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Tuesday, 24 June 2008

Increasing participation in Faith Forums

At the request of the Bishop of Barking and the Barking Episcopal Area Regeneration Group, I've recently written some draft guidance intended to encourage Anglican participation in Faith Forums (and other similar inter-faith groups).

Significant opportunities currently exist in the Barking Episcopal Area for us to become involved or extend our involvement in regeneration initiatives (including the Thames Gateway and 2012 Olympics, among others). The route into these opportunities is increasingly via local and regional Faith Forums and these new opportunities for Church involvement exist to a significant extent because of our multi-faith context both in the Barking Episcopal Area and nationally. These opportunities also present us with a challenge; how to be engaged in regeneration and faith forums in a way that is distinctively Christian? My draft paper seeks to suggest some answers to that question and to encourage each of us in the Barking Episcopal Area to make the most of the opportunities that currently exist to be involved in and to influence the regeneration of our Area.

However, before issuing the paper in a final version we are asking those involved in inter-faith groups whether they could discuss the paper and give feedback on the following issues:
  • whether your group feels this guidance strikes the right balance and addresses the right issues to increase participation in Faith Forums from the Anglican Church (and the wider Christian Church, if used ecumenically);
  • whether representatives of faiths other than Christianity in your group would be willing to say why their faith encourages their involvement in inter-faith activity, and whether they would be happy if their statement was included in the final version of our guidance; and
  • whether your group could provide one or two brief stories of the ways in which you engage in inter-faith activity or dialogue, and, again, whether the group would be happy if a selection of such stories were included in the final version of our guidance.

If anyone would be interested in seeing a copy of the draft paper and giving some feedback then please let me know.

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Iris DeMent - Let The Mystery Be.

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