The Lawyers' Three Faiths Forum is an essential part of the process of encouraging dialogue between the major religions, writes Tim Selwood


For many years lawyers and the legal profession have been well served by single-faith organisations. Valuable as this is, an additional inter-faith dimension is now available. This dimension is dialogue across our faith perspectives, engaging each other with mutual respect. This has led to the recent formation of the Lawyers' Three Faiths Forum.



Why three faiths? While recognising the need for broad dialogue between all faiths, there can also be practical and historical reasons for more specific dialogue.



This new lawyers group is part of the national Three Faiths Forum, which grew from dialogue between members of the Jewish and Christian communities but developed to include the Muslim community in view of the common roots and values shared within the Abrahamic tradition.



This wider forum, established in 1997, has a lawyer as its director, Sidney Shipton OBE. In the nine years since its launch, the forum has established an international reputation for the development of friendship, understanding and goodwill between the faiths, and the Lawyers' Forum is a natural extension of this work.



The aim of the Lawyers' Three Faiths Forum is to extend this work in several ways:



  • By arranging gatherings at which lawyers from the three faiths will be able to meet in a relaxed and interesting environment;


  • By promoting discussion and debating issues of common concern to us as lawyers from our differing faith viewpoints; and


  • By acting as a consultative group for others seeking our views on such issues.




    • The forum was launched at the Law Society in April 2006 by the Society's then Vice President Fiona Woolf and addressed by Raficq Abdulla, the prominent Muslim lawyer, author and poet.



    He outlined his vision of the unique opportunity lawyers from the Abrahamic faiths have to help bridge faith divisions in our society.

    As lawyers we are well practiced in arguing contentious issues at a professional level while remaining friends at a personal level.



    We can resolve many difficult issues, and where we cannot, we should be able to agree to disagree without threatening dialogue and goodwill.



    Indeed, we can go further by celebrating our differences and employing the rich diversity of our own faith perspectives to address issues together in ways that our single faith groups cannot.



    Dialogue can be difficult, but our experience so far suggests that it is primarily enjoyable, interesting and entertaining.



    For example, a recent meeting was treated to a romp through the fascinating history of the blasphemy laws from mediaeval anachronism to modern day public order and incitement legislation.



    At another session, we heard a proposal from Professor Derek Roebuck, academic, solicitor and author, supported by Professor Avrom Sherr of the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies at London University, for co-ordinated research into the history of Jewish, Christian and Islamic arbitration.



    Where next? We will consider family conciliation and mediation early in 2007. This is highly relevant in view of the increasing number of inter-faith parents and competing jurisdictions.



    For more information, visit: www.threefaithsforum.org.uk.



    Tim Selwood is a solicitor and Anglican priest in the Diocese of Winchester