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."
I don't despise you. I despise false teachings.
BTW, my reply was directed to The Lumster and never mentioned Catholics. Have a guilty conscience or a complex? Actually I really don't want to know. I've run across you and you are a very hostile, unChristian person.
BTW, my exchange was with The Lumster. It didn't mention Catholics.
Western women should shy away from men who ride camels or low-riders. They should run toward men whose trucks are jacked up, own horses, or listen to any music with a fiddle in it.
Problematic??? Just say "NO"! What the hell is wrong with Western culture?
It wasn't 60%. It was 52%. Bad enough, but there's a BIG difference.
I've never understood why any Western woman would even consider marrying a Muslim man.
Or are there even 50 pages about the hardships that "migrants around the world" face, with one paragraph about Islam hidden inside somewhere?
How prominent is this warning? How forcefully is it written? Excuse me for say so, but the phrase "bitter experience teaches us that a particularly careful and in-depth preparation is called for" strikes me as rather mealy-mouthed as dire warnings go.
Exactly which office issued this document? Is it from the desk of Cardinal Kasper or Cardinal Ratzinger or someone else?
I hope my fears are wrong about this, but at the moment, I find this news announcement ... (ahem) ... "problematic."
ROTFLMHO!!!
I don't think Jews have been big on honor killing in the last 15 or 16 centuries....
Keep your focus on the central issue, my dear friends! Do not take this warning from the Vatican lightly. A muslim swine shot the Pope years ago and, well, payback is Hell.
This is only the Vatican's first salvo fired against this gutter religion. We'll win.
Ronald Reagan and the Vatican ended the Cold War. They couldn't have done it without each other. They dismantled the USSR without a shot fired. Let's hope GWB and the Vatican are on the same sheet of music here.
I've never understood why any Western woman would even consider marrying a Muslim man.
My husband was telling me about some Russian girls who dated or married muslim men from the Caucauses. This was in Soviet times, before the Wahabbi rebels started causing s--- in Chechnya. The men were Sufi Muslims. They treated the girls like PROPERTY!!If a girl tried to break up the boy would'nt let her leave because she "belonged to him." When a Chechen girl gets married there is an evil custom. Her father gives the new son inlaw a bullit. Which means he has his permission to KILL HER if she dishonors him! Why would any girl want to marry a Muslim man is beyond me!
I think that's good advice actually --- anytime someone feels strongly about something, they should marry someone who is pretty compatible with that. If you're a country person, you should think hard before marrying someone who has to live in a city, if you have to have cats, don't marry a cat hater. I know people in mixed marriages who say that religion wasn't so important during the courtship but suddenly after the kids start coming it becomes more important and the source of many problems. But it depends on how important it is to both parties.
Maybe for a lot those were the only men who would pay attention to them, any husband is better than no husband --- until they find themselves wrapped up in a burka riding in the back of a truck like a dog or told they will never see their children again if they try to escape.
That makes me ill.
It also is a problem begging for a solution.
Your report indicates that is not so.
Welcome to FR. I share your prayer regarding our two nations.
>> I saw a movie about this based on a true story.
She escaped from Iran to Turkey where my mother was a balerina and then a professor and my grandma was a judge..
Where, btw, I went to a catholic high school even though I am a muslim.
I have seen plenty of American women with broken mouths married to "christian" Americans. This broad brush crap has got to stop on all sides..
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