15 Shocking Quotes from Catholic Bishops About Muslim Aggression in the Middle East

NewsRealBlog ^ | 10/20/2010 | Lisa Graas

[gocatholic]

At the Vatican’s Synod Hall, over 250 Catholic bishops are meeting for the Special Assembly for the Middle East for the Synod of Bishops. It is intended that out of this meeting will come guidance for bishops on dealing with issues specific to the Middle East, but what we hear most clearly are the voices of Catholic bishops crying out about Muslim aggression, mass emigration of Christians and the attempt by Muslims to bring full domination of the Holy Land and all of the Middle East by Islam. Here are fifteen troubling quotes from Catholic Bishops, including one from Europe, participating in the Middle East Synod.

[gocatholic]

Life for Christians in the Middle East is becoming more and more intolerable.

[DarthVader]

This is now time for another Great Crusade.

[Rashputin]

Your link must be wrong because I missed the part that was “shocking”. ;-) All that was there was a list of quotes that might have come from Sgt. Fridays’ notes, you know, “just the facts, ma’am”.

Regards

[Will88]

Solution: the Western nations will take all the Christians living in Muslim nations, and send all the Muslims living in the West back to the Muslim nations. A simple and logical population exchange.

[sageb1]

My tagline since 2005 ~

[Celtic Cross]

And yet people hear nothing about their plight. All we hear about is eeeevil bishops saying mean stuff about muslims.

[mia]

I like your suggestion.

[Talisker]

Given what is well known about Islamic behavior around the world, I didn't find these particularly shocking. Urgent, I think, would be a better term.

15 Shocking Quotes from Catholic Bishops About Muslim Aggression in the Middle East, by Lisa Graas.

#1. HIS BEATITUDE GREGOIRE III LAHAM B.S., PATRIARCH OF ANTIOCH OF THE GREEK-MELKITES, SYRIA: The Christian presence in the Arab world is threatened by the cycles of war afflicting the region, the cradle of Christianity. The main reason is the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: the fundamentalist movements, Hamas and Hezbollah are consequences of this conflict as well of internal dissension, slowness in development, the rise of hatred, the loss of hope in the young who constitute sixty percent of the population in Arab countries. The emigration of Christians is among the most dangerous effects of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: emigration which will make Arab society a society of only one colour, Muslim, faced with a European society identified as Christian. Should this happen, should the East be emptied of its Christians, this would mean that any occasion would be propitious for a new clash of cultures, of civilisations and even of religions, a destructive clash between the Muslim Arab East and the Christian West.

#2. ARCHBISHOP BOUTROS MARAYATI OF ALEPPO OF THE ARMENIANS, SYRIA: For the past hundred years, emigration or violent deportation have continued to occur from the East. … Are we waiting for the day where the world as a spectator amidst the indifference of the Western Churches will sit back and watch the ‘Death of the Christians of the East?’ Despite the crises and difficulties that face our Christian life and our ecumenical relations, we still ‘believe, hoping against every hope’.

#3. ARCHBISHOP ELIAS CHACOUR OF AKKA OF THE GREEK-MELKITES, ISRAEL: During the past twenty centuries our Christians from the Holy Land were alike condemned and privileged to share oppression, persecution and suffering with Christ. … Being the archbishop of the largest Catholic Church in the Holy Land, the Melkite Catholic Church, I insistently invite you and plead with the Holy Father to give even more attention to the living stones of the Holy Land. … We are in Galilee since immemorial times. Now we are in Israel. We want to stay where we are, we need your friendship more than your money.

#4. EUROPE. CARDINAL PETER ERDO, ARCHBISHOP OF ESZTERGOM-BUDAPEST, HUNGARY AND PRESIDENT OF THE CONSILIUM CONFERENTIARUM EPISCOPORUM EUROPAE: In our times, when Christian refugees and emigrants arrive in Europe from various Middle Eastern countries, what is our reaction? Do we pay enough attention to the reasons that force thousands if not millions of Christians to leave the land where their ancestors lived for almost two thousand years? Is it also true that our behaviour is responsible for what is happening? We are truly facing a great challenge. … Do we know how to effectively express our support to the Christians of the Middle East? … The Christians who come from the Middle East knock on the doors of our hearts and reawaken our Christian conscience.

#5. ARCHBISHOP BASILE GEORGES CASMOUSSA OF MOSUL OF THE SYRIANS, IRAQ: In our Middle Eastern countries, we are small minorities, much ravaged by the following factors: (1) Unbridled emigration. Christians are losing more and more trust in their own historical countries. (2) Waves of terrorism inspired by religious ideologies, Islamic or totalitarian, which deny even the principle of equality to the advantage of a fundamentalist revisionism which crushes minorities, including Christians who are the most vulnerable. (3) The alarming decrease of births among Christians, faced with an ever growing natality among Muslims. (4) The unjust accusation against Christians of being troops loaned or led by and for the so-called Christian West, and thus considered as a parasite in the nation. … What is happening in Iraq today makes us think back to what happened in Turkey during the World War I. It is alarming!

#6. HIS BEATITUDE IGNACE YOUSSIF III YOUNAN, PATRIARCH OF ANTIOCH OF THE SYRIANS, LEBANON: For the past 2000 years, and especially during the last fourteen centuries, Christians have become a minority in their own lands and have been harshly tested in their witness of faith, even to the point of martyrdom. [...] Our faithful, who have the right to hope as they live their lives in this tormented region of the Middle East, expect a great deal from this Synod. It is up to us to give them reasons for their faith, a faith inseparable from hope in our beloved Lord Who assures us: ‘Do not fear, little flock’. In living faith like this, with one heart and soul, we will learn how to bear courageous witness together to the One who said ‘I am the Truth and Life’. Only Truth can set us free.

#7. BISHOP CAMILLO BALLIN M.C.C.J., APOSTOLIC VICAR OF KUWAIT: In Muslim tradition, the Gulf is the land sacred to the Prophet of Islam, Mohammed, and no other religion should exist there. How can we reconcile this affirmation with the reality of our Churches in the Gulf where there are approximately three million Catholics? They come from Asia and other regions. The reality of their presence, which cannot be overlooked, questions the Muslim assertion. We cannot limit our assistance to these faithful only to celebration of Sunday or even daily Mass, and to our homilies.[...] I would like to assure Your Beatitudes the Patriarchs, and all our brother bishops, that in the Gulf region we are doing everything in our power and that, if you themselves were there, you could do no more. We ask our Muslim brothers to give us the space to be able to pray properly.

#8. ARCHBISHOP BERHANEYESUS DEMEREW SOURAPHIEL C.M. OF ADDIS ABEBA, ETHIOPIA, PRESIDENT OF THE COUNCIL OF THE ETHIOPIAN CHURCH, AND PRESIDENT OF THE EPISCOPAL CONFERENCE OF ETHIOPIA AND ERITREA: Ethiopia has about eighty million inhabitants, half of whom are below the age of twenty-five. The great challenge which the country faces is poverty and its consequences, such as unemployment. Many young people, aspiring to escape poverty, attempt to emigrate, by any means. Those who emigrate to the Middle East are mostly young women who go legally or illegally to seek employment as domestic workers because most of them lack professional training. In order to facilitate their journey, the Christians change their Christian names to Muslim names, and dress as Muslims so that their visas can be processed easily. In this way, Christians are indirectly forced to deny their Christian roots and heritage. … Even if there are exceptions where workers are treated well and with kindness, the great majority suffer exploitation and abuse. … It would seem that Christians who die in Saudi Arabia are not allowed to be buried there; their bodies are flown to Ethiopia for burial. Could the Saudi authorities be requested to allocate a cemetery for Christians in Saudi Arabia?

#9. ARCHBISHOP ELIE BECHARA HADDAD B.S. OF SAIDA OF THE GREEK-MELKITES, LEBANON: The sale of Christian land in Lebanon is becoming a dangerous phenomenon. It threatens the Christian presence to the point of reducing it to a minimum in the future.

#10. HIS BEATITUDE NERSES BEDROS XIX TARMOUNI, PATRIARCH OF CILICIA: [N]obody emigrates [to the Middle East] to look for a better Christian life.

#11. BISHOP PAUL HINDER O.F.M. CAP., APOSTOLIC VICAR OF ARABIA, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES: There are strict immigration laws (restricting the number of priests). … There is no freedom of religion (no Muslim can convert but Christians are welcome into Islam), and only limited freedom of worship in designated places, granted by benevolent rulers (except in Saudi Arabia).

#12. ARCHBISHOP EDMOND FARHAT, APOSTOLIC NUNCIO: The Middle Eastern situation today is like a living organ which has received a transplant it cannot assimilate, and with no specialists capable of healing it. As a last resource, the Muslim Arab East turned trustingly to the Church, believing her capable of obtaining justice. But this has not happened leading to disappointment and fear. Confidence has turned to frustration and the crisis has become deeper. … Today, the Church endures injustice and calumnies As in the Gospel, many leave, others lose heart or flee. The frustrated and desperate take their revenge on the innocent. But lying behind the physical assassinations and the most disastrous failures is sin. … The action of God continues throughout history, and the Church in the Middle East is now experiencing the way of the Cross and purification, which leads to renewal and resurrection. The present suffering and anguish are the cries of a newborn infant. If they persist it is because the demons that torment our society can be chased away only by prayer. Perhaps we have not prayed enough!

#13. ARCHBISHOP RUGGERO FRANCESCHINI O.F.M. CAP. OF IZMIR, TURKEY, ADMINISTRATOR OF THE APOSTOLIC VICARIATE OF ANATOLIA AND PRESIDENT OF THE TURKISH EPISCOPAL CONFERENCE: The little Church of Turkey, at times ignored, had her sad moment of fame with the brutal murder of Bishop Luigi Padovese O.F.M. Cap., president of the Turkish Episcopal Conference. In a few words I would like to close this unpleasant episode by erasing the intolerable slander circulated by the very organisers of the crime. It was premeditated murder, by those same obscure powers that poor Luigi had just a few months earlier identified as being responsible for the killing of Fr. Andrea Santoro, the Armenian journalist Dink and four Protestants of Malatya. It is a murky story of complicity between ultra-nationalists and religious fanatics, experts in the ‘strategia della tensione’. The pastoral and administrative situation in the vicariate of Anatolia is serious. … What do we ask of the Church? We simply ask what we are lacking: a pastor, someone to help him, the means to do so, and all of this with reasonable urgency. [...] The survival of the Church of Anatolia is at risk. … Nonetheless, I wish to reassure neighbouring Churches – especially those that are suffering persecution and seeing their faithful become refugees – that the Turkish Episcopal Conference will continue to welcome them and offer fraternal assistance, even beyond our abilities. In the same way, we are open to pastoral co-operation with our sister Churches and with positive lay Muslims, for the good of Christians living in Turkey, and for the good of the poor and of the many refugees who live in Turkey.

#14. ARCHBISHOP LOUIS SAKO OF KERKUK OF THE CHALDEANS, IRAQ: The fatal exodus afflicting our Churches cannot be avoided, emigration is the biggest challenge which threatens our presence. The data is worrying.

#15. RAYMOND MOUSSALLI, VICAR GENERAL OF THE PATRIARCHATE OF BABYLON OF THE CHALDEANS, JORDAN: There is a deliberate campaign to drive Christians out of the country. Fundamentalist extremist groups have satanic plans against Christians, not only in Iraq but throughout the Middle East. … We want to make the international community aware that it cannot remain silent in the face of the massacre of Christians in Iraq, and to encourage countries of Catholic tradition to do something for Iraqi Christians, beginning with placing pressure on their own governments. We are experiencing a catastrophic moment, with the emigration of families and the loss of our people who still speak the Aramaic language spoken by Our Lord Jesus Christ.

[SunkenCiv]

thanks gocatholic.

http://www.lisagraas.com/

[Torahman]

Won't happen. Unless Europe repents for what it allowed to happen to the Jew, then the judgement, that is at the door, will fall. How is this to be done? Teshuvah. Teshuvah is true biblical repentance. It is more than an intellectual or verbal assent. It means ‘return’, and in the case of historically ‘Christian’ Europe, it means a return to the Torah, and the defence of the biblical claim of the Jewish people to the land of Israel. Should Europe refuse to do this she will be destroyed.

[sayuncledave]

Persecution and martyrdom do have a long history with us, although I believe this is the worst in a very long time. Political correctness and waffle-words from limp-wristed politicians do little to help. The good Archbishop’s words comparing modern Iraq to World War I-era Turkey are quite concerning. If we had a worthwhile pres, he’d be trying to do something to help, instead of wickedly laughing at his attempts to destroy the best country extant. But, alas, that which we have will lick the boot heels of only the totalitarians of the world.

[mckenzie7]

And all the while, I thought that they had their heads in the sand.

Maybe there is hope for us yet!

Has there been a fatwa announced?

[stylin19a]

resurrect the Knights Templar

[narses]

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[SumProVita]

Thank you for this list!!!!

[goat granny]

This is just a continuation of the earlier crusades when the Christians HAD to crusade as the muslims were invading christian lands and killing the people then taking over the area...Only then the people knew what was going on and protected themselves.

The idiots of today don't even know why the crusades started, they just bad mouth them and say they killed millions...

We all know men on horseback and walking can run across the globe and kill millions....oh wait, it took Marxist and fascist's, and socialist to do that with modern equipment...

[Biggirl]

.....But in the 1980’s, it took one man to say to another, with good results a few years later, “tear this wall DOWN!”

Freedom will always come out the winner.

[goat granny]

I wasn't a Reagan fan until he fired the air traffic controllers. I think that is also when the Russians knew they were dealing with a no nonsense president....

Reagan became my hero with that firing...:O)

[NYer]

Life for Christians in the Middle East is becoming more and more intolerable.

Fr. Ragheed Ganni, a Chaldean Catholic priest in Mosul Iraq, took this picture during his visit to Rome in November 2006. He told his friend who took the picture [Source: Middle East Online]:

Take my picture please. We are the victims of terrorism. I appeal to civil and church authorties to intervene and act seriously to save Christians left in Iraq, who are daily victims of terrorism.

Fr. Ragheed Ganni's body during his funeral in Keremlish, Iraq.

Sunday, June 3, 2007

Baghdad (AsiaNews) – An armed group gunned down and killed Fr Ragheed Ganni and three of his aides. The murder took place right after Sunday mass in front of the Church of the Holy Spirit in Mosul where Father Ragheed was parish priest. Sources told AsiaNews that hours later the bodies were still lying in the street because no one dared retrieve them. Given the situation tensions in the area remain high.
[...]
Father Ragheed himself had been targeted several times in previous attacks. The Church of the Holy Spirit has also been repeatedly attacked and bombed in the last few years, the last time occurred but a few months ago.

Father Ganni was a great friend of AsiaNews. He had studied in Italy and was fluent in Arabic as well as Italian, French and English. In 2005 he had visited Italy where he gave testimony during the Vigil to Eucharistic Congress in Bari.

Fr. Ragheed was born in Mosul in 1972. In 1993, He received his Civil Engineering degree from University of Mosul. He studied in Rome from 1996 to 2003 where he received a master degree in Theology.

It is difficult and painful to ignore these attacks on christians in the Middle East.

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[little jeremiah]

BTTT.

And all Moslems in the Middle East other than descendents of Mohammed’s direct followers are descendents of Christians, Jews and others - probably some Buddhists and Hindus, in Afghanistan - who were forced to convert to Islam. And of course all the Moslems in points east are descendents of Christians, Buddhists, Hindus, Zoroastrians or Parsees in Iran, Jains, animists, and so on.

Practically no Moslems have ever been converted by deciding voluntarily that Islam was for them; other than prison converts. And now, anyone born into a Moslem family is born into a prison from which they cannot leave.