dozens of countries. The sessions deal broadly and impartially with major contemporary themes, such as the problems of youth and cities. Purpose of the meetings is to encourage Islam to face these issues from the perspective of its own traditions. Says the monastery's prior, Dom Denis Martin: "We try to show them that the alternative is not atheistic materialism, much less Christianity, but a renovated Islam adapting Moslem values to the present."

The formal yoking of Christianity with either Judaism or Islam is no more than a dim eschatological hope. Yet ecumenists involved in conversations with Islam feel that there is a valuable purpose to the current talks--the clearing away of centuries of hatred and misunderstanding, the forging of friendship among faiths that face a common enemy in atheism and disbelief.

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