Building Bridges Between Islam And The West

"The danger of ignoring this essential aspect of our existence is not just spiritual or intellectual. It also lies at the heart of the great divine between the Islamic and Western worlds over the place of materialism in our lives. In those instances where Islam chooses to reject Western materialism, this is not , in my view, only a political affection or the result of envy or a sense of inferiority. Quite the opposite. And the danger that the gulf between the worlds of Islam and the other major Eastern religions on the one hand, and the West on the other, will grow even wider and more unbridgeable is real, unless we can explore together practical ways of integrating the sacred and the secular in both our cultures in order to provide a true inspiration for the next century."

Taken from Prince Charles' speech, 'A Sense Of The Sacred, Building Bridges Between Islam And The West, at a Foreign Office Seminar, 13th December 1996