Ecumenical Islam: A Muslim Response to Religious Pluralism 1 [Roger Boase (ed.), Islam and Global Dialogue: Religious Pluralism and the Pursuit of Peace (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2005; 2007), chap. 17, pp. 247-265] Roger Boase I. The Present Context In the increasingly interdependent world in which we now live, the co-existence of different religious, cultural, and ethnic groups poses an existential problem that our ancestors never had to confront. For the first time in history the general outlook of a large number of people in the “westernised” world is dogmatically secular. Yet, as a result of the rapid expansion of the mass media, Internet and email communication, immigration, cheap travel, tourism, and other factors associated with the process of globalisation, we are faced with the daily spectacle of racial, cultural, and religious multiplicity. This is particularly true in the cosmopolitan cities of Britain, Europe and the USA, where citizens, motivated as 1 This essay is based on a paper presented at the 3rd Annual Conference of the Association of Muslim Social Scientists (AMSS), Unity and Diversity: Islam, Muslims, and the Challenge of Pluralism, held at the Diplomatic Academy, Westminster University, London, 20-21 October 2001. I have used some material from this essay in “Hatred and Revenge: Religious Pluralism Under Assault”, Middle East Affairs Journal, vol. 7, nos 3-4 (Summer / Fall 2001), 43-50, and World Faiths Encounter, no. 22 (July 2002), 21-7.