19 April 2004

Mosque in Cathedral in Cordoba?

This'll be an interesting story to watch and see how it develops. After the Reconquista when the Reyes Catolicos ousted the moors from Spain and unified Spain under Catholic monarchy, the mosque in Cordoba was converted to Christian worship by becoming a Cathedral. With increased north African presence in southern spain the question is being posed by Muslims; "Could we use our old mosque please?". I've long wanted to visit Cordoba [and Seville and Granada and Toledo], but as I haven't I don't know how good might be the geographical solutions to share space or how it might be done -the article hints that it should be possible relatively easily. It is interesting to note the appeal to the Vatican: Catholic pronouncements on interfaith theologiy etc in recent years have been tolerant whilst retaining the centrality and uniquness of Christ for salvation, so there is room to make that appeal over the heads of what might appear from this article to be an unsympathetic hierarchy.

Of course the question of whether Christians could do the same in Muslim-majority lands is an interesting one [and put by one person in the article]. Personally I feel that any such request from Muslims if met should perhaps also include an explicit statement from the Muslim groups concerned recogniseing that it would be fair to allow Christians [and others] similar rights/priviledges in more Islamic states ...

No comments:

"Spend and tax" not "tax and spend"

 I got a response from my MP which got me kind of mad. You'll see why as I reproduce it here. Apologies for the strange changes in types...