I spent a fascinating week in Birmingham last month. All three year groups joined together to learn about Islam, another of the three monotheistic (one God) faiths.

We met Muslims and were invited inside a mosque complex to talk with their Imam. We learnt about the routine of the mosque and the teaching services on Fridays. We had a session with Caroline Jarawala, a well known Indian artist whose work portrays a personal spiritual interpretation of early Christian Art with Hindu symbolism; and it was helpful to see that a Hindu style painting of "Mother and Child" could still lead one to thoughts about Mary and Jesus. We spent time with the Revd. Dr. Michael Jagessar - a minister in the United Reformed Church whose special interests include interfaith and ecumenical studies and black theology - as he led various discussions based around similarities and differences between the Christian and Islamic faiths.

It was quite a challenging experience as we explored our own reactions to what we were being told and what we were seeing. To learn that Muslims don't believe that Jesus Christ was anything more than a prophet, and one who had failed at that. To be told that Mohammed had been sent by God to complete the work that Jesus had failed to do was also difficult to simply accept without wanting to say more ourselves. 
It was doubly difficult when we came to realise that not only did the Muslims we were talking to know their Qur'an very well indeed but they were also particularly well informed about what the Bible says. I have to confess to my chagrin that I am not as well versed in my own sacred text as some of the people I met.

We also had sessions with someone working closely with Muslim women as we looked at the special gifts women can bring to interfaith encounters. We identified their sense of shared community spirit, lack of other agendas and flexible, open attitudes as something that it would be very easy to engage with. Someone from the Scripture Union told us about the work he was doing to bring teenage Christians and Muslims together in social environments. This way they meet on neutral territory and can see for themselves how normal they all are. A third session was led by an Anglican priest who had spent his life and ministry working first in Dohar, India and subsequently in Bangladesh. He shared with us the importance of community for Muslims.

What did I take away from the week? I certainly know a little more about Islam. It brought home to me very powerfully the dangers of banding the various strands of Islamic faith into a single group. There was a heartfelt complaint from one of the Imams about the problems caused by Saudi Arabian financed Imams bringing their own brand of Islam to England with no experience or tradition of the UK based faith development. I learnt that care is needed not to tar all with the same brush; that although tolerance and diversity are encouraged by the Qur'an, the conservative Wahibi sect is gaining influence through its worldwide network of Saudi financed madrasas (religious schools).

I liked what I saw. I met genuinely ordinary and humble people who had a love for God and their fellow man. I saw practical care in the community with the emphasis on sharing food as a symbol of their unity. What was personally affirming was the sense of the goodness of humanity; of being with a group who were able to share doubts and concerns; and also the importance of Jesus Christ in my own faith, if only because my own faith doesn't work without Christ.

A footnote to conclude: one evening I tuned into the radio hoping to catch the news and found myself listening instead to Unity FM. They were starting a regular programme of verses of the Koran, read first in Arabic and then in English. I spent a very peaceful and enjoyable half hour lying on my bed listening to what was being broadcast. As I wondered how many people round Birmingham were tuned into the same programme I reflected on how and when we Christians might spend the same care and attention sharing our sacred text with the wider world.