Controversy rages about Pope's comments on Islam

[voltaire]

Predictably perhaps, Fareena Alam and Tariq Ramadan's comments are far more useful than the MCB's.



V

[sania]

What could have been the motive for the Pope to quote from an old Christian King?

--to condemn jihad?
--to associate jihad with Islamic terrorism?
--to slander Islamic teachings?
--to instigate reaction against Muslim nations?
--to remind Christians of their ancient enemy-Islam?
--Or simply nothing but an academic memory?

Whatever it could be, it is an avoidable and unnecessary comment coming from the head of a religion,
who is supposed to promote religious harmony.

By not resorting to violent reaction as in the case of the cartoon issue, Muslims have earned respect.

If they have resorted to violent vandalism, Muslims would have prooved the POPE right!

[Ruks]

sania

Apparently the muslims did react with violent reactions - mainly burning effacgies.

If it hadn't been for the report on burning effacgies, then i wouldn't have known that the pope had said this. Besides, like one of the quotes, insults about Islam are as old as Islam themselves. People are always critising Islam, or some aspect of it - should we expect anything else? Non-Muslims will always being saying something or the other. I think outbursts aren't really that heathly or good for non-muslim & muslim relations.

Although, T Ramdhan did mention an important point- are the europeans (or the pope at least) trying to say that Islam never existed in europe - or the very least of eradicating it from history?

[Al-khiyal]

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - The Vatican said on Saturday the Pope was sorry Muslims had been offended by a speech whose meaning had been misconstrued, but Morocco withdrew its ambassador as anger at his words flared on.

"The Holy Father thus sincerely regrets that certain passages of his address could have sounded offensive to the sensitivities of the Muslim faithful," Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone said in a statement.

Pope Benedict's first big crisis since his election 17 months ago was sparked by a speech in his native Germany on Tuesday that seemed to endorse a Christian view, contested by most Muslims, that early Islam was spread by violence.

The backlash has cast doubt on a planned visit to Turkey by the Pope in November. In an early reaction to the Vatican statement, Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood said it was not enough.

"We feel he has committed a grave error against us and that this mistake will only be removed through a personal apology," the Brotherhood's deputy leader, Mohammed Habib, told Reuters.

Morocco's King Mohammed recalled his ambassador to the Vatican in protest.

"Ali Achour is recalled for consultations as from Sunday following offensive remarks by Pope Benedict about Islam and Muslims," the official MAP news agency quoted a foreign ministry statement as saying.

The Pope's next scheduled public appearance is his Sunday Angelus blessing, when he often comments on current affairs.

Bertone, walking into the crisis only a day after taking over as "deputy pope", said the 79-year-old Pope confirmed "his respect and esteem for those who profess the Islamic faith" and hoped his words would be understood "in their true sense".

The academic speech was meant as a "a clear and radical rejection of religiously motivated violence, wherever it comes from", said the statement, which came as criticism of the leader of the world's 1.1 billion Roman Catholics swelled.

Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan of Muslim Turkey said on Saturday before the Vatican statement that the Pope's comments were "ugly and unfortunate" and should be withdrawn.

"The Pope spoke like a politician rather than as a man of religion," he said in televised remarks. Asked if the Pope should cancel or postpone a planned trip to Turkey in November, he said: "I do not know."

Yemen's president publicly denounced the pontiff and five churches - only one of them Catholic - were attacked in the West Bank, although no one was hurt.

Egypt's foreign ministry summoned the Vatican envoy to Cairo to express "extreme regret" at Benedict's speech.

But Chancellor Angela Merkel and other German politicians defended his comments, saying he had been misunderstood.

"It was an invitation to dialogue between religions," she told the mass-circulation Bild newspaper in an interview.

The New York Times said in an editorial the Pope must issue a "deep and persuasive" apology for quotes used in his speech.

"The world listens carefully to the words of any pope. And it is tragic and dangerous when one sows pain, either deliberately or carelessly," it said.

In the speech, the Pope referred to criticism of the Prophet Mohammad by 14th century Byzantine Emperor Manuel II Palaeologus, who said everything Mohammad brought was evil "such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached".

Using the terms "jihad" and "holy war", the Pope said violence was "incompatible with the nature of God".

But Bertone said the Pontiff "had absolutely no intention" of presenting Emperor Manuel's opinions on Islam as his own.

Vatican insiders and diplomats say the Pope may have mixed up his new role with his former posts as a theologian and head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, when as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger he was known as a disciplinarian.

Angry Muslim leaders flung what they saw as allegations of violence back at the Christian West.

"How can (the Pope) imply that Muslims are the creators of terrorism in the world while it is the followers of Christianity who have aggressed against every country of the Islamic world?" prominent Saudi cleric Salman al-Odeh said. "Who attacked Afghanistan and who invaded Iraq?"

In Libya, the General Instance of Religious Affairs said the "insult ... pushes us back to the era of crusades against Muslims led by Western political and religious leaders".

Turkish paper Vatan quoted a member of the ruling Justice and Development Party saying Benedict "will go down in history in the same category as leaders like Hitler and Mussolini".

Catholic bishops in Turkey feared the angry local reaction, led by the Grand Mufti, could show public opinion was shifting against the Pope's planned visit. But Turkish officials said they hoped the row would blow over and the visit would go ahead.

In Iraq the government asked Muslims not to take their anger out on the small Christian minority, after the door of a church in Basra was attacked. The foreign ministry summoned the Vatican's top diplomat there to explain the Pope's remarks.

Pope sorry his Islam speech found offensive

[Al-khiyal]

VATICAN CITY — Pope Benedict XVI "sincerely regrets" that Muslims have been offended by some of his words in a recent speech in Germany, the Vatican said today — stopping short of issuing an apology the Islamic world has demanded.

The new Vatican secretary of state, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, said the pope's position on Islam is unmistakably in line with Vatican teaching that the church regards Muslims with "esteem."

Thus, the pope "sincerely regrets that certain passages of his address could have sounded offensive to the sensitivities of the Muslim faithful and should have been interpreted in a manner that in no way corresponds to his intentions," Bertone said in a statement.

"Indeed it was he who, before the religious fervor of Muslim believers, warned secularized Western culture to guard against 'the contempt for God and the cynicism that considers mockery of the sacred to be an exercise of freedom,'" Bertone said, citing words from another speech that Benedict gave during the German trip.

"In reiterating his respect and esteem for those who profess Islam, he hopes that they will be helped to understand the correct meaning of his words," the cardinal said.

The words, in a speech Benedict gave to university professors earlier in the week during a pilgrimage to his homeland, angered many in the Islamic world and raised doubts over whether a planned trip to predominantly Muslim Turkey in late November would go ahead.

Muslim leaders have been unappeased by previous overtures by Vatican officials and have demanded the pope apologize for his remarks on Islam and jihad, or holy war. The Vatican has said that Benedict only meant to emphasize the incompatibility between faith and war.

Benedict on Tuesday cited an obscure Medieval text that characterizes some of the teachings of Islam's founder as "evil and inhuman" — comments some experts took as a signal the Vatican was staking a more demanding stance for its dealings with the Muslim world.

When giving the speech, the pope stressed that he was quoting the words of a Byzantine emperor and did not comment directly on the "evil and inhuman" assessment.

Bertone, referring Saturday to the emperor's "opinion," said "the Holy Father did not mean, nor does he mean, to make that opinion his own in any way."

The cardinal pointed out that the pope was speaking in an academic setting and suggested that a "complete and attentive reading" of the entire text would make clear the pope's reflections about the relationship between religion and violence in general.

He said the pope's speech ended with "clear and radical rejection of the religious motivation for violence, from whatever side it may come."

Bertone also cited other recent statements by the pope which he said makes "unequivocally" clear the pope's work in favor of intercultural and interreligious dialogue.

He noted that during Benedict's pilgrimage to Germany last year, shortly after being elected pope, the pontiff called for both Christians and Muslims to walk down the "paths of reconciliation and learn to life with respect for each other's identity."

In a recent message to mark the 20th anniversary of Pope John Paul II's interreligious prayer gathering in Assisi, Italy, Benedict stressed that violence should not be attributed to religion in itself but to "cultural limitations" over time.

The pope's first public appearance to the general public since his return from Germany is set for Sunday, when he is to greet the faithful at Castel Gandolfo, the papal summer residence in the Alban Hills near Rome.

The rage unleashed by Benedict's comments stirred fears of anti-Western protests like those that followed the publication in a Danish newspaper of caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad....

Vatican statement falls short of apology to Muslims

[Al-khiyal]

NABLUS, West Bank — Palestinians wielding guns and firebombs attacked five churches in the West Bank and Gaza today, following remarks by Pope Benedict XVI that angered many Muslims.

No injuries were reported in the attacks, which left church doors charred and walls pockmarked with bullet holes and scorched by firebombs. Churches of various denominations were targeted.

Relations between Palestinian Muslims and Christians are generally peaceful, and the attacks on the churches sparked concern that tensions would heighten.

"The atmosphere is charged already, and the wise should not accept such acts," Father Yousef Saada, a Greek Catholic priest in Nablus, said Saturday.

Ayman Daraghmeh, a legislator from the ruling Islamic militant Hamas group, denounced the attacks. Dozens of police took up position around churches in Nablus to protect the holy sites.

Firebombings left black scorch marks on the walls and windows of Nablus' Anglican and Greek Orthodox churches. At least five firebombs hit the Anglican church and its door was later set ablaze. Smoke billowed from the church as firefighters put out the flames

In a phone call to The Associated Press, a group calling itself the "Lions of Monotheism" claimed responsibility for those attacks, saying they were carried out to protest the pope's remarks in a speech this week in Germany linking Islam and violence.

Later Saturday, four masked gunmen doused the main doors of Nablus' Roman and Greek Catholic churches with lighter fluid, then set them afire. They also opened fire on the buildings, striking both with bullets.

In Gaza City, militants opened fire from a car at a Greek Orthodox church, striking the facade. A policeman at the scene said he saw a Mitsubishi escape with armed men inside. Explosive devices were set off at the same Gaza church on Friday, causing minor damage.

There were no claims of responsibility for the last three attacks Saturday.

"The people who did this are uneducated and ignorant," said the Gaza church's prelate, The Rev. Artinious Alexious.

In his speech, Benedict cited an obscure Medieval text that characterizes some of the teachings of Islam's founder as "evil and inhuman." The pope, spiritual leader of more than 1 billion Roman Catholics, did not explicitly agree with or repudiate the text.

The Vatican later said the pope did not intend the comments to be offensive. However, they have sparked worldwide protests by Muslims, and Muslim leaders have demanded an apology.

George Awad, a cleric at the Greek Orthodox church in Nablus, said he and other Christians have apologized for the pope's remarks and urged Muslims to use restraint.

"There is no reason to burn our churches," he said.

On Friday, about 2,000 Palestinians protested against the pope in Gaza City, accusing him of leading a new Crusade against the Muslim world. Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas said the pope offended Muslims everywhere.

Christians make up a small — and dwindling — minority of several tens of thousands among the more than 3 million Palestinians in the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem. The Palestinian Authority has made considerable efforts to ensure the political representation of Christians.

Bishop Riah Abo El-Assal, the top Anglican clergyman in the Holy Land, said Saturday he expected his Muslim colleagues would swiftly denounce the attacks on the churches. He called them "childish acts" and said he was not increasing security at the Anglican churches in the area.

In Nablus, merchant Khaled Ramadan, who was dressed in traditional Islamic garb, said the pope's comments were unforgivable, but that Palestinians must not fight among themselves.

"We are one people and violent reactions like these should not happen here," he said.

Palestinians attack 5 churches after Pope comments

[Al-khiyal]

Saudi Arabia's highest religious authority, Grand Mufti Abdul-Aziz al-Sheik, said in remarks published Saturday that the pope's comments on Islam were "all lies."

"These are all lies. The prophet (Muhammad), peace be upon him, came as a mercy to the world," the daily al-Riyadh newspaper quoted al-Sheik as saying.

He said the pontiff's remarks showed reconciliation between religions was impossible.

"Everybody should know by now that all claims about religions' reconciliation have just been proven to be lies in reality," al-Sheik said. "How can they think of reconciliation while insulting Islam and the prophet?"

Saudi Arabia's grand mufti: Pope's comments lies