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"UK archbishop challenges secular view of religion"

("IRNA," June 11, 2003) 

    Dr. Rowan Williams 
Wednesday delivered his    

first major address on interfaith relations since becoming the        

Archbishop of Canterbury in which he criticised the secular view of   

treating religion as a separate and subordinate sphere of life.       

   "One of the 
most important tasks of religion in our culture, I'd   

dare to say, is to challenge the secularist to produce good and       

coherent grounds for their goals," he said.                           

    This, the 
archbishop said, was made all the harder by the         

assumption "that 'religion' is a subdivision of human activity 
which  

belongs among the optional extras, after you have attended to the     

clear imperatives of non-religious public life."                      

    He argued that 
the secular assumption must also "strive to make   

itself credible," saying that when this was refused "we have a 
mirror 

image of theocracy - an uncriticised ideology defining the terms of   

public life."                                         
                

    In his address 
at Birmingham University, the recently appointed   

religious leader of the Church of England also challenged some of the 

basic assumption about relations between faith communities and called 

for a new approach to the dialogue between religions.                 

    He called for 
a clearer appreciation and understanding of the     

"very disagreements about the kind of universe we inhabit, what 
that  

universe makes possible for human beings and what is the most         

truthful or adequate or even sane way of behaving in the universe."   

    "Once we 
are clear about the nature and scope of religious        

disagreement, we are actually more rather than less likely to develop 

a respectful and collaborative practice in inter-faith relations,"    

the archbishop said.