Faith Schools Seminar (Primary)

As the Muslim and Christian Presidents of the Christian Muslim Forum we deplore terrorism and violence, especially any which claims to be religiously justified (‘Chief Constable warns terror fight will take decades’ comments to BBC2′ ‘Generation Jihad’). We re-affirm that our scriptures and prophetic traditions themselves neither inspire nor support violence. Rather they call us to peace, bridge-building and being good neighbours with each other and discourage the waging of war. The roots of religiously justified terrorism and violence lie elsewhere, as many in the community and inter faith organizations have been saying for some years.

We were very disturbed and concerned that the image of a Muslim praying at a mosque was originally used to accompany the online report of this news item. This allows, or encourages, people to wrongly associate religious practice with violence and terrorism. We are pleased that the BBC has recognized that this was inappropriate and have now replaced it. We also ask the BBC, and other media, to avoid associating the mainstream Muslim community, and practice of Islam, with violence and terrorism and clearly identify these as criminal, not Islamic acts.

The Christian Muslim Forum, whose origins pre-date 7/7 and 9/11, exists to promote positive dialogue and better understanding between both faiths by challenging myths, misunderstandings and prejudice. We have contributed to improved public understanding and better relations between both communities through our statements on Religious Festivals, our Ethical Witness guidelines and our current Mosque-Church twinning and Campus Dialogue projects.’

Rt Revd Dr Richard Cheetham, Dr Musharraf Hussain OBE (Co-Chairs), Revd Esme Beswick MBE, Shaykh Abbas Ismail, Shaykh Ibrahim Mogra, Shaykh Haytham Tamim, Dr Nicholas Wood