Encounter and dialogue

From Manila I received a link from the Indonesian Jesuit Greg Soetomo. It was related to the review of my book on Catholics in Independent Indonesia, 1945-2010, published in his journal Asia Pacific Mission Studies, vol 2 (2020). This journal is the continuation of the East Asian Pastoral Review. The review was written by Paul Steffen, teaching in Rome at the Urbaniana University.
It was nice to see how Steffen presented the whole structure of the book (as third volume of the history since 1800) in a well written, informative article, with some personal additions.
 Thank you Paul (and Greg).

Greg also published an article in this issue of the journal: Maturing as believers through Interreligious Encounters. He studied Christian theology in various places and countries, but wrote his Ph.D at the Islamic University of Jakarta (UIN Syarif Hidataullah) on the history of Islam by Marshall Hodgson. His mission is not conversion, but maturing belief. Evangelization, proclamation of the Gospel are not the first words he would like to use for his way of life and worldview. In the end he formulates from the document Nostra Aetate (of the Vatican II Council of 1965) three questions: 1) Can structures (Church as religious system) save? 2) Is Muhammad a prophet? 3) Is Qur'an the Divine Word?
Dialogue between religions had in the 1960s the same dynamic as ecumenical dialogue: ultimately with a goal that Christianity should be united in one church organization. Therefore divided Reformed Protestantism started with the World Council of Churches. Finally this institutional unity was not reached and for most more or less religious people nowadays it is no longer an ideal. The churches are human creations and not divine per se. The same can be said for religions: let them focus on encounters where personal belief can grow.
About the Qur'an as Divine Word, Wilfred Cantwell Smith already formulated that this depends on the reader/hearer: when it is used as motivation for hatred, religious crimes and terrorism, it is definitely not functioning as divine word. But when it gives inspiration for good acts, solace in troubles, it can be seen as a divine gift.