Peter James Cox SAID President.
Two books have caught my attention recently – The Pope and the Grand Imam – A Thorny Path – A Testimony to the Birth of the Human Fraternity Document by Mohamed Abdel Salam and Godless Morality – Keeping Religion out of Ethics by Richard Holloway.
Glancing through Godless Morality and a Thorny Path I am filled with hope.
Mohamed Abdel Salam is Secretary General of the Muslim Council of Elders and Richard
Holloway served as the Anglican Bishop of Edinburgh from 1986 – 2000.
Given the moral basis of the document on Human Fraternity and Living Together co signed by Pope Francis Grand Imam Al Azhar in Abu Dhabi in 2019 these books are worth considering together.
As we enter what the author of Thorny Path calls a new era of religious dialogue the lucid observations of the liberal Richard Holloway are very much worth bearing in mind.
Thorny Path is a meticulously heartfelt first hand account of everything in the run up to the signing of the historic Abu Dhabi declaration on Human Fraternity by Pope Francis and the Grand Imam in 2019, In his forward to A Thorny Path Pope Francis refers to Mohamed Abdel Salam as his son.
In addition to having served as Bishop of Edinburgh Richard Holloway was Primus of the Scottish Episcopal Church from 1992 to 2000.
I have often criticised so-called “Progressives” for the fact that generally they cannot offer a definition of progress. However the general inclination towards future progress is as good as the inclination to conserve what we have built in the past. As Thomas Aquinas tells us – Si Bonus non esset – “if it wasn’t good it wouldn’t exist”.
In Richard Holloway I am reminded of the luminary Scottish Enlightenment philosopher David Hume. As Hume and other brilliant Scottish Enlightenment luminaries created the zeitgeist in the 18th Century in a contemporary Scottish postmodern context Richard Holloway offers similarly brave comment – building strong tracks for the progressive ecclesiastical agenda to run on in the future.
Holloway’s former diocese of Edinburgh was once the centre of the Scottish Enlightenment.
Much of contemporary prophecy consists in artists merely commenting on the zeitgeist. On the other hand the Scottish Enlightenment was an era in which men and women of virtue cooperated and actually delivered a new and enlightened and modern time.
In the present new era of religious cooperation ushered in by the Abu Dhabi Declaration conservatives and liberals must learn from each other. The heartfelt writings in Thorny Path and Godless Morality point towards a New Enlightenment – one in which the lessons of the past are learned and we can move forward hopefully together.
Peter James Cox SAID President.