Posted on 09/12/2006 11:52:19 AM PDT by kellynla
REGENSBURG, Germany (Reuters) - Pope Benedict invited Muslims on Tuesday to join a dialogue of cultures based on the premise that the concept of an Islamic "holy war" is unreasonable and against God's nature.
In a major lecture at Regensburg University, where he taught theology between 1969 to 1977, Benedict said Christianity is tightly linked to reason and contrasted this view with those who believe in spreading their faith by the sword.
The 79-year-old Pontiff avoided making a direct criticism of Islam, packaging his comments in a highly complex academic lecture with references ranging from ancient Jewish and Greek thinking to Protestant theology and modern atheism.
In his lecture, the Pope quoted, among others, the 14th century Byzantine emperor Manuel II Paleologos who wrote that Mohammad had brought things "only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached."
The Pope, who used the terms "jihad" and "holy war" in his lecture, added in his own words: "Violence is incompatible with the nature of God and the nature of the soul".
Benedict several times quoted Emperor Manuel's argument that spreading the faith through violence is unreasonable and that acting without reason -- "logos" in the original Greek -- was against God's nature.
At the end of his lecture, the Pope again quoted Manuel and said: "It is to this great 'logos', to this breadth of reason, that we invite our partners in the dialogue of cultures."
(Excerpt) Read more at today.reuters.com ...
ping
Pope Benedict is THE man PING
Yes. It is his time and place to confront them directly and to correct publically their evil misdirection. May he continue to speak out against their evil works and machinations.
Only way for the Religion of Peace to react to this insult: go out and kill a bunch of people. Any people. Even they're own people. It doesn't matter. If you're Muslim, and somebody criticizes you in any way, you have to go out and murder somebody. That's why we call it the Religion of Peace.
Dear Pope, Convert to Islam or we will chop off your head and any Muslim that agrees with you.??? VTY.... OBL
I would like to see the Pope now challenge the leaders and clerics of Islam to put out a 'fatwah'--condemning to hell, any maniac that kills innocent people in the name of Islam.
Okay then! This is a good thing!
Good cannot have a productive dialogue with evil.
bttt
I hope he keeps this up and makes himself very visible and active in this regard for a very long time to come. It is an excellent approach.
God bless Pope Benedict!
Faith dialogue is impossible with Islam. I would love to see Pope Benedict point out that Christ taught us to call God our Father. In Islam, this is blasphemy. Allah is a slave master to whom you are to submit.
Want to end a faith dialogue real quick? Just begin saying the "Our Father" and it will be over. We have no common faith ground and we are not worshipping the same God.
that's the sign we will know when it is over...
Ping = later
The last pope challenged the moral roots of communism and it crumbled easily. This guy might be able to do that to the IslamoFascists if he gets the air time. If people think - I.F. evaporates like a spectre in the sunlight.
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