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21st Century Multifaith Initiatives

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Abstract

This chapter describes how following September 11, the focus on environmental issues within the multifaith movement was eclipsed by the threat of terror, and examines the impact that this tragic event had on Muslim communities in particular. It also explains how a dramatic increase in multifaith engagement occurred in the USA, the UK and Australia in response to the September 11 and July 2005 London bombings, as multifaith initiatives were implemented as peacebuilding and countering violent extremism strategies. This included a rise in multi-actor peacebuilding networks and also academic and state interest in multifaith initiatives. Finally, it explores how following the release of Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth in 2006, the global risk of climate change re-emerged as its primary focus of the multifaith movement and broadened multifaith engagement beyond the Abrahamic faiths to again include Indigenous, Hindu and Buddhist communities.

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Halafoff, A. (2013). 21st Century Multifaith Initiatives. In: The Multifaith Movement: Global Risks and Cosmopolitan Solutions. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-5210-8_5

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