In the midst of both anti-Muslim and anti-Christian sentiments making their way through the media after the recent events in Libya, Yemen, and Egypt, Pope Benedict XVI offers hope for peace and unity, speaking to Catholics, Muslims, and visitors from Syria in his address to the youth in Lebanon this weekend.
To the young Catholics he said (my emphasis):
The Year of Faith, which is about to begin, will be a time to rediscover the treasure of the faith which you received at Baptism. You can grow in knowledge and understanding of this treasure by studying the Catechism, so that your faith can be both living and lived. You will then become witnesses to others of the love of Christ. In him, all men and women are our brothers and sisters. The universal brotherhood which he inaugurated on the cross lights up in a resplendent and challenging way the revolution of love. “Love one another as I have loved you” (Jn 13:35). This is the legacy of Jesus and the sign of the Christian. This is the true revolution of love!
Christ asks you, then, to do as he did: to be completely open to others, even if they belong to a different cultural, religious or national group. Making space for them, respecting them, being good to them, making them ever more rich in humanity and firm in the peace of the Lord. . . . Experiencing together moments of friendship and joy enables us to resist the onset of division, which must always be rejected! Brotherhood is a foretaste of heaven!
He encouraged them to read the Apostolic Exhortation Ecclesia in Medio Oriente, which he signed on September 14th, saying, “This letter is also addressed to you, dear young people, as it is to the entire People of God. Read it carefully and meditate upon it so as to put it into practice.” He continued, encouraging the young to take responsibility for the future of their country:
I am aware of the difficulties which you face daily on account of instability and lack of security, your difficulties in finding employment and your sense of being alone and on the margins. In a constantly changing world you are faced with many serious challenges. But not even unemployment and uncertainty should lead you to taste the bitter sweetness of emigration, which involves an uprooting and a separation for the sake of an uncertain future. You are meant to be protagonists of your country’s future and to take your place in society and in the Church.
The pope directly addressed the Muslims present:
I should like now to greet the young Muslims who are with us this evening. I thank you for your presence, which is so important. Together with the young Christians, you are the future of this fine country and of the Middle East in general. Seek to build it up together! And when you are older, continue to live in unity and harmony with Christians. For the beauty of Lebanon is found in this fine symbiosis. It is vital that the Middle East in general, looking at you, should understand that Muslims and Christians, Islam and Christianity, can live side by side without hatred, with respect for the beliefs of each person, so as to build together a free and humane society.
And the Syrians:
I understand, too, that present among us there are some young people from Syria. I want to say how much I admire your courage. Tell your families and friends back home that the Pope has not forgotten you. Tell those around you that the Pope is saddened by your sufferings and your griefs. He does not forget Syria in his prayers and concerns, he does not forget those in the Middle East who are suffering. It is time for Muslims and Christians to come together so as to put an end to violence and war.
And, perhaps most significantly, after addressing each of these distinct groups of young people he invoked the name of “Mary, the Mother of the Lord, our Lady of Lebanon. From the heights of Mount Harissa she protects and accompanies you with a mother’s love.”
Why most significantly? Because while discussion of Mary is what divides Catholics and Protestants, it is she who unites Catholics and Muslims–so much so that on February 18, 2010, the Feast of the Annunciation (March 25) became, “an official national holiday sanctioned by the Government of Lebanon. All public buildings, schools, banks and university are closed. The government has also encouraged private businesses to do the same.”
This “national Christian-Muslim Day” is “something that has never occurred before in the history of Christian-Muslim relations. The decision was confirmed two days later during a meeting between Pope Benedict XVI and Prime Minister Hariri in the Apostolic Palace in the Vatican. . . . Dar-al-Fatwa Secretary General Sheikh Mohammed Nokkari, one of the main promoters of the joint festivity, said he hopes that such a holiday would spread to other parts of the world, adding that it was fitting that it should begin in Lebanon, which the late Pope John Paul II had described as “a message of pluralism for the East and the West.”
September 17th, 2012 | 4:03 pm
Thank you for this report and God bless Pope Benedict for his courage – and his timing. In particular, the designation of a religious holiday shared by Muslims and Christians is a fascinating development. I have never been to Lebanon, but I have experienced both Muslim and Christian holidays in Egypt, and it is clear that they are not shared holidays. Christians go on about normal business during Ramadan, and Christmas is largely relegated to people’s homes and international hotels (though rather gaudy), with the brave venturing into churches.
September 17th, 2012 | 5:06 pm
What anti-Muslim sentiment has there been in the media? And even if there were criticism of Islam, what then? Frankly, I am outraged that our leaders take more offense at an exercise of free speech, than they do at Christians being killed in Egypt, or a 14-year-old Christian girl with Down’s Syndrome being arrested on charges of capital blasphemy in Pakistan, or pastor Nadarkhani being robbed from his young children for three years while facing a death sentence for being a Christian.
This is beyond offensive. And the Muslim world, quick to be offended at a lot of things, is strangely silent on these matters. It should be out in the streets protesting these atrocities. Instead, it is outraged about some movie no one had ever heard about until they started protesting it. That tells me all I need to know.
September 18th, 2012 | 10:40 pm
@ Maximilian: I don’t think you understand the long term repercussions that films like the one being protested have on the world stage. Such films are intended to paint the Muslim religion and thus the Muslims as unsympathetic, as something that needs to be subjugated and stamped out because Muslims can’t be expected to follow their prophet and remain hospitable and friendly because their prophet was apparently not such. For example, if someone were to post up a video denying or praising the Holocaust or portraying Jewish religious figures as money grubbing con artists, such videos would be deemed as not only offensive slander, but also dangerous as it encourages sympathy and acceptance of the Jewish people to be denied.
Likewise, there are many radical Protestants who have attempted to paint Catholics as being part of the church of the devil and pushing the agenda of the Anti-Christ. Sometimes this paranoid criticism has led to abuses of Catholics by radical Protestant and nationalist organizations.
When you have a film like the one that has recently made a splash, it not only disparages the religion of the people but ultimately encourages anxiety and even contempt of the adherents themselves which can culminate in the persecution or violence towards them. When the Israelis go in and bulldoze and slaughter Palestinian civilians or steal land from the Lebanese or Syrians all with American money, much of which intentionally given by Christian politicians and citizens, people are less likely to feel sympathy for the Muslim people on the receiving end if they don’t see Islam as being worthy of respect or as something fundamentally dangerous that needs to be gotten rid of. And much damage has been done to the Islamic peoples of the Middle East by predominately Christian Western powers over these last centuries and Westerners can and do often ignore or excuse the injustices by the “fact” that Muslims are a fundamentally “dangerous” people who follow a “destructive” or “evil” religion.
The actions of so-called “Islamic” radicals and tyrants against innocents, whether they are Christians or fellow Muslims, is inexcusable and evil, but so is the Christian mindset that aims to cause sedition and separation between the Muslims and Christians of the East who seek to build a future together. Pope Benedict XVI, may God bless him, has helped to show that Muslim and Christian unity and respect is possible in a time where the conflicts between East and West has seemingly pitted these two great faiths against one another.
September 19th, 2012 | 11:20 am
Erik: Such films are intended to paint the Muslim religion and thus the Muslims as unsympathetic,
But such films are not really necessary for that, they are not even enough. No one would believe that Islam is a religion of violence on the say-so of a film. Followers of the Muslim religion are pretty adept at showing their religion to be unsympathetic. And anyone who reads Muslim holy texts will see that Islam is a religion that encourages violence against innocents.
Erik: For example, if someone were to post up a video denying or praising the Holocaust or portraying Jewish religious figures as money grubbing con artists,
Not a proper comparison. The Holocaust happened, it’s one of the best documented events in history. And if a Jewish religious figure is actually a money grubbing con artist (as many members of the Shas party in Israel were), then it is entirely correct to point it out. People merely point out that Muhammad was an extremely evil man: who slaughtered 700 Jews and sold their women and children into slavery. That’s a fact. You can’t compare it to slander, because slander is by definition something that is not true.
Erik: When you have a film like the one that has recently made a splash, it not only disparages the religion of the people but ultimately encourages anxiety and even contempt of the adherents themselves which can culminate in the persecution or violence towards them.
Who has been violent? Not critics of Islam. Followers of Islam have been violent, because Islam is a religion that encourages violence against innocents.
Erik: The actions of so-called “Islamic” radicals and tyrants against innocents, whether they are Christians or fellow Muslims, is inexcusable and evil,
I am glad that you finally got around to condemning the murderous mobs. But you still put Islamic within scare quotes. Is it your position that people who kill innocents cannot be Muslims? Then Muhammad was not a Muslim, for the aforementioned crime of killing 700 innocent Jews and selling their women and children into slavery.
Erik: respect is possible in a time where the conflicts between East and West has seemingly pitted these two great faiths against one another.
No, my good man, what pitted these two faiths against each other is Muhammad’s commandment to fight against the unbelievers until they are subjugated and pay the unbeliever tax, the jizyah (Koran 9:29). What has pitted these two against each other is the division Muslims make of the world, between the House of Islam (Dar-al-Islam) and the House of War (Dar-al-Harb), against which Muslims are to wage war until it is surrenders to Muslim rule. The word Islam itself means surrender, and not without good reason. There is nothing great about Islam, but its wrongs.
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