Selmanovic, radical evangelical

Leaders in the emerging church movement are used to suspicion and attack. They question whether Jesus is the only way, truth and life. They conduct experiments in church-going that don't look like church-going at all. They insist on the incoherence of their movement and revel in postmodern theology. Such things cause alarm in their conservative evangelical counterparts. It's a judgment that Samir Selmanovic turns to his advantage in a witty YouTube video , made to promote his new book, It's Really All About God: Reflections of a Muslim Atheist Jewish Christian . It features his daughters warning folk not to buy a publication that advises readers to talk with strangers from other faiths. What kind of Dad, Ena and Leta ask, would tell his children to talk to strangers? "Sabotage this book", they insist: "Buy it and then burn it without reading it." Selmanovic is in the UK this month to take part in an event at the Irish School of Ecumenics, Belfast. Organised by Pete Rollins , the Re-emergence Conference will also feature author Phyllis Tickle and post-evangelical Dave Tomlinson . (One problem with incoherent movements is that you have to become au fait with lots of names to follow them.) I met Selmanovic in a New York diner. It was an appropriate location: as we made our way to a free booth, I overheard snippets of conversation in as many languages as there were tables in the place. The multicultural, multi-faith nature of a city like New York is precisely what fires his religious imagination. Born in the former Yugoslavia, he was alert to the danger Muslims in Manhattan faced after 9/11. He organised public meetings to help defuse fears about the terrorist attacks. It's just one incident that raises what he believes is the most pressing question of our age: how to live with others? The close proximity of diverse neighbours, inherent in modern life, precipitates a fear of difference. Religious traditions in particular have typically viewed their relationship to other faiths as a zero-sum game: you win or you lose. They can feel much the same even about other denominations within the same faith. What's lacking is a conception of how to be a passionate custodian of one religious story whilst living in a plural world of many. The risk is that people of faith have little capacity to see people of other faiths as sojourners with them, together. "The question should be one of relationships, not competition," Selmanovic argues. In fact, Selmanovic sees pluralism as a positive boon for evangelical traditions such as his own. In a diverse culture, replete with communications technology, everyone can and does proclaim their story. And evangelicalism is nothing if not declarative. It's one reason why it has thrived in modern times. However, conservative evangelicalism has made a mistake, he continues. Its desire to share and spread the good news has led it to treat non-Christians as objects: "We have it, they have to receive it" – "it" being the message of Christ. But what kind of good news is it, Selmanovic asks, when only an elect few have it? What kind of control freakery is inherent in the perception that you alone have a message from God and cannot receive any good news from others? He points out that the Bible presents a picture of exactly the opposite dynamic, in the examples of God's chosen ones receiving good news from strangers and foreigners. "It's wise men and shepherds who come to the stable," he says. The Christian movement's first financial backers were a bunch of alien astrologers. His message is that God is fully present in others. You won't see that until you have dug deeply enough into your own tradition to hit bedrock, which is to say that it's the insecure in their own faith who fear the other. It's a view of pluralism that is not ephemeral and uncommitted, but profound and faithful. There is also a vital role for disagreement in it. Respecting other traditions requires that you indicate when you think they are mistaken – though you have to be prepared to seek out and listen to their reply in turn. Such a dialectic leads to learning. Moreover, all traditions have ideas about pluralism within them. Christianity talks of the body being composed of many parts. Islam talks of people being created different so they can compete in offering good deeds to one another. Humour is key too – though it must pass a test: can a non-Christian, say, make a joke about Christianity in such a way that the Christian can reply, "thank you"? That said, it seems easy to pick intellectual holes in it too. Aren't there plenty of quotes in the Bible that claim exclusivity, I ask – not least when Jesus says he's the way, truth and life? Selmanovic points out that the context of that saying shows that Jesus was not reflecting on how to live in a plural world but was offering comfort to his disciples. OK, I continue: what about the fundamental differences between religions, such as Christianity, which asserts that salvation comes from God, and Buddhism which asserts that enlightenment comes by your own efforts? Selmanovic argues that contradictions are inevitably apparent to us, as we have no divine "view from nowhere". But "contradictions today become treasures tomorrow", Admit that, and you raise the possibility differences might not be as profound as we think.