Background on Pope Benedict and Islam

Well worth reading this article by Abdul Hakim Murad about Pope Benedict. It was written a year after he took up the position, and not after the recent controversy.

He points to a number of early indicators of the Pope's intent towards Islam - and it's not good. There was the meeting with the extremely rightwing Oriana Fallaci.

There was the insistence at a meeting with German Muslim leaders that he only wanted to discuss terrorism, and not discrimination that Muslims were facing. He opposed Turkish entry into the EU as it is a Muslim country.

During his time as a Cardinal, there is his "Islam is not simply a denomination that can be included in the free realm of a pluralistic society" comment and others airing his belief that Muslims cannot be "assimilated". Time report that in 1997 he said Islam features "a very marked subordination of woman to man". He's also on record saying that Islam "simply does not have the separation of the political and religious sphere that Christianity has had from the beginning."

Then there is the shuffling of key staff, including pro-Israeli appointments:

Ratzinger has also moved to distance himself from Cardinal Angelo Sodano, the previous pope’s Secretary of State, who is widely regarded as pro-Palestinian, and remains a close friend of the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, Michel Sabbah. Sodano’s likely successor is widely expected to be Cardinal Ruini, the former president of the Italian Bishops’ Conference, who has been outspoken in insisting that Muslim children in Italian schools should not have the right to study their own religion, because, Ruini believes, this would involve ‘dangerous social indoctrination.’ In Palestine, two key appointments have added to the pessimism of the beleaguered Palestinians. Sabbah has been given a new auxiliary bishop, who will succeed him automatically in two years’ time: this is Fouad Twal of Jordan, regarded in Israel as far more acceptable than Sabbah, who has been a fearless critic of Israel’s policies in the occupied territories. No less symbolic has been the choice of Pierbattista Pizzabella as bishop of the Hebrew-speaking Catholics in Israel. Pizzabella has regularly outraged Palestinian human rights activists by his outspoken support for Israel, and his appointment was loudly applauded in right-wing circles. One Anglican Palestinian leader calls him ‘very bad news’, and sees him as a sign that the Vatican is determined to draw a line under its former support for Palestinian rights, in favour of a pro-Israel strategy that will tie it in with wider right-wing aspirations for the Middle East. In making such an appointment, Ratzinger must have known very well the symbolic gravity of the step he was taking.

There seems to be a distancing of himself from the anti-war position of Pope John Paul.

The content of this article appear to suggest the current storm isn't out of character for Ratzinger, but part of his overall philosophy.

Comments

[ainelivia]

Osama, thank you for providing the link to Mr Harads writings. This provides information I have not come in contact with previously. And also provides links to his other work.

I am particularly interested in his article on "Faith & Reason" which was published in the Independent, however the link is broken. Any suggestions?

[Sadat]

Catholic institution was rocked by high-profile paedophile scandals in the 1990s. Now they have a Nazi pope in their midst.

Wow!

[ainelivia]

Sadat, just a little history of which you may not be aware.

1941, Grand Mufti of Jersualem, attempted to establish pro-Nazi gvt in Iraq. Reported as praising the Germans for their efforts against the Jews.

April 18 2001, Egyptian newspaper, Al-Akhbar. "Our thanks go to the late Hitler, who wrought in advance the vengeance of the Palestinians...... However, we rebuke Hitler for the fact that the vengeance was insufficient".

adequatio intellectus et rei

= when the mind has the same form as reality we think truth.

and are hopefully, fair and balanced in our reporting....

[Sadat]

The Nazi pope is gunning for Jews now.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/pope/story/0,,1874891,00.html

Fascist America and a Nazi papacy is a deadly combo. Surely, this is End Game.

[ainelivia]

Surely you need help.

[George Carty]

Sadat is Naveen's mirror image...

[Sadat]

Watch how the Nazi pope issued internal memos to cover-up the paedophiles in his establishment from being brought to trial.

SEX CRIMES AND THE VATICAN
BBC One
Sunday 1 October at 2215 BST

[A Siddiqi]

What's the big deal about the Grand Mufti of Jersualem allying with Germans? It is very common that the freedom fighters of nation that has been colonised will seek support from the enemies of their colonizers, regardless of who they are. Ever hear of Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose?

[joe90]

It certaintly didn't stop Jewish terrorist groups opening up negotiations with with the Nazi regime and the likes of Eichmann. Menachem Begin, ex Prime Minsiter of Israel, was a member of one these racist extremist violent zionist terrorist groups, who were content to cultivate a relationship with the Nazi.

The Grand Mufti was another western made puppet who decided to ally himself with his own people, the Palestinians, rather than follow the orders of the racist British empire. The Mufti was anti-British imperialist, as were just about every other people in the world, under the heel of the then racist British Empire.

The British Imperialists had decided to give away Palestine to a bunch of European foreigners in their notorious 'Balfour Declaration'. Trying to defend your own homeland and people from racist illegal European zionist colonisers is, apparantly, to be pro-Nazi!

[ainelivia]

Oh he got up to a little more than that. He went off to Berlin, where he was ever so chummy with Mr Hitler, and at one point intervened in the transportation of Jews, preventing their deportation to the Levant, and enusuring their almost certain deportation to a concentration camp.

So any form of colonization takes away the individual's ability to think and make desicsions for themselves, and you can blame someone else for time immemorial?

[joe90]

"ever so chummy with mr hitler" -
- tabloid rhetorical cant

As far as I can tell, a lot of other people were quite chummy with mr hitler too, such as other western governemnts including and especially the British government - they weren't too bothered at all about the crimes of the Nazi regime until, of course, mr hitler started to attack and threaten their interests as well, which is when they all began to fall out with each other.

So the Grand Mufti is now responsible for the behaviour of the Nazi regime is he?

Haj Amin al-Husseini was anti-British, before the British goverment fell out with the Nazi regime in 1939, and was anti-British after it. The Grand Mufti's policy didn't change with regards to the British racist imperialists. It was their policies that changed with regards to the Nazis in 1939.

And the Grand Mufti, Haj Amin al-Husseini, escaped to Berlin from his sanctuary of the Holy Haram al-Sharif in Al Quds - a salient fact given the context of the situation
ie the British authorities in Mandate Palestine no longer had a use for him and were trying to arrest him.

The Grand Mufti's escapades and escape acts are quite amusing and funny to follow. He was absolutely brilliant at disappearing from one location, turning up again unexpectedly somwhere a thousand miles off!

[ainelivia]

Are you, related to, connected with, member of the same lodge as, affiliated to the BNP or David Irving?

"The Grand Mufti's escapades and escape acts are quite amusing and funny to follow. He was absolutely brilliant at disappearing from one location, turning up again unexpectedly somwhere a thousand miles off!"

Sounds like a earlier reincarnation of David Blaine.

[Shavez]

Pope 'led cover-up of child abuse by priests'
by EWAN FLETCHER

The Pope played a leading role in a systematic cover-up of child sex abuse by Roman Catholic priests, according to a shocking documentary to be screened by the BBC tonight.

In 2001, while he was a cardinal, he issued a secret Vatican edict to Catholic bishops all over the world, instructing them to put the Church's interests ahead of child safety.

The document recommended that rather than reporting sexual abuse to the relevant legal authorities, bishops should encourage the victim, witnesses and perpetrator not to talk about it. And, to keep victims quiet, it threatened that if they repeat the allegations they would be excommunicated.

The Panorama special, Sex Crimes And The Vatican, investigates the details of this little-known document for the first time. The programme also accuses the Catholic Church of knowingly harbouring paedophile clergymen. It reveals that priests accused of child abuse are generally not struck off or arrested but simply moved to another parish, often to reoffend. It gives examples of hush funds being used to silence the victims.

http://www.mailonsunday.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=407808&in_page_id=1770&in_a_source

[ainelivia]

All of this is relatively true. Indeed as someone who knows very well how much was the culture of cover-up, the BBC is a little late on this one. The Ferns (Ireland) report has been out for over a year now. The powerful either siding with religions or being too scared of them to take a stand is nothing new.

At least we are freely able to discuss and debate the shortcomings of the Catholic Church; without fear of public disturbance. Or indeed the threat of burning at the stake.

[Shavez]

Ainelivia, I think you'll find Islam getting attacked daily in the media without people being burned at the stake either.

There's also a difference between discussing something that actually happened, and recently, than random scaremongering.

[ainelivia]

Shavez, my reference was to the Catholic's Church's response to anyone disagreeing with them, as in heresy.

[Shavez]

Apologies didn't realise you were referring to the days gone by when people were actually burned at the stake.

[ainelivia]

Yes, "those were the days", when the Church was free to dispense justice to suit itself; answerable only to God. And indeed God, who's wishes and laws they (the Church) interpreted for the masses. Now those whom they hid for shame are answerable to the law. As we all should be.

This type of abuse is quite widespread, more widespread than our society is willing to admit. The Church's response is pretty much the microcosm of society's response; there is a lot of denial out there, and not all of it within the walls of the CC.

[Sadat]

The Nazi pope is visiting Turkey next month.

According to the published programme, the Nazi pope will arrive in Ankara, then go on to Izmir and Ephesus on November 29, ending up in Istanbul where he will stay until the end of his visit on December 1.

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/60A7920D-97D4-46F8-BF7E-88F30FE6BBD4.htm

It should be recalled that the Nazi pope called Buddhism as masturbation for the mind.

[Sadat]

Tha Nazi pope's basic instincts...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Hf3OHfNzAs