Conversation with Ingrid Mattson - Program 5310

now let's talk with Ingrid Matson Ingrid thank you for joining us today it's a delight to have you here and have an opportunity to deepen our understanding about the religion of Islam I thought we might start by talking about your personal journey a little bit we mentioned in the introduction that you chose to convert and I'm wondering what inspired that and what is the the essence and the beauty of this Muslim faith for you for me it really was this example of faith in the world the first Muslims I met poor West African students living in Paris not very well accepted by by the people of that city as as a part of the common good they still maintained a sense of dignity a sense of generosity they didn't become angry but they lived their faith through this compassionate sense of generosity which they shared with me another another poor student hanging around the city so it was that that that appealed to me that attracted me to see what was the spiritual basis of of their presence in the world I'd be interested Ingrid to know it seems that your life-changing friendships with those Muslim students in France and also your work in Pakistan to help Afghan refugees where you met your future husband it seems to me you were you were doing ministry you were doing discipleship about the reduction of human suffering so what were those attitudes and values in Islam did you see a merging of your understanding of the Christian faith and Islam in your conversion absolutely I was raised Roman Catholic and when I stopped practicing Catholicism it wasn't a rejection of the Catholic Church but at that time my faith had simply had simply left and and it was Islam that gave me back faith in God but one thing that I always appreciated in my Catholic upbringing was the a sense that we were called to alleviate suffering in the world to show our gratitude towards to God for what we had the blessings we had by demonstrating that by sharing them with others and when I became a Muslim I found that message so strong in the paren caring for the poor showing gratitude to God not just through your words by saying thanks but through your deeds by by helping the people of the world and making this a better place especially for those who are the most marginalized you know it's such a resonance between these two traditions and I think that's one of the reasons why I find work between Christians and Muslims so so easy because it's clear to me that this is just a foundational message in both our traditions and what do you find are some of the greater challenges or the misperceptions that people have right now and that Christian Muslim relations you talked about a little bit in your message but there seems to be a lot of misunderstandings out there that you alluded to certainly certainly many people believe that that Muslims are are more violent than other people and that even Islam encourages this violence this is a problem that is related to the way we understand scripture it's one of the reasons I wrote a book on the port on the Koran called the story of the Quran to show how the context of the revelation of the Quran needs to be understood so that we can separate those passages that deal with war and conflict and what are the messages for us today and and given the fact that Muslims are now considered to be a quarter of humanity and that most of them are living very peacefully in many cases as minorities in countries like like India and Russia and China that that most Muslims certainly are not violent people in trying to break through these stereotypes of distortions of truth often fueled by secular media Ingrid I wonder I wonder if you can help us try to see more clearly the fringe elements I mean there's in turn I seen more warfare not only between religions but among religionists who claim the same faith so help us understand some of the fringe pieces of Islam in trying to bring clarity to the stereotypical feelings and that's a great point Lydia because in fact if we look at the kind of violence that has occurred in the last say seven or eight years we see that more Muslims have died as a result of terrorism by Muslim extremists than non-muslims so this is primarily directed at their own societies and what are these people opposing certainly there are many different messages some of them more political economic but what we see consistently is an authoritarian attitude a belief that that there's one way my way or the highway and that that really goes against the construction of authority and traditional Islam we do not have one authority who can see who decides what is right or wrong in our religion assam has a tradition of dialogue bringing together Muslims from across different places to form a consensus or try to approach consensus on issues so this authoritarian perspective which can almost be totalitarian seems in fact more inspired by those kind of 20th century fascists or totalitarian movements than anything from the Islamic tradition and I think that's something we need to take seriously is that is the way that that ideologies of the 20th century have really distorted our tradition well it's a good segue to talk about a common word then that you mentioned your message as well this is a document that exists that's constantly evolving some people would ask what kind of document itself do but talk about some of the practical applications of this and the time that we have left here because it's making an impact in the world in a big way you would you would say absolute lutely and in the end we are people of scripture and we are people who have looked to authoritative statements and creeds to tell to show us the bounds or the limits of proper behavior within our traditions both Christianity and Islam so it's important when as I mentioned when bad ideology comes in the door that there's something that can refute that and and what we've noticed is that there's such a sense of relief on the part of ordinary Christians and Muslims that they now have a document like the common word in the Christian responses to them to say yes you should engage with your with your neighbor of the other faiths in doing good work you are not required to dislike them or keep them at an arm's distance you will not water down your faith if you work with them for the common good to alleviate human suffering so although people may say well it's just words we need those words as authoritative so that then we can go out and do those good works with a response to the extremists or fundamentalists in our religion who say you know stay away from those other people angry we're so happy you've joined us today there's been a wonderful conversation we're going to continue it on the show I know in future programs thank you again thank you so much it's been my pleasure you

Channel: 30GoodMinutes

Views: 31,557

Rating: 4.9375973 out of 5

Keywords: 30 Good Minutes, Conversation with Ingrid Mattson, Christian, Muslim, Christian and Muslim relations, Chicago Sunday Evening Club, Gratitude

Id: v65z-EYcyl0

Length: 8min 10sec (490 seconds)

Published: Mon Jul 15 2013