Falling Walls Lab Aarhus

Jeg har i dag haft den glæde og udfordring at deltage i en konkurrence for phd. studerende, hvor man skulle fremlægge sit projekt på 3 minutter. Vi var 9 deltagere, men jeg vandt ikke. Men det var sjovt og udfordrende at skulle forsøge at præsentere sit forskningsprojekt for over 100 mennesker og 4 dommere – heraf 3 professorer.
Man måtte bruge et par powerpoints – og jeg brugte naturligvis den tegning, som illustrer min blog.
Min præsentation blev som følger:
1. slide: Breaking the wall of Judgment Day
2. slide: This is a cartoon from a newspaper 10 years ago. It shows a danish bishop with a warning sign telling that the end is near. The bishop is me, and the church is the dome of Maribo.
A journalist had asked me, if the climachange could indicate that the end of the world is near. My answer was very cautious. “I don’t know. But maybe!” I said. “Christians expect Jesus to come again, so why not? The end might be near, when Jesus will come to judge the living and the dead.”
This started a tough debate. How could a bishop talk about and believe in this? The walls of the churches were somehow broken. People outside the church heard, what they didn’t know: That Christians believe some day the world will come to an end, and there will be a judgment day for all human beings.
3. slide:
Now I will break down another wall for you. Did you know that muslims also believe, that Jesus will come again? And some day the world will come to an end, and there will be a judgment day for all human beings?
14 days ago I visited a mosque in Aarhus, and we were sitting talking about the Judgment Day. Islam teaches, that in the afterlife, on the day of judgment, all people will be judged. Faith and good deeds done during one’s lifetime will be rewarded with paradise, and bad deeds and corruption by worldly temptations will be punished with hell, the place of no hope and full of suffering.
What are the differences between islam and christianity? It is important to be honest and fair and aware of this question. And that’s what my project is about. I want to compare and analyse what christians and muslims, what christianity and islam actually teach and believe. Is the Judgment Day a day of fear or hope?
In the New Testament Jesus is called the dawn from heaven. We have come to know and to believe the love, that God has for us and for the whole world in Jesus Christ. Therefore we may have hope and confidence on the Day of Judgment. This dawn from heaven is what I as a christian want muslims to see and to know about.
You might call it my mission.