We are delighted to announce the next 'Christians and Muslims in Public Life' workshop.

This event will continue to explore the topic of Media and Religious Phobias. It will look at how the reporting of the experiences of Christian minorities in Muslim-majority contexts – including Believers from a Muslim Background in the West – contributes to Western Christians’ understanding of Islam. Are Muslims anti-Christian? Is there such a thing as ‘Christophobia’? How should the realities be reported and what should be the Christian response?

Speakers:

Julia Bicknell – Director, World Watch Monitor; former BBC presenter/reporter/producer
Dr Iqtidar Cheema – UN Advisory Board on Genocide and Atrocity Crimes; Director, Institute of Leadership & Community Development
Fr Dr Nadim Nassar - Executive Director & Co-Founder of The Awareness Foundation; Church of England Syrian priest
Dr Richard McCallum – Senior Fellow, Centre for Muslim Christian Studies

Panellists:

Dr Karamat Iqbal - Education & Diversity Consultant, with an interest in religious literacy and religious freedom
Nathan Javed - A Christian involved in ethnic ministry in West Yorkshire and Pakistan

Pre-reading and outputs:

Papers, resources and links for pre-reading will be posted at https://www.cmcsoxford.org.uk/research/public-life. Attendees are requested to review (some of) the materials in advance, and come to the workshop willing to contribute their perspectives in groups with others sharing broadly similar persuasions, in order to develop coherent arguments that will be published on the CMPL website. Participation and contributions will be under Chatham House rule (https://www.chathamhouse.org/chatham-house-rule#). Attendees are free to use the information received during the event but neither the identity nor the affiliation of the contributor(s) may be revealed, apart from attributed material provided, with permission, on the CMPL website. If you have suggetions for further resources, then please send them to cmpl@cmcsoxford.org.uk. Outputs including audio and powerpoints will be posted at https:www.cmcsoxford.org.uk/research/public-life/media-phobias-workshops.

Attendees:

Please note that, although we have Christian and Muslim speakers, this workshop will be for Christians to explore their own ideas and differences on these topics. We hope that there will be a later opportunity for Christians and Muslims to come together to continue the discussion in a suitable context. As always CMPL will explore different perspectives on these topics with anticipated but respectful disagreements between participants.

A later stage in the project will open up the Christian responses to Muslim response, in which we hope to draw Muslims into the conversation and join in existing conversations such as those at the Christian Muslim Forum (http://christianmuslimforum.org/).

Tickets:

Attendees must register in advance
Tickets are £20, payable on the day
Refreshments will be provided but attendees are requested to bring their own lunch.

The CMPL Initiative:

The CMPL initiative focuses on topics arising in the public sphere of relevance to Christians and Muslims. It aims to improve the quality of the debate, particularly where there is a range of opinions and disagreements including among Christians, by making available resources that can inform a wider discussion. CMPL outputs, developed during workshops and subsequent discussions, are intended for: Christians, Muslims, policy makers and journalists.

We encourage involvement from a broad range of Christian perspectives, representing a range of traditions committed to the uniqueness of Jesus Christ. However, we do expect attendees to respect one another, maintain high standards of integrity and to use these occasions for fruitful discussion. This is described in our code of practice provided to attendees. We believe that in this way we can encourage free speech on issues of religion in public life in this counttry.

The topic of Christians, Muslims and the Media sits within a broader series of topics such as social cohesion, education, the law and marriage. Recordings, response papers and links to helpful resources are developing as an on-going cnversation, and are available on the website at https://www.cmcsoxford.org.uk/research/public-life/

Data Handling:

If you register to attend this event, your details will automatically be registered on the CMPL contacts database. If you do not wish for this to happen, or if you wish your details to be included but cannot attend this event, or have any other questions concerning CMPL, please email CMPL at CMPL@cmcsoxford.org.uk

Disclaimer:

The initiative aims to present a broad spectrum of different perspectives, and any views presented are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the organisers or the Centre for Muslim-Christian Studies.

CHRISTIANS, MUSLIMS AND THE MEDIA - Persecuted Christians