Christian Muslim Forum
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Non- Governmental and Other Organisations
- المنتدى الإسلامي المسيحي
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Second Floor, 305 Cambridge Heath Road, London, UK
- christianmuslimforum
Arabic, English- Show
Aim
Weave a web of open, honest, and committed personal relationships between Christians and Muslims; encourage shared reflection on the spiritual, theological, scholarly, ethical and practical values of the two traditions in order to offer resources for citizenship in our society; build a shared public platform to strengthen Christians and Muslims working together for the common good in partnership with others; develop channels of communication to help Christians and Muslims together to respond to events which test our relationship.
History
The Christian Muslim Forum is built on friendship between a group of Christians and Muslims, showing how faith is a catalyst for good relationships and welcomes the 'other'. This friendship began with a small group of Muslims and Christians working on the Archbishop of Canterbury's Initiative in Christian-Muslim Relations. This grew from Archbishop Carey's comments in 1997, "For the sake of the health of this country, we need to find ways in which members of our two communities can meet regularly together in a more structured way than has been possible up to now." His remarks were received warmly and positively by leaders of the Muslim community, leading to the Initiative's Listening Exercise between 2002 and 2004.
IRD Activities
- Community and Public Affairs Projects
The Forum aims to furthering positive interactions between Christian and Muslim communities, in particular, to foster the formation of Christian and Muslim dialogue groups. Community and Public Affairs projects include, inter alia, a dialogue group of young Christians and Muslims in Yorkshire, women's retreats organised for Muslim and Christian women to reflect on how spirituality underpins their lives as women and how women of another faith approach the same questions that life throws up
- Education
The Forum is committed to furthering positive interactions between Christian and Muslim students and teachers. The Education Specialists aim to bring together school aged Christian and Muslim students and Christian and Muslim teachers in order to engage in dialogue in a shared and safe environment on issues of mutual relevance and interest, encourage meaningful interaction between the two faith groups in order to promote mutual understanding and co-operation and develop long-term sustainable relationships between students and teachers from the two faith communities
- Family Issues
The Family Specialist Group provides support, advice and training to people on issues about the role of fathers, interfaith marriage and sexual health. The Family Specialist Group aims at raising and researching key issues of concern to Muslim and Christian families, developing networks of suitable practitioners, creating opportunities for people to discuss family issues, and creating links with grassroots activities and organisations
- International Issues
The Forum is committed to fostering good relations between Christians and Muslims in the International context, in particular with reference to Africa and Iran. The Forum aims to do this by bringing together different faith based international development agencies in order that their pooling of resources - material and human - can optimize the work of each. In the case of Iran, the Christian Muslim Forum works with other advocacy groups and attempts to stimulate discussion about Iran on the basis of the two faith traditions
- Media
The Media Specialists are involved with training local interfaith groups and intercultural leadership in Muslim and Christian communities in the field of communication
- Christian and Muslim Women's Programme
The women's programme built on work carried out among Christian and Muslim women in recent years. In 2011 the Christian Muslim Forum gathered information at women's focus groups in Burnley, Bradford, Leicester, Birmingham and London. The key issues raised by the women were fed into The Edge Report, which was unveiled at the first national Christian-Muslim women's residential in Northampton in March 2012, and launched across the country during National Inter Faith Week in November 2012. The programme culminated into The Edge Faith, Fear and Friendship event that was held at St Ethelburga's, London in 2013 to mark World Interfaith Harmony Week. The programme commenced a number of initiatives, such as: Muslim-Christian Women's Network for Leicester at the Central Mosque, Local Women's Inter-faith Directory, Local Women's Inter Faith Directory, Muslim-Christian Women's Dialogue Group in Leicester
- Youth
The Youth Specialists initiated the Forum's reflections on Youth and are committed to recognising the wide range of contexts and beliefs within and between faith communities, creating opportunities for Christian and Muslim young people to meet and build friendships, recognising the importance of creating opportunities for intra-faith dialogue and creativity, equipping young people to speak of their faith to people of another faith, training youth leaders in Christian Muslim dialogue and facilitating learning, aiming to develop new and creative methods which can be replicated elsewhere, and learning and developing our own knowledge and practice. Among other things, the Youth Specialists have a list of projects, such as OurLives Photography Project, Training in Syria: A series of seminars delivered in Syria on East-West understanding, Youth Dialogues: Meetings for Muslim and Christian pupils.
Main Focus Countries of Activities
UK - Birmingham, UK - UK - UK - UK - Leicester, UK - Burnley, UK - Bradford, UK - Birmingham, UK - London, UK - Birmingham, UK - Syria - Virtual