Last week, I was at the Islamic Society of North America Convention in Chicago and I ran into a Muslim high school kid I know.
“Good summer?” I asked.

“Great summer,” he said. “I went to a Muslim camp.”

“Yeah, what did you learn?” I asked.

“To love Jesus,” he said.

I wonder what Becky Fischer would do with Tarek? Or me? Or the billion plus other Muslims who are committed to following the example of mercy and monotheism set forth by Jesus and all of God’s messengers, may the peace and blessings of God be upon them.

In this case, a good place to start is to understand how the Muslim tradition views Jesus, and other important Biblical figures. Dr. Umar Abdallah, American Islam’s most senior scholar, quotes from the Holy Qur’an in his excellent article One God, Many Names: “Say (all of you): ‘We believe in God and what was given unto Abraham, Ishmael, Isaac, Jacob and the tribes of Israel and what was given unto Moses and to Jesus and what was given to all the prophets from their Lord.”

I believe that the faith divide will determine issues of war and peace in our century. And I believe that it is among the most cynically manipulated and appallingly misunderstood issues of our time.

For every Becky Fischer who thinks the Muslim world is only terrorist training camps, there is someone in the Muslim world who sees Becky Fischer and thinks that she represents all churches. They are each using the other to rally support for their tribal army. And those tribal armies will destroy us all.

And so you know where I stand: I think that all people intent on their group dominating and everyone else suffocating are on the same side of the faith divide, working arm-in-arm against those of us who still dream of a common life together.