Last Tuesday Benedict XVI gave a talk at the University of Regensburg in Bavaria. The theme of his speech was that faith must have reason. God is reason and only by reason can one have faith. He also condemned religious violence as an attempt to promote inter-faith relations. He went on to give an example by quoting Byzantine emperor Manuel II Paleologus:
Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached.
Granted, this to me does not seem like the most genteel quote to read when trying to reach out to Muslims. However, I am not the leader of the Church on earth, and therefore, there might be reasons why this quote seemed suitable that I am not aware of.
Yet, what ensued was completely uncalled for, and, in my opinion, absolutely proves the Pope's point. After our Muslim friends heard this, people from several countries burned and vandalized churches, harassed priests, and in one instance in Somalia, killed a nun. Evidently, these people either do not have an acute sense of irony, or they do not know the meaning of the words evil and inhuman. One would assume that if people were called evil and inhumane, those people might protest peacefully in order to prove that they are not. Instead, some people thought "I'll show the Pope I'm not evil and inhumane by killing an innocent and defenseless nun."
I do not hate Islam or Muslims. I do not think all Muslims are terrorists, and I am not ever afraid when I see a Muslim. Furthermore, I think the greatest majority of Muslims are defamed when the entire group is categorized as evil. However, after this occurrence, it makes it that much harder to dismiss the claims that Islam is a violent and hateful religion.
"Long live the Shepherd of the Flock! Long live the Pope of Rome!"
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Relevant links from the Arts and Letters Daily:
http://service.spiegel.de/cache/international/0,1518,437684,00.html
http://www.guardian.co.uk/pope/story/0,,1874385,00.html
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,6-2362630,00.html
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-harris18sep18,0,1897169.story
When Chesterton was shopping around for a religion during his agnostic days, he went through a period of narrowing down before finally deciding on Catholic Christianity. This may have seemed like a foregone conclusion (since he was raised as a Catholic), but anyway he claims to have rejected Islam on the grounds that it is nothing but Christianity without all that theology.
To the extent that this is true, it seems relevant to the present conversation. For in its formal doctrine, Islam has tended to subtract from the developments of the early Church fathers rather than add to them. What is left is a kind of noble simplicity, which can lead either to great devotion to God through perfect submission--which I have admired in many Muslims--or to violent fanaticism.
This is not to say that Christianity has had no extremists of its own, but can we say that the precarious definition of God's unity and multiplicity that was taught in the early councils might have a tempering effect? After all, where we acknowledge mystery, there is really no room for fanaticism.
Perhaps not enough of us Christians are willing to accept that mystery is at the heart of our theology. For who can be a brute when he understands that faith is grounded not in superior intellect or will, but in love.
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