Dhimmi of the day

For this deep sense of what it means to be truly integrated, I am so grateful to my Muslim sisters and brothers for Ramadan. I love its measured rhythms and purifying disciplines. They are truly restorative for my own faith. But more than this, at a personal level they address me directly, as they invite me to redress the imbalance I so often detect in my failure to care properly for my own body while deluding myself that my soul's passage to heaven is assured through the power of my intellect and the spiritual insights which may come through regular theological reflection.

The holy month of Ramadan reminds me that I need both body and soul to be in good shape if I'm to approach the heavenly courts. It also teaches me that the taqwa, which is the divine gift to all people of faith and goodwill, will only come my way when I achieve a more balanced nurturing of both.

So, who wrote this then? Some devout Muslim, no doubt?

Well, no, actually. It was in fact the canon chancellor of Blackburn Cathedral, the Revd Chris Chivers, who has written an article in The Guardian bearing the headline "Thinking about the meaning of Ramadan has made me a better Christian". He adds that "Muslims seem to express a more integrated relationship between body and soul" than Christians.

Looks like we might just have another Ann Holmes Redding on our hands!

And does anyone want to speculate on the chances of a Muslim imam talking of how grateful he was to his Christian brothers and sisters for telling him about Easter, and thereby making him a better Muslim?