Pope refutes notion of Moderate Islam

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Benedict XVI on Islam and the West
by Hugh Hewitt

http://hughhewitt.com/archives/2006/01/01-week/index.php#a000962

*Yesterday I interviewd Father Jospeh Fessio, Provosty of Ave Maria University in Naples, Florida, and student and friend of Benedict XVI. (Father Fessio is also the founder of Ignatius Press.) The entire interview should be read, and the transcript is here, …

*http://www.radioblogger.com/#001282

… but the most fascinating part concerned a gathering at Castle Gandolfo with the Pope and his students this past September, where the subject was Islam:

HH: Oh, you bet. Yesterday wouldn’t be too soon. Let’s go back to this meeting, because I’m fascinated by this. And to the extent that you can, obviously, without violating confidence, who was there? And how did it unfold? And what was the idea behind it?

JF: Well, Joseph Ratzinger as professor was very, very popular, and had many, many graduate students. And as part of the graduate program, you’d have these seminars called Hauptseminare, major seminars, or Proseminaren, and there’d be eight or ten or twelve of us graduate students with Cardinal Ratzinger. Then, he was Father Ratzinger leading it. And they were so rich, so fruitful, that when he became archbishop of Munich in 1977, the students decided that they would want to try and continue some kind of regular meeting to discuss theological issues. And he was very happy to do that. So from that point on, every year, we have met for a weekend, usually at a monastery. We’ll pray together, we’ll read scripture together, we’ll do fellowship together, we will study together, we will eat together, and have a couple of presentations from scholars on a particular topic, and we’ll discuss it. They’ve always been very, very enriching and very beautiful. And so, we had planned last year, in 2004, that in 2005, we would discuss Islam. And it was all agreed upon. We had two people picked out to come. When he was elected Pope, we figured well, it’s going to be all off now. But he said no, no. He said I’m Pope, but I want to keep my relationships with my friends in the past, and I want to continue this. That’s why we had it again.

HH: And the other speaker, who would that have been?

JF: That was another Jesuit, actually, from Germany, a Father Christian Troll, who is an expert on Islam in Europe.

HH: And what were the natures of their presentations? That it is an ominous time for Christendom, because it simply cannot keep pace, either population or with zeal, compared to the reach of Islam?

JF: Let me divide my answer into two parts, and you can interrupt me at any time, because I realize it’s your show. I’m taking all the time.

HH: Oh, no. I’m fascinated.

To continue reading: click on the link.
 
The pope’s unexploded bombshell
Jan 23, 2006
by Diana West
townhall.com/opinion/columns/dianawest/2006/01/23/183354.html

"Remember when word came down from the Vatican that Pope John Paul II had watched Mel Gibson’s “The Passion of the Christ” and liked it? The anonymously sourced story sparked a media firestorm around the globe as reporters sought confirmation of the papal equivalent of two thumbs up. “It is as it was,” we later learned the pope supposedly said. Which sounded like the perfect biblical movie blurb; but did the pontiff actually utter the words?

After some non-clarifying retractions from the Vatican, it was ultimately hard to say for sure – although not for journalistic want of trying. This natural curiosity stands in striking contrast to the media silence that has met a far more sensational, far more significant report of papal opinion: namely, that Pope Benedict XVI is said to believe that Islam is incapable of reform.

This bombshell dropped out of an early January interview conducted by radio host Hugh Hewitt with the Rev. Joseph D. Fessio, SJ, a friend and former student of the pope. The Rev. Fessio recounted the pope’s words on the key problem facing Islamic reform this way: “In the Islamic tradition, God has given His word to Muhammad, but it’s an eternal word. It’s not Muhammad’s word. It’s there for eternity the way it is. There’s no possibility of adapting it or interpreting it.” Fessio continued, elaborating not on how many ratings stars the pope thinks some biopic should get, but rather on the pope’s theological assessment of a historically warring religion with a billion-plus followers, some notorious number of whom are now at war with the West. According to his friend, the pope believes there’s no way to change Islam because there’s no way to reinterpret the Koran – i.e., change Koranic teachings on infidels, women, polygamy, penal codes and other markers of Islamic law – in such a way as to propel Islam into happy coexistence with modernity.

As I said, a bombshell. But this is one bombshell that has yet to explode because no one wants to touch it. Hugh Hewitt posted the extraordinary interview online, a couple of blogs picked it up, and Middle East expert Daniel Pipes wrote a short piece taking exception to it, but, as the Asia Times Online columnist Spengler noted (in a column called “When even the pope has to whisper”), “not a single media outlet has taken notice.” Posting the Spengler column at The Corner at National Review Online, Rod Dreher wrote: “Spengler is amazed by the silence from the Western media over this remarkable statement attributed to the current pope … and he suggests that we shrink from acknowledging it because the consequences of the pope being right about this are too horrible to contemplate.” Indeed, with one exception, NRO Corner regulars failed to comment on the pope’s putative words – noteworthy, given the magazine’s tradition of a Catholic identity.

Is facing up to the pope’s notion of unreformable Islam really too horrible to contemplate?.."

click on the link to read the rest of the article
 
Do Muslims refute the notion of “moderate” Islam? I’m sure some do (e.g., terrorists), but do all, or most?
 
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Ahimsa:
Do Muslims refute the notion of “moderate” Islam? I’m sure some do (e.g., terrorists), but do all, or most?
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It would seem, that since Hamas got the most votes in the Palestinian election, that what the Pope has said is certainly true. The Muslims are attracted to violence. Since 9/11/01 I’ve been studying Islam, and concluded that the only possible answer is for them to be converted. I know it sounds almost preposterous, but recall how Our Lady of Guadalupe converted the Aztecs. If you don’t know the story, or would like to read it again with more of it’s background, here is an excellent site:
catholicism.org/brmichael-guadalupe.html It’s long, but an excellent history.

In the following site, “Our Lady and Islam”, the author, a holy priest from the Blue Army of Fatima, tells the history of Our Lady’s appearances, and reveals a prophecy that Mary will convert the Muslims. We must pray and fast for our Muslim brothers that they will come to know Our Lady and through her be led to Jesus and His true Church.

catholicculture.org/docs/doc_view.cfm?recnum=3998
This isn’t as long as the previous document.
Blessings on all.

Mary, Our Mother, pray for us,
Ruth
 
the Holy Father, in his beautiful calm but clear way, said well, there’s a fundamental problem with that, because he said in the Islamic tradition, God has given His word to Mohammed, but it’s an eternal word. It’s not Mohammed’s word. It’s there for eternity the way it is. There’s no possibility of adapting it or interpreting it, whereas in Christianity, and Judaism, the dynamism’s completely different, that God has worked through His creatures. And so, it is not just the word of God, it’s the word of Isaiah, not just the word of God, but the word of Mark.
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Oh, there are a lot of Christians who seem to believe much the same as Islamic tradition directs. Does that mean that moderate Christianity is impossible?

Certainly the Pope did not say as much - its an interpretation to his remarks. And we don’t even get the Pope’s actual statement… just someone’s recall of what he had privately said a few months earlier.

I don’t think the article supports the title of this thread.
 
Tristan daCunha:
Oh, there are a lot of Christians who seem to believe much the same as Islamic tradition directs. Does that mean that moderate Christianity is impossible?

Certainly the Pope did not say as much - its an interpretation to his remarks. And we don’t even get the Pope’s actual statement… just someone’s recall of what he had privately said a few months earlier.

I don’t think the article supports the title of this thread.
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I agree. Where’s the confirmation? What we do know for sure is we shouldn’t be publically reporting the Holy Father said something when we aren’t sure it’s true. I think if it was in the least bit realiable the MSM would be shouting it from the rooftops.
 
I believe Fr. Fessio has recognized that he ought not to have spread this around, since it’s clearly been blown out of proportion. Apparently the Pope expressed some (quite reasonable) doubt as to whether the Qur’an could be reinterpreted in the same way that the Bible has been, given the more rigid Islamic views of the Qur’an (more rigid compared to mainstream Catholic or mainline Protestant views–not necessarily compared to fundamentalist Protestant views, I’d suggest).

That’s a long way from “refuting the notion of moderate Islam.” It isn’t a refutation of anything, just a query. And it doesn’t refute the idea of moderate Islam–it just questions the extent to which Islam can change or reinterpret itself (as Christianity demonstrably has done).

I think this is a valid issue, but ultimately it’s not something any Christian can decide. Muslims have to decide the future of their own tradition. But of course we can’t be blamed for watching with intense interest (and with our hearts in our mouths, since the direction Islam takes in this century probably makes the difference between relative peace and a wave of bloodshed that makes the World Wars look like border skirmishes).

Edwin
 
From post 1:

“…a Father Christian Troll…” LOL 😃 ##
 
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