Rev Malcolm Duncan: Building a Better World - Part 2

The Leader of the Faithworks Movement, Revd Malcolm Duncan, has just published his first book, Building a Better World (Continuum Press, £7.99, ISBN 0-8261-9152-9). In this, the second of a series of extracts and thoughts from the book, he considers how Christians need confidence in their own faith in order to work with others...

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"Yet there is still a need for a better understanding of what Christian faith contributes to our communities and our world. It is not enough to read the words of pop stars and politicians - we need to know how Christian faith builds a better world. We need to understand some of the positive principles that underpin Christian faith if we are to understand what it can contribute to our lives and to the world... Christian faith must understand its own unique contribution to building a better world, but it must also understand how others can contribute to making the world a better place."
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Many followers of Christ can view everything about other faiths as wrong. We are often better known for the things that we oppose, rather than the things we actually believe in. I wonder if this might be because of a lack of confidence in our own faith, and in our own faith identity.

A key question is how do we work in partnerships with people of other faiths and people of none, without losing our own sense of identity?

Some would have us believe that the answer is to keep faith private. The Prime Minister, Tony Blair, delivered a speech for the Faithworks Movement in March 2005 in which he said that faith should always be seen as private.

But what if faith is not privatised? To quote the American author, Jim Wallis, "what if faith is personal, but never private?" Rather than suggesting that Blair should not let his 'private faith' get in the way of his public life, perhaps it might be healthy to think about the reality that it is impossible for anyone not to be shaped by their convictions, their beliefs and their spirituality? If we believe that faith cannot be put in a box, how can any decision we make not be affected by it?

The faith that someone holds, whatever that faith might be, is a massive influence on that person's views. It cannot be anything else. The challenge of faith has arisen because we have allowed the idea of 'faith' to be misrepresented by moralists, fundamentalists and extremists. We have allowed a very narrow definition of 'morality' to become the norm. We have allowed faith to be sidelined because we have allowed it to be hijacked.

As a follower of Christ, I believe that in Christ God has uniquely revealed himself to the world and that outside of Christ God cannot be known fully. However, I do believe that other religions contain many good things and that across religions and non-religious belief there are a number of common traits and values that unite us. As a citizen, I can recognise a shared value across faiths and work for a better world. I do not need to become a Sikh or a Muslim in order to see this uniting value and build upon it. I do this because of my faith, not in spite of it.

The Faithworks Movement has members from all Christian denominations, encompassing a wide spectrum of views. Despite these differences, we are all committed to building a better world by engaging with and serving our communities. Having an element of disagreement on some issues can actually fuel our creativity, and we understand it is possible to work with someone without agreeing with everything that they say or do.

We are confident that Christian faith works, and because of that we can be confident in engaging in dialogue or working with others towards a shared aim. Faithworks calls this Distinctive Faith: we all have a right to be confident in our own faith identity, and we all share a responsibility towards the communities in which we live and work.

I'd love to hear what you think about this. Why not join in the debate at www.buildingabetterworld.typepad.com?