Posted on 05/14/2004 10:11:07 AM PDT by KentTrappedInLiberalSeattle
VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - The Vatican warned Catholic women on Friday to think hard before marrying a Muslim and urged Muslims to show more respect for human rights, gender equality and democracy.
Calling women "the least protected member of the Muslim family," it spoke of the "bitter experience" western Catholics had with Muslim husbands, especially if they married outside the Islamic world and later moved to his country of origin.
The comments in a document about migrants around the world were preceded by remarks about points of agreement between Christians and Muslims but they seemed likely to fuel mistrust between the world's two largest religions.
The document said the Church discouraged marriages between believers in traditionally Catholic countries and non-Christian migrants.
It hoped Muslims would show "a growing awareness that fundamental liberties, the inviolable rights of the person, the equal dignity of man and woman, the democratic principle of government and the healthy lay character of the state are principles that cannot be surrendered."
When a Catholic woman and Muslim man wanted to marry, it said, "bitter experience teaches us that a particularly careful and in-depth preparation is called for."
It said one possible problem was with Muslim in-laws and advised future mothers that they must insist on Church policy that children born of a mixed marriage be baptized and brought up as Catholics.
If the marriage is registered in the consulate of a Muslim country, the document said, the Catholic must be careful not to sign a document or swear an oath including the shahada, the Islamic profession of faith, which would amount to converting.
DIFFERENT APPROACHES
The document highlighted the contrasting approaches the Vatican has taken in recent years toward Islam, which has emerged as a strong rival for souls, especially in Africa.
Pope John Paul has broken ground in dialogue with Muslims and even prayed in a mosque in Damascus. He won plaudits in the Muslim world for his strong opposition to the Iraq war.
But Vatican officials and leading Catholic prelates have expressed increasingly critical views about the spread of Islam and the challenge this poses for Catholicism.
The Vatican's top theologian, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, said earlier this week the West "no longer loves itself" and so was unable to respond to the challenge of Islam, which was growing because it expressed "greater spiritual energy."
The migration document also discouraged churches from letting non-Christians use their places of worship.
This issue arose last month when Muslims in Spain asked to be able to pray in Cordoba cathedral, which was once a mosque. A senior Vatican official said this would be "problematic."
Ditto !
Yeah. I feel really badly about that, of course. :)
Heh Heh...Because it is morally equivalent to bestiality?
Wow. The Vatican gives the finger to political correctness.
Thankk God.
Keep praying for the hubby!
MM
Isn't this the same as telling someone not to stick their tongue in a light socket?
Excellent point, and some of the posts make additional good points about custody/law issues in dissolution of these marriages. Frankly, I think people ought to consider very carefully before marrying the citizens of other countries as well, regardless of faith. There are some truly awful international custody disputes involving Americans and citizens of other nations, where the children, previously raised in the U.S., are removed to the country of the non-American citizen parent and held there. For some reason, I want to say there are some very tragic German cases. I don't know if that is because the German government isn't stepping up to the plate to intervene, or because there are a greater number of American-German marriages due to U.S. military presence in Germany.
I heard a former Protestant minister converted to Catholic say one of the best things he learned in seminary was to never presume that everyone knows the basics of the Christian faith.
And any good teacher knows that "repetition is the mother of learning".
Teach and persuade, Christian. Repeat the basics. Someone, somewhere said to do it with gentleness and reverence, yes?
Thank goodness - the drivel that has been coming out of the Vatican about "building a bridge to Islam" was making me ashamed to be a Catholic. This warning, on the other hand, is what Catholics need to hear.
Does anyone in the Vatican have ANY familiarity with the tenets of Islam? Children are automatically Muslim by virtue of birth to a Muslim. Catholicism is out of the question.
The appropriate answer in this situation is "Don't marry a Muslim at all. It's against the Faith!"
You made me LOL in a quiet room while waiting for trainees to finish up a written exam! For shame!
:-)
Heh Heh...Because it is morally equivalent to bestiality?
Yeah, this reads kind of like a "Warning: Do not use on genitals" label on a chainsaw.
The catch is that if you are stupid enough to need to be warned, you are too stupid to heed the warning.
Nick Berg might agree with this.
Agreed. These seriously mixed messages are quite troubling, though.
What can I say, useful idots are in all walks of life.
Apparently he was well grounded in the Bible or that would not have happened.
What in the world? Every day a new pronouncement from the Vatican?
I called it. Was over at the DU and here was the posters comment on this story.
Oh please spare me the holier than thou babble. The implication here is that muslims are so narrow minded in their views that xtians would never be able to live with one of them. Wasnt too long ago catholic women were less than human.
This is good.
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