Re-examining Bishop Fulton Sheen's idea about Mary and Muslims

[JimG]

n 1952 Bishop Fulton Sheen wrote that Mary as Our Lady of Fatima was the key to converting Muslims. Bishop Sheen believed that the devotion Muslims already had toward Mary would eventually lead them to her divine Son.

But 1952 was a far different time. The Islamic world was in a period of moderation. William Kilpatrick re-examines Bishop Sheen’s thesis in this article:

Our Lady of Victory

 

[adamhovey1988]

I know MANY Muslims consider Mary to be of pre-eminence amongst women. I think it possible (though not likely) that Muslims could stop to consider the fact that, whilst they neither believe that Jesus (Isa) is God or the mother of God, that it seems odd that a virgin (Muslims believe that Mary was a virgin) would conceive a child that was simply nothing more than a prophet, although Muslims consider Jesus the messiah, they have a very different understanding of this than do Christians. Here are some prominent converts to Christianity from Islam.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazli_Sabri
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fathia_Ghali
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bashir_Shihab_II

 

[PluniaZ]

I stopped reading when I read this:

Judging by subsequent events, Bishop Sheen may have been overly optimistic, but those subsequent events also seem to suggest that nothing short of a heavenly intervention will turn Islam away from its goal of conquering the planet. Fulton Sheen may have underestimated the difficulty of converting Muslims, but the strategies for moderating Islam proposed by current world leaders border on the delusional. All the efforts of secular leaders to appease Islam have only made Islam stronger and the West weaker.

Yes, all that land westerners stole from Muslims in Palestine, all the puppet dictatorships western governments installed in the Persian Gulf, all the bombs western countries have dropped on Iraq, Syria, Libya, Yemen, Afghanistan, Somalia etc., all the economic sanctions that have starved children in Muslim countries … yeah all that appeasement and Muslims still hate us for some reason.

 

[adamhovey1988]

I stopped reading when I read this:

Yes, all that land westerners stole from Muslims in Palestine, all the puppet dictatorships western governments installed in the Persian Gulf, all the bombs western countries have dropped on Iraq, Syria, Libya, Yemen, Afghanistan, Somalia etc., all the economic sanctions that have starved children in Muslim countries … yeah all that appeasement and Muslims still hate us for some reason.

I don’t disagree with you but you listed Syria is a Muslim country. Syria is not a Muslim country Syria is a secular country. In fact the only religious law I know of in Syria is that the president has to be Muslim. that is not dissimilar to the law and Lebanon where the president must be Maronite Catholic. 50 years ago I’m pretty sure most people would not have referred to countries in the Middle East as Muslim, even if Muslims make up the majority in those countries many of those countries have millions of people that are not Muslim like Egypt, for instance

 

[DignumEtJustum]

Sheen in his argument in “The World’s First Love” also pointed out that Mary is the only woman to be mentioned in the koran. Another priest I’ve listened to speak said he witnessed moslems with a devotion to her in an underground Marian shrine in the Middle East, assumingly seeking her intercession. This likely occurred 50 or 60 years ago.

 

[Bob_Crowley]

I think that Mary will have a role to play in the eventual conversion of the Moslems.

I also believe that the current resurgence of Islam is part of a judgment against the West, and the world in general, including those Moslem governments and movement sgiven to violence. We will reap what we’ve sown - if we sow a wind, we’ll reap a whirl wind.

As such, I think most of the course has still to be run. Exactly what form it will take I don’t know, but I think it’s going to be very unpleasant.

As for the West - I remember a sermon by my old pastor in which he had a few things to say about TE Lawrence aka “Lawrence of Arabia”. “Lawrence was no fool …” he said, adding “he pleaded with Western governments and oil companies to give the Arabs independence…” But he went on, “… the powers that be refused to listen … the Arabs were going to get nothing!”

Had they listened he remarked, many of the problems that so bedevil the Middle East today would never have eventuated. Too late now. Lawrence gave up and become a motor bike mechanic, a mechanical hobby which eventually killed him.

Since he gave that sermon, probably in the late 1980’s, we’ve had Gulf War I, Gulf War II, 9/11 and Afghanistan, Libya and Syria. Pakistan and India now have around 100 nuclear warheads each, with fundamentalism in Pakistan alive and well. Israel, surrounded in the Middle East, is rumored to have about 80 nuclear weapons.

Bombs have gone off in Bali, London, Moscow and Paris, and waves of Moslem refugees have flooded into parts of Europe.

The course has yet to be run. Mary may well have a role at some point in the future with regard to the Moslems, but I think it’s early days yet. While we continue to kill hundreds of thousands of our own unborn children each year as just one example, I can hardly see God withdrawing his judgmental hand, until He’s taught us a very tough lesson.

And I believe Islam is going to be a part of that judgment, whether we like it or not.

For me, World War I was a judgement against a colonial and increasingly humanist Europe in particular - at the height of their power and often cruel treatment of subject nations, they found the bowls of God’s wrath poured out on them in the charnel house of Western Europe. And not until that battle was at it’s height, in 1917, did God send Mary to the little village of Fatima in Portugal, and He sent her not to the war lords of Britain, France, Germany or the USA, but to three almost illiterate children in a backwoods village nobody had ever heard about.

And her message? If men don’t change, there’ll be another even worse war.

Quite possibly, as the current crisis builds momentum, God may once again send Mary with a message. But he won’t send her to the powerful or the wise - He will send her to children and the humble, and the childlike in heart. It will be when the crisis is at its height, and not before, if I’m any judge.

And her message? Well, that will remain to be seen.

 

[Peter_J]

Sheen in his argument in “The World’s First Love” also pointed out that Mary is the only woman to be mentioned in the koran.

True, but I think that fact has less to do with their positive regard for Mary, and more to do with their dim view of women generally.

I don’t know how many men are mentioned in the Koran, but I imagine it’s quite a few.