With today's launch of the Inspired By Muhammad campaign (the religio-political equivalent of 'I agree with Nick'?), I am reminded again of our 2007 Cambridge Paper, Christian responses to Islam, Islamism and 'Islamic terrorism', in which Colin Chapman wrote:

'Christians should be willing to support those Muslims who challenge the harsher Islamist interpretations of the Qur'an. Instead of suggesting that 'the Qur'an is essentially violent', Christians should listen to the internal debate between moderate and extremist Muslims and add whatever weight they can to support Muslims who challenge the more violent interpretations of the Qur'an, and who do so from within Islam.'

It is perhaps unsurprising that 58 per cent of UK adults link Islam with extremism, while just 13 per cent believe the religion is based on peace and only 6 per cent associate it with justice, especially when, as the Bishop of Buckingham notes on his blog today, the papers appear to feed bigotry about Islam.

Nevertheless, I can't help but think that the Exploring Islam Foundation's presentation is equally unbalanced. When they claim that Muhammad 'made formal agreements with the Christians of Najran and the Jews of Medina promising full protection,' for instance, they skirt over the conflicting fact cited by Chapman that he 'had a difficult relationship with the three main Jewish tribes in Medina, largely because they refused to accept his prophetic claims and were accused of colluding with the idolaters of Mecca against him.'

Chapman finished his paper by posing five question for moderate Muslims who are prepared to engage in meaningful dialogue. The first and third of these seem particularly relevant in connection with the above advert, claiming 'I believe in women's rights. So did Muhammad':

• We are prepared to be critical about our history; but are you prepared to be critical of yours? You are critical and sometimes bitter about centuries of Western imperialism. But we don't often find that you are willing to admit that Islam has had its own empires.

• What is your ideal political order? Sudan, Saudi Arabia, Iran and Pakistan are countries which describe themselves as 'Islamic'. If a favourite slogan of Islamists is 'Islam is the answer', would you point to these or to any other countries as evidence that 'Islam is the answer'?

• Do you accept the concept of universal human rights as they have developed in recent years? Many of us are concerned about the clear tensions that seem to exist between internationally accepted standards of human rights and traditional Islamic values - e.g. over the status of women and freedom to practise and change one's religion.

• What about the means that you use to achieve your goals? Does the end justify the means? While we recognise that many Islamists are totally committed to work within the law and democratic processes, we are concerned when we hear some Islamists saying that they have no qualms about using democratic processes to subvert democracy.

• Are you willing to accept the existence of pluralist societies? While we understand your anger about so much that the West has done to the Muslim world, and while we weep over the many failings of Western societies, we don't like the sound of the alternative kind of society that many Islamists want to create in the West. We have seen many examples in history of what happens when religion is too closely related to the state, when faith is too closely identified with power. The oft-quoted Qur'anic text 'There is no compulsion in religion' (2:256) must mean at the very least that submission to God cannot be brought about by coercion.

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