Western Resistance

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March 10, 2006

Western World: Using the Catholic Church Against Israel

An important article in Frontpage Magazine explores the Muslim effort, spearheaded by Jordan's King Abdullah, of turning Catholics against Israel. I have a few commentaries of my own:

* It is supremely ironic that there are people who blame Israel for the dwindling presence of Christians in the Holy Land. There are several causes for that; Muslim violence against Christians, the never-ending war, the rise of the so-called Arab Nationalist identity, which ends up making Christians, like good dhimmis, serve the Islamic cause. All of those causes can be traced to the Islamic religion.

* I whole-heartedly agree with quoted theologian Reinhold Niebuhr and his concept of "pitiless perfectionism"; the impulse found in many Christian Churches, the Catholic Church included, to hold one's society to impossibly high, often utopian standards, while brushing aside the failures of one's enemies. Pitiless Perfectionists often hold peace as their highest value. (I maintain that Peace is not a value to be held, but a consequence of upholding real values.)

* And finally, it is supremely ironic that a ruler like King Abdullah, allegedly the moderate muslim to out-moderate all moderate muslims, is the one pursuing a diplomatic course against Israel that might, in the long term, harm his regime. King Abdullah is still a muslim.

Whitout furthering blathering, here is the article: Warfare by Other Means

For more than half a century, Arab governments have been manipulating the plight of Palestinians to marshal public opinion against Israel. Now, one Arab ruler is trying to play a variation on that theme.

Jordan's King Abdullah II has been meeting with prominent Catholic bishops from the West to solicit their help on behalf of Palestinian Christians. The Muslim king talked with officials from the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops in February and spoke a month earlier with Archbishop Patrick Kelly of Liverpool, vice president of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of England and Wales.

Abdullah met Kelly in Jordan while Kelly was attending the annual meeting of the Coordination of Episcopal Conferences in Support of the Church of the Holy Land, a group of Catholic bishops from Europe and North America. So far, at least one bishop is doing more than listening.

Cardinal Theodore McCarrick of Washington, D.C. - who serves as the USCCB's president and who greeted Abdullah graciously during the king's separate visit in September – addressed the problems that Palestinian Christians face in a meeting with President George W. Bush, columnist Robert Novak reported Feb. 16.

Posted by Ruy Diaz at March 10, 2006 11:21 AM

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