Some of my best friends are…
Whether you believe in many gods, one god or none, you can't deny the fact that religions are the backdrop of every society on earth. Today, religion is questioned and scrutinised in a way that earlier generations would have found astonishing and even terrifying. But although some religions are in decline, others are flourishing and taking new and unexpected forms.
Channel 4's series, Some of my Best Friends Are…, gives four people from different religious backgrounds a chance to explore and question those with power and influence in their own faith communities.
'Who'd be a Catholic these days?' asks Dermot O'Leary. What does the church amount to when so many people who profess to belong break so many of its rules? From the intense young trainee priest who denies the possibility of any change in the church to the modern monk who refuses to lay down the law on contraception, Dermot finds himself part of a lively – and sometimes dangerous – debate.
Yasmin Alibhai Brown has always been a sceptical Muslim. Now, finding herself drawn to a community that is under pressure worldwide, she wonders why Muslims themselves are showing intolerance and trying to suppress the diversity of views within Islam. In the process, she talks to young women about hijabs (headscarves) and polygamy and asks a dynamic Imam about the threats made against those who, like Yasmin, dissent.
Regular worshippers in the Church of England are a dying breed and Rod Liddle thinks he knows why. Because Anglicans are too liberal. T'hey can sodomise, drink, play the stock market, eat bacon sandwiches and express their disbelief in God, he says. John Betjeman described it as 'faint conviction'. Its priests justify it as broad, open and searching for truth. But Rod discovers that people are increasingly being drawn to the more comforting certainties of the CofE's evangelical wing.
Anita Land is a practising, modern Jew. Her family was rooted in the immigrant East End community but her mother was a convert to Judaism – not a real Jew according to the orthodox authorities. Anita, with her brother Michael Grade, explore their family history, and Anita discusses the tensions within Jewish life with people right across the spectrum, from the ultra-orthodox woman with 11 children, to the atheist stand-up comedian who asserts his place in the Jewish community.
