Communio Messianica Position on Christian-Muslim Dialogue
Background
“Communio Messianica (CM) is a response to a major phenomenon of Muslims to embrace the Gospel of Jesus Christ. This is resulting in the rapid growth of large communities of believers coming from a Muslim background (so-called Muslim Background Believers, MBBs) throughout the Muslim World and also among Muslim immigrants to the West.”
Christian-Muslim dialog was originally initiated around 630 AD, when some 60 Christian clergy from the south Arabian city of Najran descended on Medina to debate Muhammad, the prophet according to Islam, regarding his claims of prophethood and to expound on the main Christiaan beliefs with special emphasis on Jesus Christ, His sonship and deity. Details of this debate are provided by Muslim sources—it was lopsided ending in the imposition of the Dhimmitude treaty on the Christians of Najran and the appointment of a Muslim ruler of that city.
Since the Najran debate, there had been a rich record of debates mainly between scholars on both sides during periods of relative tolerance in the Islamic empires.
In the modern era, Muslim countries have initiated many dialogues involving not only Muslims and Christians, but Jews as well. The well-publicized “Common Word” initiative by 138 Muslim scholars in 2007, has spawned a series of Christian-Muslim Dialogues and given the Muslim community a great level of respectability on the international scale.
Effectively, Muslims have used the dialogue forms to promote Islam by controlling the topics of discussion and the rules of dialogue, and by using carefully crafted Islamic arguments to put Islam in a positive light and in many cases by undermining Christianity.
Impact on Muslim-Background Believers
Muslim-background believers (MBBs) are highly qualified for debating and/or dialoging with Muslim experts and scholars. Yet, they are not allowed to do that in public settings in Muslim-majority countries. Even in non-Muslim countries, Muslim speakers would refuse to debate MBBs. This is unfortunate as Christians are normally not familiar with Islam and its debating tactics. As a result, Muslims would maintain the upper hand in most debates and dialogues.
CM Position on Christian-Muslim Dialogue
MBBs should be deeply involved is dialogues with Muslims, whether in Muslim-majority countries or the Diaspora. They should be involved in the planning, topic selection and rules of the dialogue. The goal is to attain a level-playing field in this area that can explain our faith in contrast to Islam.
Furthermore, they should be active in counseling Christians on how to dialogue with Muslims.
Recommendations
As an aspect of the MBBs gaining the right of religious liberty and freedom of expression, Muslim-majority countries should remove any restrictions thereof.