Mogens Amstrup is a pastor in the Church of Sweden. With over 13 years of experience in interreligious dialogue, Fr. Amstrup shares in this interview his experience as a pastor living near the Polar Circle, but also expresses his visions about the future ecumenical and interreligious movements.

Q: How is it to live near the Polar Circle?
The area here is very fantastic in all ways. It is an inland climate, which means that the summers are warm (25-30 degrees Celsius) almost without any rainfall at all. The winters are cold with lots of snow. (Minus 30, from time to time below minus 40 degrees). During summer the midnight sun is shining, and during wintertime is almost dark all the time. Of course this also means that some days are of bigger importance that other. Around the 21st of March we celebrate that the days are going to be longer than the nights. On that day, night and day are precisely 12 hours each. And because we go from almost total dark to total light, this is a very important day and we even celebrate in church. I usually have an outdoor service in the middle of the God created nature that day.

Q: People from a more mediteranian environment think in your region there are only people with a more cold attitude towards the others. Is this only a cliche?
It absolutely must be a cliché, because it isn’t true. Seldon have I experienced more open-minded and open-hearted people than here. This probably has to do with the fact that we are in need of each other. Very few people live here. My parish is around 100 km long and 40 km wide, but in the parish there only live 734 people. This also means that some people have their nearest neighbours 20 km away. If something happens to somebody travelling the area in wintertime in minus 40 degrees, of course people open their homes to welcome people. Most of the houses here are not even locked when your leave them. People can go in here and find a shelter. But of course this also is changing, if crime comes to this area, I am sure that some people at least begin to lock parts of their houses.

Q: What are the most challenging problems of your activity as a pastor?
It’s probably the distance in the area. Some people are very isolated, but I'm trying to visit all parish members at least every third year.

Q: In your community you have a number of indigious people. How did you approach them?
I do not have a lot of Sámi people in my area, but I do have some Sámi villages. In general I do not differ between them from any other parish members. I visit them; we often talk about their traditional life and culture. All of them are Christians, but together with an old Sámi man, I have visited some of their traditional and important (holy and cultural) places.

Q: The ethnical problem is present in almost every country of Europe. What is the model followed in Sweden for the integration of these people?
In most of Sweden the Swedes with another ethnical background than Swedish are very well integrated. Only in bigger cities it looks like there are some problems. Immigrants are sent to all corners of the country, this makes it easy to integrate them. Mostly they are warmly welcomed by the Swedes; even the Church of Sweden is involved in this work. However at the last general elections in Sweden, September 2006, an extreme right wing party against immigration to Sweden got a lot of votes especially in the very south of the country.

Q: You have 13 years of activity in interreligious dialogue. What do you think some of the churches/religions are not understanding in the issue of women pastors?
My experiences from my Interreligious work during many years have shown me a lot of things. Religion in general is undergoing a change these years. All big world religions are grown out of patriarchal societies. In the time of their establishing, this has been more of a cultural than religious phenomena. With cultural changes also come some religious changes. In Christianity, Islam and some of the eastern religions as for instance Taoism and Confucianism some changes are undergoing at the moment. In many areas these religions are studied more by women than by men. In Denmark and Sweden for instance most of the students studying theology are women. If the established church does not accept them as pastors, there will be soon a lack of competent people to do the work. The Catholic Church has some problems at the moment with the lack of priests. I think the first step here will be the allowance of priests to marry. The second step would be to even allow female priests. Already now the Catholic Church has as great number of very competent female theologians.

This also is the case in some parts of the moderate Islam. I think it was some months ago, Morocco accepted female imams. It was very important; it was a Muslim country that did this, and not a European country. These women are meant to teach women. But this also shows that by studying the holy script of the Islam, the women experienced that they have some power within their own religion. Moderate Judaism also has accepted female rabbis. Earlier this year the Confucian belief accepted women in the genealogy of Moreover, there are the new religious movements, a lot of them are built up around one specific person, this can be a man or a woman (e.g. Pastor Moon or Jane Morashti).

Q: People are fearing the new rise in the number of Islamic conversions. What aspect exactly do they fear?
Primary the unknown I presume. But I also see the meeting, or clash if you like, between Christianity and Islam, as a wake up call for Christianity in the west.

Q: In the interreligious dialogue there's always a political element involved. Do you think we'll reach the time of a interreligious dialogue erradicated of political implications?
It is not true, that there always will be a political ellement. That’s a question relating to the level in which the dialogue is taking place. When I'm talking man to man to my Muslim neighbour, there is no political element involved. But as soon as I go public there might be a political element. This might be eradicated if I decide to go public together with my dialogue partner of another belief.

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