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http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=sto...les_1&printer=1
Seminary to Launch Interfaith Ethics Code
Sat Dec 6, 9:52 PM ET – AP Associated Press
PASADENA, Calif. - A leading evangelical Christian seminary is using federal funds to launch a $1 million program to ease strained relations with Muslims with an interfaith code of ethics.
Fuller Theological Seminary's proposed code would ask members of either faith to refrain from making offensive statements about the other, affirm a mutual belief in one God and prohibit proselytizing over the two-year span of the project.
The initiative, funded by a grant from the Justice Department (news - web sites), includes teaching the code to Muslims and Christian community leaders in the Los Angeles area and publishing a book, the seminary said.
"We hope to lead a large portion of evangelical Christians into a better understanding of Islam," said Sherwood Lingenfelter, Fuller's provost and senior vice president. "After 9/11 there was a great deal of hostility in the Christian community toward Muslims."
Last year, televangelist Jerry Falwell described the Prophet Muhammad as a terrorist and the Rev. Jerry Vines, former president of the Southern Baptist Convention, called Islam's founder a "demon-possessed pedophile."
Some Muslim leaders who have already begun participating in the initiative said they were delighted by the Fuller program.
"We are changing the course away from accusations and poisoning the well of relations to what can develop into a project in the service of God," said Yahia Abdul-Rahman, who began participating in the initiative last year when he headed the region's network of mosques, known as the Islamic Shura Council of Southern California.
However, some conservative Christians opposed parts of the ethics code.
"For Fuller to declare that Christians and Muslims worship the same God would be a radical departure, not only from the evangelical tradition but also the tenets of orthodox Christianity," said John Revell, a spokesman for the Southern Baptists' executive committee.
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Psalm 119:104Through thy precepts I get understanding: therefore I hate every false way. 105Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path.
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