Interfaith Reconciliation

INTERFAITH RECONCILIATION True religiousness is to realize that the universe has one Lord and Maker—God Almighty—to whom we will have to answer for our actions on Judgement Day. Therefore, the discovery of God and the realization of one’s answerability before Him are integral parts of true religiousness. Despite recent improvements in global communications, there is still widespread ignorance and misinterpretat ion of different faiths, and this often leads to religion being used as a divisive rather than a cohesive force. Therefore, there is an ever-increasing need to promote a better understanding of all major faiths so inter-religious harmony may prevail. Given our multi-religious world, we must cultivate the transcendent genius of spirituality so that conflicting religious identities do not cause a disintegration of the socio-political framework of any country or wrongly channel people’s energies. Religions must play a positive role in inter-community bridge-building. Interfaith dialogue assumes particular in this regard. In such dialogue, the basic truths about different religions need to be emphasized so that superficial interpretations of one another’s scriptures may not be used, wittingly or unwittingly, to aggravate inter-community tensions. Scriptures should be read not to find their faults but to grasp their underlying spirituality. Religious tradi tions must be understood in depth. They must be lived in order to be known.