Generous Love: the truth of the Gospel and the call to dialogue: a report from the Anglican Communion Network for Inter Faith Concerns: an Anglican theology of inter faith relations, (London: Anglican Consultative Council, 2008)
I suspect that this is worth reading.
There is a Fulcrum article on this from Richard Sudworth:
The Church of England and Islam: Hospitality and Embassy - Theologies of Religion in Process: Part IV Generous Love - 2008 and Beyond
It speaks about how 'Generous Love is a remarkable document that provides a Trinitarian rationale in support of an ongoing shift in formal Anglican approaches to other faiths ...
It talks engagingly about how the Church is both to be host and guest: receiving, learning and being challenged, as well as reaching out, proclaiming and challenging in turn.'
Here are some very encouraging quotes which caught my attention and have prompted me to think more about why I would like to read this.
“the truth of the Gospel and the call to dialogue” - I am interested in the sacredness of our conversations and about the conversations the church has on the web too and how we are engaging others with other faiths and none.
“that double conviction that we must regard dialogue as an imperative from Our Lord, yet must also witness consistently to the unique gift we have been given in Christ.”3
In echoes of the perichoresis theology more familiar to Eastern Orthodox spirituality, the work of God in the world and across cultures and religions is set in the “boundless life and perfect love which abide forever in the heart of the Trinity” and “are sent out into the world in a mission of renewal and restoration in which we are called to share.”5 I think that we need to build any interfaith dialogue on these very solid foundations.
“our relationships with people of different faiths must be grounded theologically in our understanding of the reality of the God who is Trinity. Father, Son and Spirit abide in one another in a life which is “a dynamic, eternal and unending movement of self-giving.””7
The combined “going out” and “welcoming in” are seen from within the Trinitarian dynamic around which the Eucharist is both symbol and source of that self-giving love.14 I love this idea of wiating for one another before we come to eat.
“the giving and receiving of hospitality is a most powerful sign that those who were strangers are reconciled to one another as friends.”15
“The mediation which Christians practise is motivated by the Spirit of love, in imitation of God’s own action of welcome and hospitality towards all people… To put it another way, God is himself both host and guest”.16
Ultimately, within this dynamic, God is the only host...a vision that encompasses the embassy of Christ, to “decide by the Gospel as the people of the Gospel must”.
No comments:
Post a Comment