I have become increasingly convinced that the early 21st century is a kairos for interfaith engagement, especially among the Abrahamic faiths, and that there will be serious consequences if this opportunity is missed. Allow me to say something of the journey that has brought me to this conviction.
As a theologian, the university setting brought me along an important transformative path that ultimately led me with others to found the Cambridge Inter-faith Programme (CIP). But before transformation comes formation. For me, that included being brought up as an Anglican in the Church of Ireland in Dublin (a 3 percent religious minority), playing a great deal of sport, being gripped by questions of life and death after my father died when I was 12 and studying classics at Trinity College Dublin where I was active in politics, debate and journalism. I completed my studies and was heading toward a business career that was interrupted (permanently, as it turned out) to accept a scholarship to Cambridge to study Theology. I was to go onto Yale for my masters and back to Cambridge for my doctorate.
