There are tons of people, I'm sure many who post on this board, who believe that all religious texts are basically telling the same story and that all gods are one in the same. So, a pastor who is a Christian and Muslim isn't that crazy to me and I'm actually kind of amazed that there isn't a church with a large following that combines all of the elements of the major religions.
This is something one hears a lot, and I don't know quite what to make of it. Can you say more? From what little study I've had of world religions, they most definitely do not teach basically the same thing or acknowledge the same God. As I said earlier, Islam and Christianity disagree on the fullest revelation of God. One cannot be a Muslim and a Christian, although one can be a Christian and respect Mohammed or a Muslim and respect Jesus. The Abrahammic religions focus on being who God creates us to be, both in this life and the next, whereas most Eastern religions look to the negation, not the actualization, of the self as the ultimate goal. Buddhism affirms that all existence is suffering and we can only cease suffering but ceasing to want, which will allow us to cease to exist. Christianity teaches, at its best, that Creation is a gift that we should celebrate and live fully into, knowing that we will experience both pain and ectasy, but that both are part of being human. Although it's often said, it simply isn't true that all major religions boil down to being excellent to each other. Treating another well is not sufficient in Christianity. We must love our neighbors, so it about our internal state as much as our ethics. In Islam, according to my limited understanding of it, again ethics are secondary to right relationship with God as taught by the Qur'an. Maybe being decent to others is a common denominator, but it is a very low one. Distilling any of the world religions down to that robs them of their theological complexities and turns them into something that they really aren't. While the Buddha and Socrates might inform the way I live as a Christian, they do not share my worldview or my basic beliefs.
