Tony Blair plans launch of interfaith group

Tony Blair has been proposing some kind of interfaith initiative. It's interesting that this article in the Torygraph picks up this comment. "'The tragedy is that Christians, Jews and Muslims are all Abrahamic religions. 'We regard ourselves as children of Abraham but we have fought for so long.'"
I find it interesting, at least because of this 'Abrahamic faiths' thing. I find it hard to get excited about it. In fact, I think that it is potentially a pernicious distraction. There are a number of reasons for this. Firstly, the commonality, while seeming attractive, I suspect is illusory and not powerful enough to make any real impact. The ways we handle the texts and stories of Abraham are just so different and the place that Abraham has in our respective traditions are such that it doesn't carry much authority for many Christians or Muslims. Secondly, the endeavour is bound to exclude other, important, parties who should be in on the peace-speaking processes: Buddhists, Hindus, and Sikhs among them. Thirdly, I suspect the Abrahamic religions move as being a way to maintain the priviledged positions of some faiths and to sideline groups that others would rather not have to deal with because they present challenges to their raison d'etre. For example, Muslim difficulties with post-Muhammedan 'prophets' such as Guru Nanak and successors, or Baha'ullah. In fact the whole Abrahamic faiths thing seems to offer far more by way of fractures and fissures than it seems to heal. It's an enterprise which is far more congenial to Muslims than the rest of us, I suspect, and I rather suspect it's a Muslim enterprise at root. It plays well with their views on prophethood but less well with Jewish and Christian notions of religious and spiritual history.
I may be wrong, but I hope that by opening out my skepticism, I can find out where and how.
Tony Blair plans launch of interfaith group - Telegraph: