Regensburg Vindicated

First Things ^ | 9/17/2014 | George Weigel

[AncientAirs]

On the evening of Sept. 12, 2006, my wife and I were dining in Cracow with Polish friends when an agitated Italian Vaticanista (pardon the redundancy in adjectives) called, demanding to know what I thought of “Zees crazee speech of zee pope about zee Muslims.” That was my first hint that the herd of independent minds in the world press was about to go ballistic on the subject of Benedict XVI’s Regensburg Lecture: a “gaffe”-bone on which the media continued to gnaw until the end of Benedict’s pontificate.

Eight years later, the Regensburg Lecture looks a lot different. Indeed, those who actually read it in 2006 understood that, far from making a “gaffe,” Benedict XVI was exploring with scholarly precision two key questions, the answers to which would profoundly influence the civil war raging within Islam—a war whose outcome will determine whether 21st-century Islam is safe for its own adherents and safe for the world.

The first question was about religious freedom: Could Muslims find, within their own spiritual and intellectual resources, Islamic arguments for religious tolerance (including tolerance of those who convert to other faiths)? That desirable development, the pope suggested, might lead over time (meaning centuries) to a more complete Islamic theory of religious freedom.

The second question was about the structuring of Islamic societies: Could Muslims find, again from within their own spiritual and intellectual resources, Islamic arguments for distinguishing between religious and political authority in a just state? That equally desirable development might make Muslim societies more humane in themselves and less dangerous to their neighbors, especially if it were linked to an emerging Islamic case for religious tolerance.

[RedHeeler]

No.

[BeauBo]

Well I guess there is no reasoning with someone like you then.

[RedHeeler]

Good.

[thesligoduffyflynns]

my bad you’re correct . BUT, I believe it was at the peak when the Yazidis were stranded on Mt.Sinjar. Now I may be wrong again but was there ever any publication or notification from the Vatican as to how they would aid all these refugees;christians and yazidis alike when even the Mosul church was decimated. Didn’t those ISIS thugs start back in May of 2014 . I can tell you I’ve only seen 2 beheadings and that was enough. One of was Daniel Pearl and the other back in March/April/May of 2014 of two Syrian priests.