Source: The Associated Press
On December 6, 2003 The Associated Press reported that "a leading evangelical Christian seminary is using federal funds to launch a $1 million program to ease strained relations with Muslims with an interfaith code of ethics. Fuller Theological Seminary's proposed code would ask members of either faith to refrain from making offensive statements about the other, affirm a mutual belief in one God and prohibit proselytizing over the two-year span of the project. The initiative, funded by a grant from the Justice Department (news - web sites), includes teaching the code to Muslims and Christian community leaders in the Los Angeles area and publishing a book, the seminary said. 'We hope to lead a large portion of evangelical Christians into a better understanding of Islam,' said Sherwood Lingenfelter, Fuller's provost and senior vice president. 'After 9/11 there was a great deal of hostility in the Christian community toward Muslims.' Last year, televangelist Jerry Falwell described the Prophet Muhammad as a terrorist and the Rev. Jerry Vines, former president of the Southern Baptist Convention, called Islam's founder a 'demon-possessed pedophile.'"