Benedict and Islam: a few more thoughts

I don’t have any insights on Tom’s theological question, but I’ll throw a few more musings into the pot. 

Here at Fordham on Saturday the Institute on Religion, Law & Lawyer’s Work had the privilege of co-sponsoring / providing hospitality for the Muslim Bar Association of New York event, “Five Years Later: Protecting Civil Liberties and National Security After 9/11.”  The president of the organization is a close friend, and so as we were setting up for the program (including the construction with room dividers of a space for prayer) we had the chance to chat a bit about Benedict’s remarks and the reaction.  When I reflected, “this is not a sound-bite Pope,” she understood profoundly what I meant, and commiserated about how many misunderstandings about the Muslim community have been generated by a sound-bite culture. 

I’m not saying that a global leader such as the Pope should not flank himself with skilled PR folks to anticipate how a sound-bit culture will react, and I think the apology was in and of itself a wonderful example of the readiness to live up to the demands of dialogue. 

But I do wonder if part of our task—as academics, and as people of faith—is to help people move beyond the sound-bites, to a deeper capacity to listen and welcome the complexity of what the other is trying to say, and how they might be struggling with some of the tensions inherent in their own texts and traditions. 

It seems to me that one of the best ways to engage at this level is to take a breath from head to head conceptual debate in order to create spaces in which we can simply get to know each other, listen to each other, and take in, in a more profound way, the other’s perspective.  And often the best way to create this kind of space is through the concreteness of loving hospitality: a meal together, water to wash, space to pray, listening and reacting to another’s article or talk, or simply just being completely present without worrying about a list of things to do.

(And to respond to Rick’s request, this is, in a very small nutshell, the core of my Scarpa conference paper—it is possible to reconcile evangelization and dialogue when, like Jesus, we “empty ourselves” out of love, and this kind of love in and of itself communicates an evangelical message.  I’ll try to get the full paper into decent enough shape to post soon!)

Amy