You lose me here as I do not know all Bishops are saying, “Islam is great.” If that is true then there must be a directive from the Vatican that says so and as far as I know there is certainly none.
I am not saying all of them , but take for example Bishop McManus who stopped Spencer from speaking to catholics. or the archbishop of Milan who works hard to ease the life of the islamic community in Milan ! indeed the bishops in Europe are easing islamic illegal immigration . Rather than forcing islamic religious leaders to denounce saudi arabia publicly for not allowing churches to be build , we are seeing praises of islam !
As far as I know, Islam does not have structured hierarchy unlike Catholicism. The question is, who therefore are representing Islam? The most we can do would be to get those clerics who have official position in their government. I am not too sure if the Church is doing that. Obviously a radical would not fit in this category.
Ah, you are right there. No Hans Kung to represent Catholics. But would the Saudi grant Mufti, or the Saudi government rather, consented to participate in the dialogue? They seem to be very elitist and not much that we can get out of them. As far as I know such dialogues are on who is willing basis.
exactly , that is my whole point ! the Saudi grand mufti , Yusuf al qardawi , are all bunch of radicals . no doubt about it, but they are representing a huge section , of not the majority, of Sunni Islam. most islamic orginizaton in the west are tied to saudi funding . The Vatican should dialogue with the Real guys , not the pussycats. you will say " but they are not willing to dialogue " well , then you are admitting that they are people from the bronze age , so stop speaking of islam in high language , and treat it as it is.you don’t dialogue with Nazis to find a common ground , you tell them your practices ought to be change.
In the first place it is not for the Church to tell Muslims what to believe. So that would be out of the question. The most they can do is to voice their disagreement.
This is the problem . The church treats islam as of it is a developed religion . Islam is medieval in all sense, and the doctrines and laws were lied down by their “church fathers” in that period. so the church ought to know what muslims “really” believe. Why modern islam of the early 20th century disappeared ? why egypt became more radicalized ?why revival of classical islam (which is radical) happened ? because all attempt to reinterpret islam will hit their classical interpretation( which is built on the sayings of muhammad himself) . it’s like hoping that catholics will denounce the doctrine of the real presence , despite the fact that Ignatius of Antioch , and Justin martyr wrote about it. likewise , you can’t hope muslims will give up doctirnes such as Jihad , that were understood from the beginning to be like that .
Pope Benedict VI once did that and what was the result? It was in the negative, right? Not to mention how our religious were killed because of the simple statement. This is not to say that our clergies should avoid saying the truth but more so to say that would probably achieve a more positive outcome, and that is not an easy thing to do.
So , if islam is peace , why would they kill people or commit violence because pope statment ? and if violence is merely a minority position , why most muslims in the world got angry ? it is what you wrote that prove my point , that islam is barbaric religion . So people should stop saying it is nice religion and deceiving other fellow catholics ! or stopping people like spencer from speaking to other catholics about islam
my point is clear sir , if you think islam is evil , and saying that publicly would make violence , then don’t say it is “peaceful” , just be silent about it ; at least. yet this is exactly what the bishops , in the case of Spencer case, didn’t do !
Thanks for the statement on the Islamic four schools and that we should differentiate Islam and Muslims. In any case, I think it is a gross exaggeration that Bishops are that ignorant about Islam.
they are . If muslims who don’t speak arabic don’t even know that muhammad did that or said this, and they are surprised when I give them Islamic sources which prove my point, then what about our bishops ? do you really think the church is training its bishops and priest to understand islam ? I know that public schools in saudi trained us muslims to reject Christianity , but from what I know , the answer is no. Indeed , it would not surprise me if I see bishops who silent their priests and laity for criticizing islam !
or be surprised (and in this case because Pope Francis is giving Muslims leaders such appreciation) with his charitable tone to Muslims.