Whilst I appreciate the Dr’s sentiments I don’t see his suggestion working.

It should be noted that, not only are there more Buddhists in Australia than Muslims, but also that Buddhism is growing at a faster rate than Islam within our territory. And it’s through conversion as well as migration. Buddhism has been here longer and, conflicts aside, has had a greater impact on our culture if conversions, contributions to language and worldview shifts are a reasonable benchmark.

So, strictly speaking, Buddhism is the greater contributor to the value system of our society – ‘Abramic’ values language doesn’t stretch nearly that far.

On the ‘different names, same god’ issue. Whilst I agree with that to a point, I note that the Islamic undestanding of God is far more transcendant than ours, somewhat similar to the way that the Buddhist understanding is far more immanent. And to the extent that we Christians affirm that God is Christlike and Trinitarian, well, they’re never going to agree with us on that one. Its blaspheme for them to allow Christ into their concetion of divinity and its blaspheme for us not to. Even if its the same god deep down there somewhere (and I think there is) there’s still incompatable perceptions that go way beyond the name issue. I think the important thing is, not necessarily to minimise the differences, but to respect the right of the other to hold their differences.