Unity in diversity

I have lived in Bloomsbury for many years, which is near the St. Pancras' church of the nursery rhyme in Orwell's 1984. As I was planning today's running route from Regent's Park back to Bloomsbury, I stumbled upon the Church website.

It said something striking:

INCLUSIVE CHURCH.net, A Declaration of Belief

We affirm that the Church's mission, in obedience to Holy Scripture, is to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ.... We acknowledge that this is good news for people regardless of their gender, race or sexual orientation. We believe that, in order to strengthen the Gospels proclamation of justice to the world, and for the greater glory of God, the Church's own common life must be justly ordered. To that end, we call on our Church to......... to celebrate the diverse gifts of all members......... and in the ordering of our common life to open the ministries of deacon, priest and bishop to those so called to serve by God, regardless of their gender, race or sexual orientation.

If you ignore the obviously religious bits, this is a rather remarkable and heartwarming assertion. It is a Church of England church, which is probably one of the most egalitarian and liberal religious establishments I have ever seen. I mean, they have women priests (hope that is the correct word), gay bishops etc. As far as I know, they welcome just about anyone inside their church, regardless of religion, unlike the Catholic and Orthodox Christian Churches. Rather like Buddhist temples, though I think Buddhists are the most tolerant of the whole lot.

I wish the Catholic Church, the Hindu religious establishment and the Muslim religious establishment had the basic human decency to say something similar. And as an Indian, I wish all those temples, mosques and churches in India had something like this posted at their gates or doors or whatever.

Now that would be a first step to solving a lot of problems.