At its recent biannual meeting, the Board of Trustees of the Council for a Parliament of the World's Religions elected as its chair Imam Abdul Malik Mujahid. The new leader's term of office begins on 1 January 2010.

The current and incoming General Secretaries of the World Council of Churches have said that honest conversation is the basis of meaningful interfaith encounter and the hopeful collaboration that can spring from it.

The Chicago-based Council for a Parliament of the World's Religions has announced their fifth global conference from 3 - 9 December 2009 in Melbourne, Australia.

A US Episcopal priest who has been banned from practising as a cleric for claiming loyalty to both Christianity and Islam says she still believes it is possible to have dual religious loyalties.

Equal participation and shared responsibility in society are at the basis of a peaceful coexistence between Christians and Muslims, participants at an inter-religious symposium in Tehran, Iran, declared last week.

The UN has backed a resolution calling for interreligious understanding. But its backing by a regime known for its religious intolerance has provoked mixed responses. The issue of faith and terror was also discussed.

An inaugural Roman Catholic-Muslim Forum has affirmed the right of individuals and communities to practise their religion in private and in public, while also rejecting terrorism in the name of religion.

The Pope has received a delegation of the International Jewish Committee on Interreligious Consultation with which the Holy See says “for over thirty years has contributed to understanding and acceptance between Catholics and Jews”.

Christian communities should improve their knowledge of Islam, be good neighbours to Muslims and bear witness to their faith in an appropriate manner, according to an international group of church leaders and experts on dialogue.

The World Council of Churches along with some Christian world communions, the World Evangelical Alliance and the Roman Catholic Church are expecting some 50 church leaders and experts at a high-level Christian-Muslim dialogue in Switzerland.