Syncretistic prayers with Muslims... any advice?

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Luvtosew said:
You know what we love Muslins and Jesus died for them too, but we do not need to pray with them, but by all means go ahead and do it if you want.

Please read about Muslins more and what and how they feel about Christians and Jews, not all Muslins but most.

Oh I said Christlam , not Christian, two different things. Christlam is when Christians and Muslins pray together.

:)🙂
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Huh?
 
rinnie said:
Then I guess I am pretty ignorant. Because Alah means the ONE true God. Just because they do not understand our teaching of the Trinity does not mean that we disagree that there is only ONE true God.
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Who is disagreeing?

I am only disagreeing that Allah = Christian God from all perspectives. As I showed with examples, they are not.
rinnie said:
There is ONLY ONE TRUE GOD. We do not have plural gods. There is as I said earlier ONE TRUE GOD. God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit, ONE In BEING with the Father.
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So?
rinnie said:
While I agree they had a leader Muhammad who led them astray it had nothing to do with them bellieving in the ONE TRUE GOD, the GOD of Abraham.
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They believe in One True God that has the philosophical properties we attribute with God. They also have pretty big differences with respect to this One True God.

You seem to want to ignore all those differences. Depending on what you are talking about, sure, we can ignore it. But it is not true that in general it should be ignored all the time.
 
rinnie,

when the Muslins take over, you will pray to their God, and no more communion. No more Jesus.🙂
 
Luvtosew said:
rinnie,

when the Muslins take over, you will pray to their God, and no more communion. No more Jesus.🙂
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No I won’t. Because as I told you they have the same God as I do, Please show me where they do not believe in the same God the God of Abraham.

Where did I EVER say we have the same beliefs and teachings as them. I SAID and let me repeat they believe in the same God as us. Please show me where that is not the truth or Catholic teaching.
 
And by the way they will never take over the RCC.

God promised us that the gates of hades will never prevail, that the Holy Spirit will be with us until the end of age. So why would I be afraid of Muslims to take over the fullness of the truth the Catholic Church>
 
rinnie said:
Where did I EVER say we have the same beliefs and teachings as them. I SAID and let me repeat they believe in the same God as us. Please show me where that is not the truth or Catholic teaching.
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I know you keep repeating this and it is very tempting because there is such a statement in most Church documents. But you do realize the context is important right?

When you say they believe in the SAME GOD as us, it is difficult for someone to understand if they are not already thinking on your terms. It can seem absurd. Here is a group of people who think that Jesus was just a prophet, wants to eradicate Christianity and yet you say they believe in the same God.

You have to admit that causes a bit of confusion.

Also, what do you mean by the word “Believe”? Usually to believe or to have Faith means to do the will of God. Since Muslims and Christians perceive pretty different things as being the “Will of God”, how do you say that they both have “Faith” in the same God?
 
passer_by said:
I know you keep repeating this and it is very tempting because there is such a statement in most Church documents. But you do realize the context is important right?

When you say they believe in the SAME GOD as us, it is difficult for someone to understand if they are not already thinking on your terms. It can seem absurd. Here is a group of people who think that Jesus was just a prophet, wants to eradicate Christianity and yet you say they believe in the same God.

You have to admit that causes a bit of confusion.

Also, what do you mean by the word “Believe”? Usually to believe or to have Faith means to do the will of God. Since Muslims and Christians perceive pretty different things as being the “Will of God”, how do you say that they both have “Faith” in the same God?
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I believe I have made my point as clear as I could . They believe in the same God as we do the God of Abraham, I do not know how much clearer I can put it. How else can I explain believe? For them it is the same as us, we have ONE God.

As I stated earlier they do not understand that God the Father God the Son and God the Holy Spirit are not Plural Gods. They do not have our understanding of the Trinity.

But that is not what the question was. The question was and is, Is the God of the Muslim God of Abraham and the Christian God of Abraham the same God. The answer is yes. What part of this do you disagree with.

I never denied that we have different teachings. We believe that all teaching comes from the Church and cannot be interpreted by human understanding. We believe that all Church teaching comes from the Holy Spirit. But that was not the question.
 
Not to derail the discussion, but regarding semantics, the world “Allah.”

Semantic a bit, we Catholics, whose mother language receive loan word from Arabic, do call “God” as “Allah.”
In my mother tongue (Bahasa Indonesia), the Nicene Creed begin with: “Aku percaya akan satu Allah…” (“I believe in one God…etc”).

The same can be said with Christians in Arabic world.
 
rinnie said:
I believe I have made my point as clear as I could . They believe in the same God as we do the God of Abraham, I do not know how much clearer I can put it. How else can I explain believe? For them it is the same as us, we have ONE God.

As I stated earlier they do not understand that God the Father God the Son and God the Holy Spirit are not Plural Gods. They do not have our understanding of the Trinity.

But that is not what the question was. The question was and is, Is the God of the Muslim God of Abraham and the Christian God of Abraham the same God. The answer is yes. What part of this do you disagree with.

I never denied that we have different teachings. We believe that all teaching comes from the Church and cannot be interpreted by human understanding. We believe that all Church teaching comes from the Holy Spirit. But that was not the question.
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First, Muslims do not actually BELIEVE in the God of Abraham. Lumen Gentium, as that article I cited indicates, merely acknowledges that Muslims WANT TO FOLLOW the God of Abraham. It is that which is credited to them.

“The plan of salvation also includes those who acknowledge the Creator, in the first place amongst whom are the Muslims; **these profess to hold the faith of Abraham, and together with us they adore the one, merciful God, mankind’s judge on the last day” (CCC 841)

So while they profess, it is very certain they don’t.

Second, depending on how you define “BELIEVE”, I will either agree or disagree with your that Muslims and Christians believe the same God.
 
Christians can quote the Bible, Muslims the Quran and Jews the Talmud (or the Torah) until the stars grow cold, each claiming to be the “one true faith.”

The reality is, Christians, Muslims and Jews all sprang from the same root.

That root is Abraham, which is why all three are referred to as Abrahamic religions.

The world might be a more peaceful place if members of all three Abrahamic religions would remember that from time to time.

Peace,

Seeker
 
seeker57 said:
Christians can quote the Bible,
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Thank God.
seeker57 said:
That root is Abraham, which is why all three are referred to as Abrahamic religions.
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But Abraham worshipped the Holy Trinity.

Do the other so-called “Abrahamic religions” claim that Abraham worshipped the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit?

If not, then their god is not the same God.
 
Luvtosew said:
We have the same Father, huge difference!!!
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I get what you’re trying to accomplish with that distinction, and you’re right, but because each Person of the Holy Trinity is fully God, it is not inaccurate to assert that we share the same God. This is what the Catechism says:

*… together with us [Muslims] adore the one, merciful God, mankind’s judge on the last day. * - CCC 841
passer_by said:
I think it is always important to understand context and perspective.

While philosophically speaking, The Muslim God is the same one as the Christian God, this is not true from every perspective.

Simply from a Theological perspective:-

Allah is a God that wants Pagan’s murdered or enslaved. The Christian God wants us to love everyone. NOT THE SAME GOD.

Allah revealed the Koran and it therefore contains Divine Revelation. The Christian God has not made public revelation other-than what is in Scripture
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“Allah” - as you know - is simply Arabic for “God,” and the word in context certainly means “the One True God.” As you also would certainly agree, our God - the Christian God - is the One True God.

Thus your reply is incredibly contradictory. Based on what the names you’ve used mean, you basically said in your first point, “the One True God is a God that wants Pagan’s murdered or enslaved. The One True God wants us to love everyone. NOT THE SAME GOD.”

Thus, I think you see the philosophically responsible answer here. Muslims believe many errors about God. It’s not that their God is not Triune, or a God of Love… rather, He is, and they don’t know that about Him.

That’s why it’s beyond goofy when people treat this idea that we share the same God as some kind of encroaching relativism. The very assertion that we share the same God assumes and implicitly asserts that they believe many errors. It implicitly asserts that the Qur’an gets a lot of things wrong.
Mickey said:
Whosoever denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father (St. John 2:23).
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This is a great point, too. We have to distinguish mere intellectual knowledge of and access (by prayer) to God, from a true relationship with Him. No doubt about it: no one can come to the Father except through the Son, as our Lord explains elsewhere in that very same Gospel of Saint John.

In other words, what we’re asserting here, Mickey, does not presuppose that Muslims “have” the Father. That’s a separate matter. God the Father still hears the prayers of those who do not have Him in this sense - obviously, since He is omniscient. And it is He to whom the Muslims intend to direct their prayers, since - despite their faith’s errors - they intend to worship only the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. That is why the Catechism of the Catholic Church asserts what it does.
 
Safia said:
In what ways does it do that? :confused: I’d say that praying with them legitimizes Catholic Truth, especially as Catholics don’t pray to Allah…
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Catholics do pray to Allah, in at least half the world; from Morocco to Indonesia… Allah is simply the word, in various languages, to refer to what we in English speaking lands call God.

As far as praying with Muslims, of course we need to be careful not to affirm error or deny truths. However, done carefully I don’t see why it wouldn’t be acceptable to the Church.
 
passer_by said:
First, Muslims do not actually BELIEVE in the God of Abraham. Lumen Gentium, as that article I cited indicates, merely acknowledges that Muslims WANT TO FOLLOW the God of Abraham. It is that which is credited to them.

“The plan of salvation also includes those who acknowledge the Creator, in the first place amongst whom are the Muslims; **these *profess ***to hold the faith of Abraham, and together with us they adore the one, merciful God, mankind’s judge on the last day” (CCC 841)

So while they profess, it is very certain they don’t.

Second, depending on how you define “BELIEVE”, I will either agree or disagree with your that Muslims and Christians believe the same God.
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I think it is important to note that the CCC and the article you provided make a distinction between Muslims the people and Islam the ideology. Too many posters confuse the discussion by equating the two.
 
israelcatholic said:
Hello everyone,

A case has come to my attention recently of a Catholic community here in Jerusalem that prays together with Muslims.

Does anyone know of a Magisterial document that says that this is wrong so that we could take action and write to the superior of the community?

thanks in advance,

Ariel
Catholics for Israel
www.catholicsforisrael.com
catholicsforisrael.blogspot.com/
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Can you please return to this thread and explain more about this quote:
A case has come to my attention recently of a Catholic community here in Jerusalem that prays together with Muslims.
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How do they pray together?

Are they in a church?

Are they in a mosque?

Are they in someone’s house?

Do the muslims have their prayer mats?

Muslim prayer rituals are different from Catholics?

Do they recite from the quran?

Do the Catholics use the Bible?

Do they pray to Our Father do they pray in Jesus name?

What do muslims do when the Catholics cross themselves?

Are the men & women together?

We, or perhaps I, simply need more details to understand the how’s, what’s, why’s, do’s & dont’s.

Thanks
 
FabiusMaximus said:
Muslims do not believe in our Lord.

Praying with them is legitimizing their religion as proper conduit to God.

And that’s unacceptable.
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I second Fabius on this. Muslims and Christians have opposing beliefs. Having some watered-down, syncretic feel-good prayer with someone of completely different faith isn’t really ecumenism.
 
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