An exciting interfaith event has just taken place as part of student ministry at St. George's, Leeds.
Some forty of the church’s students gathered to listen to a tri-faith panel, followed by discussion in small groups. Entitled Faith in a Multifaith Culture, it aimed to help students understand what makes people from other faiths 'tick' and how, although we have differences of belief, we have much in common.
It was organised by one of St George’s students, Beth, and David Kibble, a St George’s licensed lay minister who leads its interfaith group.
During the evening trainee rabbi Anna Dyson, Vicar of Holy Trinity Boar Lane Josh Lees and Imam Qari Asim talked about how they pictured God and how they felt their faith affected their everyday life.
As part of this, Anna Dyson described how events in the Middle East were making things very difficult for those in the Jewish community.
Both she and Qari Asim said how the differences between our faiths were outweighed by the similarities. All three guests described how they had taken the path of becoming a faith leader and what it involved. What the students heard were not just factual accounts but personal reflections: they got to know their guests as people and not just as faith representatives.
One student said afterwards that she had always seen interfaith work as something marginal: she no longer saw things that way. Another student was thinking how he might support his work colleagues during Ramadan.
Speaking at the end of the event, one felt that listening to members of another faith enriches our own; another said that it was refreshing to know about the similarities between our faiths and that Jews, Christians and Muslims all have a love for God.
The evening ended with Josh Lees saying the Lord's Prayer, the trainee rabbi giving a Jewish blessing in Hebrew and English and Qari Asim offering a Muslim blessing in Arabic and English. Beth, the church’s student interfaith representative, concluded with a Celtic blessing.