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Development of Interfaith Prayer and the Discussion
In 1996 the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue and the Office on Inter-Religious Relations of the World Council of Churches jointly arranged a consultation in Bangalore. In their concluding statement, participants said that 'Christians should welcome opportunities to pray' with people of other faiths. 'Participation in interreligious prayer' they continued 'is not an optional activity restricted to an elite group, but an urgent call for a growing number of Christians today and should be a matter of concern for all Christians' (50).
Indeed, interreligious prayer should be the starting point of interreligious encounter in the view of Father Pierre de Bethune osb, who has been deeply influenced by Zen Buddhism and who is secretary of the Inter-Monastic Council. He told the consultation of the Trappists of Our Lady of Atlas, at Tibhirine in Algeria, who with Muslim friends created a prayer group called Ribat es Salam 'The Bond of Peace'. The first time a neighbouring Sufi community, at Christmas 1979, asked to meet the monks, its spokesman made clear that they wanted to meet for shared prayer. 'We do not want', he said, 'to engage in a theological dialogue with you, for it has often raised barriers which are man made. Now we feel called by God to unity. So we have to let God invent something new between us. This can be done only through prayer'.
Commenting on the experience of this group, The Prior of Tibhirine, Fr. Christian de Cherge, wrote recently, 'It is always somewhat painful to see a man of prayer and interior life stop short in his dialogue with the other, stumbling on enunciations of faith and the opacity of their incompatibilities, without seeking the other above in the heights or in the depth of the Spirit'. Tragically this dialogue through prayer was destroyed by the ruthless murder of seven of the Trappist monks, but the initiative has not been buried with them.
Evidence from the participants in the consultation suggested that interreligious prayer is increasingly common. The consultation was told of a group of Christians and Muslims in Zamboanga City in the Philippines who meet regularly and of a group of poor Christian and Muslim women in Delhi who gather regularly for prayer. Prayer does not require intellectual sophistication and, in situations of conflict, can override the divisions and bitterness, because as Fr Pierre de Bethune said, 'beyond all violence, prayer is the strongest bond, because it goes through God. It is the shortest way between humans, because God is the one who is nearest to us'.
Discussions suggested that whilst in some places, regular interreligious prayer takes place, more often it is arranged because of a special situation, for example during the Earth Summit in
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