The Archbishop of Canterbury has missed a chance to share Jesus with Muslims (again)

One of the big dangers of social media is posting without thinking first. A prime example of this occurred last week when Most Rev Sarah Mullally, Archbishop of Canterbury, posted on X:

In these early days of Ramadan, I send my warmest greetings to Muslims marking this month of fasting and prayer with friends, family and community gatherings. May this be a time of peace and joy.

Ramadan Mubarak! pic.twitter.com/O5N8AwWOie

— Archbishop of Canterbury (@ArchbishopSarah) February 19, 2026

In posting this kind of saccharine fluff, Archbishop Sarah is following firmly in the footsteps of her predecessor. In 2024, Justin Welby also shared a video on socials in which he described Ramadan as a “special time of prayer and spiritual reflection”, shared how he had hosted an iftar meal for Muslim friends at Lambeth Palace and enthused how exciting it was that Lent and Ramadan overlapped.

While I’d score both archbishops ten out ten for encouraging good community relations - it’s hugely important that Christians get to know the Muslims in our communities - I’d score them minus several hundred on every other metric.

Same, same but different

First, both have tumbled headfirst into the Same Word Fallacy. This is the elementary error in which one assumes that because Muslims use the same word as Christians do, it means the same thing. Muslims fast during Ramadan, Christians fast during Lent, therefore it must be the same, and one can murmur “Ramadan Mubarak!” (“Blessed Ramadan”) without asking further questions.

But just because two things have one thing in common doesn’t make them the same. After all, both chickens and a Boeing 787 have wings, but I’d highly recommend the latter over the former for overseas travel. Likewise, Ramadan and Lent may share an ‘abstinence’ similarity but, dive a little deeper and you’ll find that they’re wildly different.

Forgetting to mention Jesus shows a total lack of confidence in the gospel

In Islam, Ramadan was borrowed by Muhammad from the pagan Arab tribes, who would celebrate certain months as sacred by fasting and abstaining from warfare. Later, it became a time when Muslims commemorated the beginning of the period in which they believe the Qur’an was revealed to Muhammad.

For Christians, Lent is the period of solemnity leading up to Good Friday, when Jesus - no mere prophet as Muslims believe, but the very Son of God - died on the cross, giving his life to offer us adoption into God’s family and life forever with him.

Clearly Jesus

The second problem is Archbishop Sarah has sown confusion everywhere. People of no faith might assume from her post that Christians and Muslims believe pretty much the same things. Muslims, meanwhile, may assume that Christian leaders don’t really believe all that Jesus stuff and are just confused Muslims who need drawing back to the one true faith. Maybe Mullally could take a lesson here from the Pope, who politely declined to pray in a mosque recently.

Third, and most seriously, Mullally (as Welby did before her) completely failed to mention Jesus. Which is odd, as one would think that ‘Talking About Jesus Winsomely at Every Opportunity’ would be top of the job description for the Archbishop of Canterbury!

Forgetting to mention Jesus is a bit more serious than, say, forgetting your car keys; indeed, it shows a total lack of confidence in the gospel. I can only assume that Mullally doesn’t feel able to give the reasons why she believes what she believes about Jesus, and so defaults to this sugar-coated “isn’t it all lovely” nonsense.

I wish that she would take some time to listen to those with real, practical experience in sharing the gospel with Muslims (I’m part of a network of about a dozen organisations doing this kind of work in the UK). That she’d talk to Christians who have come to faith from a Muslim background and could advise her. And that above all, that she’d learn you can be friendly, winsome and also confidently, clearly share Jesus at the same time.

A living faith

A few years ago, I was in a taxi in London. It was a swelteringly hot day and Ramadan had just begun. Something in the cab suggested that the driver was a Muslim and so I asked him whether he was. “Yes, I am,” he said. I said: “It must be tough, driving a cab during Ramadan in this heat while fasting.”

“Thank you, it is really hard,” he said. Then added: “You know about Islam?” “Yes,” I replied, “I’m a Christian, but I happened to have done my PhD in Islam.”

“What did you study?” he asked. I was able to share a little of my work on the origins of the Qur’an, but in time, worked the conversation around to Jesus. I shared why I believe that true hope is only found in Him. We had an amazing, hour-long conversation at the end of which I gave him a book containing the testimony of Nabeel Qureshi, a Muslim who came to faith in Jesus.

You don’t need to have studied Islam academically to reach out to Muslim friends, neighbours, and colleagues this Ramadan. Instead, find out if they’re fasting and ask why. Listen well, then say: “I find this interesting, Christians also have a month of fasting. It’s called Lent, but we keep it for very different reasons - reasons that are all to do with Jesus”. Then take the time to share with them about Him.

Ramadan is all about the Qur’an and, in Islam, that’s the best that Muslims have: a book. But Lent is about something much greater. In Christianity, God did not merely send a book but himself in the person of Jesus. With a smile, and in the spirit of friendship, don’t be afraid to share that good news with Muslims you meet.