Bishop's faithful message of hope

Rt Rev. Philip North, Bishop of Burnley, invited 20 leaders from the Muslim community in Burnley for tea at his house in Burnley and to also discuss inter-faith working in the local area.

The leaders were welcomed by the Bishop as a thank you for their hospitality after a recent visit he made to a local mosque. Other local clergy joined the Bishop for the event.

Bishop Philip was able to discuss issues of mutual interest including further development of the successful “Building Bridges in Burnley” community project which has been running for more than a decade.

Helpful dialogue took place on other current issues as Muslim leaders also updated Bishop Philip on matters affecting their communities.

Bishop Philip said: “I was delighted to welcome Imams from nine mosques to my home, with other community leaders. We enjoyed an honest dialogue and were able to forge new friendships.

“This is important and we all agreed the way ahead with Building Bridges is through encouraging our young people to get more involved.

“I also heard about how proud they all were to be British and to be part of British society where religious freedom is guaranteed – something we all valued highly.

“We hope that, with events like this one, we are able to continue to model good and healthy relationship-building across our faith communities.”