Wednesday, July 05, 2006

Vatican stands up to Islam
“Enough now with this turning the other cheek! It’s our duty to protect ourselves.” Thus spoke Monsignor Velasio De Paolis, secretary of the Vatican’s supreme court, referring to Muslims. Explaining his apparent rejection of Jesus’ admonition to his followers to “turn the other cheek,” De Paolis noted that “The West has had relations with the Arab countries for half a century…and has not been able to get the slightest concession on human rights.”

De Paolis is hardly alone in his thinking; indeed, the Catholic Church is undergoing a dramatic shift from a decades-old policy to protect Catholics living under Muslim rule. The old methods of quiet diplomacy and muted appeasement have clearly failed. The estimated 40 million Christians in Dar al-Islam, notes the Barnabas Fund’s Patrick Sookhdeo, increasingly find themselves an embattled minority facing economic decline, dwindling rights, and physical jeopardy. Most of them, he goes on, are despised and distrusted second-class citizens, facing discrimination in education, jobs, and the courts.

These harsh circumstances are causing Christians to flee their ancestral lands for the West’s more hospitable environment. Consequently, Christian populations of the Muslim world are in a free-fall. Two small but evocative instances of this pattern: for the first time in nearly two millennia, Nazareth and Bethlehem no longer have Christian majorities. The Vatican Confronts Islam by Daniel Pipes
Mark Alexander

5 comments:

European Kafir said...

Now that comes as a real surprise!!! This is the least corner I would have expected to come up with this! I am glad to see it... but don`t trust in it much.. yet.
EK

Always On Watch said...

The old methods of quiet diplomacy and muted appeasement have clearly failed.

Islam has never acceded to compromise.

This article is encouraging, but the multiculturalists have infiltrated the church. I look for this strong stance from De Paolis to be watered down. I'm a bit of a pessimist, I suppose.

Mark said...

European Kafir & Always:

I understand your pessimism; but do bear in mind that Pope Benedict XVI is very well-informed of the dangers of Islam. He has written quite a lot about it.

Adam Moses said...

I am tired of hearing about the "Islamic World".
I am waiting to hear that the "Christian World" is finally rising to meet the challenge.

John Sobieski said...

At least some one is speaking up. Better late than never.