« Mistranslation? | Main | The Truth Will Set You Free »
February 20, 2006
Christians, Islam and the future of Europe
Sandro Magister's Denver talk from last week:
A new cathedral church was built twelve years ago in Evry, to the south of Paris. It is recognized as the masterpiece of one of the most famous architects in the world, Mario Botta of Switzerland. During Sunday Mass, it is half-empty. But the nearby mosque is overflowing with the faithful. The imam of the mosque, Khalil Merroun, asserted in an interview: “The Catholic Church should not feel Europe belongs to it. The advice I give my Catholic colleagues is to ask themselves why their faithful don’t live their spirituality.”
But what sort of spirituality inspires the new cathedral in Evry? The church looks like a cylinder cut off diagonally at the top, with a crown of trees at its summit, and a barely visible cross. The interior is almost entirely barren of figurative art. The bare walls, which should pulsate with the transcendent, in reality remain mute, unable to convey the revelation that has come down from God. There are no visible traces of this revelation capable of showing the way to the faithful along their journey.
These examples are the reflections in architecture, and sacred architecture at that, of the loss of identity seen in Europe today, which has manifested itself in the failure to mention “Christian roots” in the controversial preamble of the European Union’s constitutional treaty. For a part of European culture today, the public square should be impenetrable against Christianity. And Christianity should be entirely cut off from the European civilization in which it has its roots and to which it gives nourishment.
But exactly the opposite is happening today in the world, and also in Europe: everywhere there is an impetuous return of religion to the public square.
What follows is an historical survey of Islam within and in relationship to Europe. He concludes with his perspective on the possible future of Islam, Europe and democracy. Difficult, but not impossible, he says.
Posted by Amy Welborn | Permalink
TrackBack
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.typepad.com/t/trackback/4305877
Listed below are links to weblogs that reference Christians, Islam and the future of Europe:
» Catholic Church architectures reveals the faith of a parish from writingUp
Next to talking about modern liturgical music, very little will get orthodox Catholic tongues wagging like a discussion of modern church architecture. See Amy Welborn’s blog for a picture and discussion of the cathedral built in Evry, France. One may a [Read More]
Tracked on Feb 21, 2006 9:46:07 AM
Comments
*sigh*
Unfortunately, the sad fact is that the imam is right. Why don't a large number of Catholics live in their spirituality? I think it is the answer to that very question that leads to monstrosities like that cathedral. But even more important, its leading to the nearly complete de-Christianization of western Europe. I wonder if the secular fundamentalists in Europe will be surprised when they wake up to find not a secular Europe but an Islamic one? Have they woke up yet? Do they care? Are they so numbed by the secular culture that they can't or won't do anything... or can't figure out what to do?
I sound so filled with despair, don't I? Well, I am.. for the people that are and will be going through what Europe and the world look like they're going to have to go through in the years to come. But ultimately, I'm still very hopeful and optimistic. God always lets things look pretty bleak just before He pulls our bacon out of the fire in some highly unlikely way through some very unlikely people. That how we know its Him.
Posted by: Sean at Feb 21, 2006 12:56:55 AM
Why don't they live their Christianity?
Because they don't believe in it.
A bold Christianity wouldn't make an ampitheatre to the absurd. That colossal wreck looks like the bottom half of the Titanic sinking into the ocean. Such as it is with Christian Europe, if it doesn't change its beliefs and methods quick.
It can't be that bulding a "church" like that would've attracted people, especially young people. Only a fool could've though that. If it WAS a fool, he shouldn't have been in a position of authority.
I've heard enough weasly homilies to know that there are plenty of priests who don't give a crap about their faith, whose methods and obediance to orthodoxy are so weak that the only logical conclusion is that they don't care about it, but how can a whole CONTINENT just go under?
Where are the bishops? Where are the cardinals? Where's the bogeyman Catholic Church that all nutjob protestants fear? Where's the Church that can proudly state that ISLAM IS A FALSE RELIGION?
This is what they should do: immediately tear down that hideous church that represents more an eastern circle of oneness, build a frickin' cathedral that looks like a cross, and decorate it with images from the Crusades.
Benedict should institute a continent-wide retirement program: anyone who wants out, can get out. Hasta la vista. He should institute reverse-missionary activity: bring in priests from America, from Africa, from anywhere in the world. That'd be a nice recruiting tool: want to preach in Paris? Their only qualifying factor should be: they're orthodox (sorry if that disqualifies Jesuits across-the-board, but too bad). A priest should BELIEVE his faith. Sadly, I think that few in Europe do.
Every other Sunday, in the middle of Manhattan, at St. Patricks Cathedral, they talk about how abortion is a modern genocide, how contraception is wrong, how gay "marriage" is a false idea, and how modern society is becoming rotten to the core. They say this is the dark heart of liberalism, in the most secular city east of the Mississippi. The cathedral is PACKED. They're preaching to native New Yorkers, tourists, non-Catholics, and anyone else in the church. They boldly proclaim these things. The first time I heard it, even as a Catholic, I was shocked. Shocked, because it was totally impolitic. But it needs to be said.
If they said that stuff in Europe. If they actually preached the faith, those pews would be filled. But they're not, because they don't believe it. And so their parishes will die. And then they will follow, when the Muslims have had enough.
Posted by: Sydney Carton at Feb 21, 2006 1:11:34 AM
The same factors causing the empty Catholic Churches in France and the U.S. cause the growth of Islam, Mormonism and Evangelical Christianity. And as much as I hate modernist architecture, it isn't the architecture (yeah, a symptom, I know...)
How can I state this simply...
Post VII Catholicism ceased asking people to make choices. That's why.
I don't want to hear about the Catechism. I've read it and taught it. I obediently accept it, but when I read it, it sounds like someone apologizing to liberals for what we believe. All of the "difficult stuff" is "softened", so we don't offend anyone.
When PJXXIII called for the VII coucil, it was to reconcile the Church to the "modern world". Arguments about VII aside (PLEASE!), I think the problem resided in the stated purpose of the council - Aggiornamento. Christian Europe was dying in 1958. The idea that the Church should reconcile to a dying culture, a culture at war with Christianity for nearly 300 years was tantamount to a suicide pact.
The "spirit of VII" was the spirit of the world. Intentional or the result of a "rupture", that is the only reasonable explanation for why the "problems" in the Church so closely resemble the political platforms of western liberalism.
Once the Church resembled the world, people didn't SEE a choice, and the Church, seemingly ashamed of its own teachings didn't ask the "faithful" to make a choice. The world's art became our art. The world's music became our music. The world's political agenda, became Catholic theology.
That is why Catholicism is dying and Islam is growing. Islam, Evangelical Christianity, even Mormonism offer people a different path. A choice. For forty years the Church has offered watered down, Oprah Winfrey philosphy and pedophile priests. If the Church tells the world that the world is fine, people will take it at it's word. And stay there.
When I read the Bible, I don't see the ambiguity of the contemporary Catholic Church. It is simple and radical. It's is about being in the world but not OF the world. And I'm not talking about some watered down, compromised interpretation of that idea. It is about a choice. A choice with consequences affecting your eternal soul. Many in the early Church died for that choice.
Now, it appears the Church doesn't think that the choice is that important. Well, guess what? The laity doesn't fall far from the tree. And so they leave. To watch football, sleep in, or go to another Church that offers them a choice.
I know the theological reasoning behind ecumenism and "SOTC", but in practice it saps the Church of purpose. Universal Salvation means you don't have to make a choice.
Is it merely a coincidence that the Church's nearly obsessive focus on Christian Unity and interreligious dialogue has coincided with the death of christian europe and the crises in the Church?
I, for one, don't think so. Goodbye Europe.
Posted by: Michael Hugo at Feb 21, 2006 1:20:37 AM
You can't tell it's a cathedral. Might as well give it to the Baptists. ;-)
Posted by: Kyle at Feb 21, 2006 3:34:50 AM
You observe that contemporary man finds it hard to return to faith because he is afraid of the moral demands that faith makes upon him. And this, to a certain degree, is the truth. The Gospel is certainly demanding. We know that Christ never permitted His disciples and those who listened to Him to entertain any illusions about this. On the contrary, He spared no effort in preparing them for every type of internal or external difficulty, always aware of the fact that they might well decide to abandon Him. Therefore, if He says, "Be not afraid!" He certainly does not say it in order to nullify in some way that which He has required. Rather, by these words He confirms the entire truth of the Gospel and all the demands it contains. At the same time, however, He reveals that His demands never exceed man's abilities. If man accepts these demands with an attitude of faith, he will also find in the grace that God never fails to give him the necessary strength to meet those demands. The world is full of proof of the saving and redemptive power that the Gospels proclaim with even greater frequency than they recall demands of the moral life. How many people there are in the world whose daily lives attest to the possibility of living out the morality of the Gospel! Experience shows that a successful human life cannot be other than a life like theirs.
--Pope John Paul II, "Crossing the Threshold of Hope"
Posted by: Jason at Feb 21, 2006 4:50:41 AM
My parish priest, a Thomist with an lilting Irish accent sufficiently thick to argue a post-Modern to a pulp by merely saying the word 'Mesopotamia', said at Vigil Mass a few weeks ago that he wondered how long it will be before St. Peters in Rome suffers the same fate as Hagia Sophia in Constantinople (Istabul).
The gates of hell shall not prevail against the Church, but demographically Europeans are giving away the store.
Posted by: Jeff at Feb 21, 2006 7:23:01 AM
P.S. Cf. Mark Steyn on Demographics @
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/printpage/0,5942,18159605,00.html
Posted by: Jeff at Feb 21, 2006 7:26:13 AM
I suggest that people are finding Islam more attractive because of the temporal power it promises, and also it denies guilt-inducing bummer stuff like the idea that Christ died on the cross for mankind's sins. (In fact, to them Christ was just another man, number two prophet to Mohammed's number one.) Also, there is none of that uncomfortable stuff about the duty to endure suffering -- you get sanction to take physical action against your enemies, the unbelievers -- in other words, you can kill them. As well, leaving the faith is simply not permissable, and carries the penalty of death. The idea that Islam has so many followers because people somehow yearn for spirituality just doesn't seem realistic to me in this context.
Posted by: Andrea Harris at Feb 21, 2006 7:42:05 AM
Andrea:
I concour. Also, Moslems don't have the same concept of sin as we do nor the related ideas of guilt and original sin. In fact, they deny original sin. There a too this worldly outlook with Islam; the God's blessings are in this life while the next is just a continuation of the physical life- 72 virgins, all the milk and honey etc etc.
Finally, how many Moslems have secretly renouncd Islam but can't embrace another religion or even disbelif because of the death sentence?
I think that Islam's vigour is much more nuanceed than we suspect.
xavier
Posted by: xavier at Feb 21, 2006 7:59:42 AM
How many female Muslims -- and even male ones -- can't break away from being virtually enslaved by their clans, even in the West -- much less from the mosque?
If you read about those families.... You can never control your own life, but eventually you may get old enough and have enough status in the clan that you can control other people's lives for them. So you do. Meanwhile, backbiting, passive-aggression, regular aggression, and almost no chance to marry the man or woman you love -- but a very strong chance they'll marry a close relative, so that you'll be forced to see each other all the time and suffer. Affairs among married women are common, if they can manage to slip past their relatives. But if you're a woman and get caught, your family will make your nearest and dearest relatives be the instruments of your death. All for family honor, of course.
You're lucky if you're a woman and allowed to go to the mosque to pray, even in a separate section or back room, as many cultures make the women stay home altogether. Some young men use memorized verses from the Koran as a stick to beat their parents, but most have religion used against them, as one more bar in the prison.
The only real hope of escape from the system is in the afterlife.
Posted by: Maureen O'Brien at Feb 21, 2006 8:58:35 AM
"I suggest that people are finding Islam more attractive because of the temporal power it promises..."
With respect, this simply is not the situation in which people find themselves. The problem is not that enlightened liberals behind a Rawlsian veil of ignorance are preferring Islam to Christianity; the problem is that Muslims believe in having children, and putting a gun to their heads if they question Islam, while enlightened secularists have embraced a comfortable hedonism committed to nothing more than the annihilation of their first their appetites and then themselves. Committed, day-in-day-out Christianity is a fringe concern of a tiny minority.
PVO
Posted by: mulopwepaul at Feb 21, 2006 9:07:24 AM
Michael Hugo wrote, " When Pope JXXIII called for the VII coucil, it was to reconcile the Church to the "modern world". . . Aggiornamento. Christian Europe was dying in 1958. The idea that the Church should reconcile to a dying culture, a culture at war with Christianity for nearly 300 years was tantamount to a suicide pact."
I think there is a lot in what you say, Michael, and I also think that much of the history of the Church in the years since VII has borne you out.
At the same time, I believe that the institutional Church did and does need to stay literally au courant (in the current), and in the thick of things, if she is to do her job, which is to proclaim the Gospel and save souls. She's got to be able to reach people where they are.
Might the barque of Peter be seen as a Coast Guard cutter, out on a rescue mission? The barque needs to be able to go out into dangerous waters where the need is greatest. For the mission, she needs the most up-to-date equipment and the most up-to-the minute information.
I think what may have happened is that the Modernists within the Church looked around, saw that all those caught in the maelstrom of post-Christian chaos had had holes punched in their hulls. And so, they decided it was important to punch holes in the Barque, as well, to make the others feel at home, that we might take on water "together." Oy.
Posted by: Marion (Mael Muire) at Feb 21, 2006 9:25:19 AM
Michael Hugo - what you say about Aggiornamento is true, at least in how it has played out. But I agree with B16 that the word was misunderstood, and that it never meant reducing the Church to the zeitgeist at all; instead, it was supposed to find new ways to speak the old truths to the world. I belive that JP2's "Theology of the Body" is an astonishing and cutting-edge way to do just that, to explain sex, love, marriage, the problems with homosexuality and abortion and contraception in powerful philosophical/theological categories --- like a new Aquinian synthesis, almost (without denying Aquinas).
And the second part of VII was supposed to be "Resourcement" (I've probably spelled that wrong), the part that was totally ignored by the dissenters like Kung and his ilk - a rejuvenating of the church by a return to its sources. I think that that is what B16 is doing in so many of his books. Aggiornamento without Reosurcement just leads to the heresies of "the Spirit of VII" while Resourcement without Aggiornamento can lead to those super-trad sedevacantists setting up their own popes!
Sydney: LOVED your post, especially this: "Benedict should institute a continent-wide retirement program: anyone who wants out, can get out. Hasta la vista. He should institute reverse-missionary activity: bring in priests from America, from Africa, from anywhere in the world. That'd be a nice recruiting tool: want to preach in Paris? Their only qualifying factor should be: they're orthodox...."
Posted by: Mary at Feb 21, 2006 9:45:40 AM
I think what we're seeing in Europe is the logical consequence of the falling away from faith brought on by secularization.
The Church will always survive but it may not prosper in particular places. However, there's something deeper going on: the paschal mystery. Jesus Christ had to die in order to save us. The Church, as the mystical body of Christ, lives out his mysteries from age to age, and that includes the mystery of his death.
But it's always followed by resurrection. Just when people are getting ready for its funeral, it springs up again in surprising ways.
The Church in Europe is in a sorry state. But even so, there are signs of hope in certain renewal movements springing up in France of all places.
Posted by: Sr Lorraine at Feb 21, 2006 9:48:10 AM
As Steyn points out in the Australia News piece mentioned above, the magic demographic number is 1.3, not 2.1. Once a society's reproductive rate slips below 1.3, it enters a death spiral of inevitable depopulation; there is virtually no way to pull out from it. Most Western European countries have crossed it or are accelerating towards it.
Posted by: Rich Leonardi at Feb 21, 2006 9:49:16 AM
“The Catholic Church should not feel Europe belongs to it. The advice I give my Catholic colleagues is to ask themselves why their faithful don’t live their spirituality.”
I doubt if this poor imam has the ability to judge if even his own are living out any kind of true spirituality. He's into the numbers game, and the coerced, out of fear, make up those numbers that he appears to be so proud of. What a religion! Rather, people should be more depressed and prayerful for all those who are forced to hand over their most beautiful tool for their salvation: their free will. He forgets that the God of those Catholics who actually built the great civilization of Europe because His Will was in it - had to be because the fruits were good - is the God of all. Yet, with his worship of the numbers within the coerced religion, what he is truly witnessing is more fear, hatred of differences, arrogance of control and a refusal to be open to the constant Movement of God ... beyond the 12th century. Why dialogue appears to be impossible to many. This happens when one worships a set of rules as God itself rather than the personal God, always waiting to forgive. We may have the prodding guilt of sin and the knowledge of its origins, but that's so much better for our salvation than ignorance and a fear based on that ignorance. What a religion!
From:
http://www.catholic.com/thisrock/2003/0305clas.asp
"Mohammed gave to our Lord the highest reverence and to our Lady also. On the Day of Judgment (another Catholic idea that he taught) it was our Lord, according to Mohammed, who would be the judge of mankind, not he, Mohammed. The Mother of Christ, "the Lady Miriam," was ever for him the first of womankind. His followers even got from the early Fathers some vague hint of her Immaculate Conception.
But the central point where this new heresy struck home with a mortal blow against Catholic tradition was a full denial of the Incarnation. Mohammed taught that our Lord was the greatest of all the prophets, but still only a prophet: a man like other men. He eliminated the Trinity altogether.
With that denial of the Incarnation went the whole sacramental structure. He refused to know anything of the Eucharist, with its Real Presence; he stopped the sacrifice of the Mass and therefore the institution of a special priesthood. In other words, he, like so many other lesser heresiarchs, founded his heresy on simplification.
Catholic doctrine was true (he seemed to say), but it had become encumbered with false accretions; it had become complicated by needless manmade additions, including the idea that its founder was divine, and the growth of a parasitical caste of priests who battened on a late, imagined, system of sacraments that they alone could administer. All those corrupt accretions must be swept away.
There is thus a very great deal in common between the enthusiasm with which Mohammed’s teaching attacked the priesthood, the Mass and the sacraments, and the enthusiasm with which Calvinism, the central motive force of the Reformation, did the same."
The various heretical falls from the Original Faith should now also include the accepted silliness by the rather universal culture in its Da Vinci Code worship, attempt at arrogant human "trials" to prove Jesus was God, the seeming present need to throw dung or insult the images of Mary either crying or bleeding. The reason why Catholic spirituality cannot be followed these days in strong numbers is simply because it calls for that narrow road and the use of the beautiful gift of reason based on truth and real facts. People go without hearing. If the imam would truthfully examine his own, he would see that his group isn't really any better. To be the catch barrel for the ignorant, superstitious and fearful is nothing to boast about!
Posted by: chris K at Feb 21, 2006 10:18:19 AM
I hate to be a phillistine, but those are HIDEOUS looking churches.
Not that this is the first time I've seen Tor Tre Treste. There's not a lick of the transcendent or the tradition in there, and that's by design.
I think Michael Hugo is a little hard on V2, which was responding to genuine pastoral concerns even if its implementation went badly off the rails - the Church would have been in for a rough time no matter what it had done, I think, though it certainly made things worse for itself. But he is correct that bad architecture isn't the problem, it's just a symptom.
After all, it's not like Europe lacks for some beautiful cathedrals and churches.
Posted by: Richard at Feb 21, 2006 10:44:41 AM
For what it's worth, during Mass it appears that at least the large crucifix over the altar is highlighted with a spotlight.
http://www.washington.edu/ark2/archtm/MLC13.html
Posted by: Liam at Feb 21, 2006 11:14:00 AM
The West's willingness (in Europe and in North America) to be invaded in slow motion by peoples whose demographics will someday produce a majority is not a religious phenomenon, but a social one. Westerners no longer wish to do real work, nor do they wish for their children to do real work. They accept a steady influx of disadvantaged people into their countries who are willing to do the hard labor jobs, even though it is quite clear that someday they will become a majority. Of course, the pattern in the U.S. up until now has been that the new immigrants will become Americanized, become sophisticated and unwilling to work, will cease having children and then admit a new wave of immigrants to do the dirty work. At some point, that pyramid scheme will fold and problems will result.
Case in point: Appalachian mine operators are trying to recruit Mexican immigrants into the mines because the locals have become too demanding and safety conscious.
Posted by: Desert Chatter at Feb 21, 2006 11:34:07 AM
Desert Chatter
Of course, the Catholic Church's approach to the mine operators would be to ask whether the demands of the locals -- and fears for their safety -- were justified (and to what extent) in light of current conditions (that is, just because certain dangers were acceptable 500 years ago due to the lack of knowledge and technology does not mean they are morally justifiable now). There's no natural right of employers to the cheapest and most intimidatable labor force transportation can buy.
Posted by: Liam at Feb 21, 2006 11:46:02 AM
Thank you, Liam, you beat me to it!
Posted by: bruce cole at Feb 21, 2006 11:51:55 AM
Well, recent events in WV are indicating a shift on standards.
Nevertheless, we won't have more children because mine safety improves.
Posted by: Ed the Roman at Feb 21, 2006 12:11:19 PM
It isn't just hard labor that locals won't do. They won't do hard study in difficult subjects like math and science either. That is why graduate schools in the hard sciences and engineering are full of foreign students from lesser-developed countries like India. Software development in silicon valley would disappear without Indian engineers on H1B visas.
Posted by: SiliconValleySteve at Feb 21, 2006 12:16:39 PM
I admit I was thinking mainly about converts to Islam, not people born into it, when I spoke of its promise of temporal power to its followers. Still, just how difference is holding a metaphorical gun to the head of one's children from any other sort of temporal power? A lot of power is held in this world by using fear. As well, just because you are raised to believe that you will be killed if you leave your family's faith doesn't necessarily mean you will yearn to abandon that faith -- more often than not you accept the lesson, become brainwashed, and come to believe that it is a right attitude to hold. We like to think that oppression and suffering causes people to become better persons, or that the oppressed will be 100% grateful to be freed from their oppression, but this is not always the case -- often the oppressed become just as bad as their oppressors, because human pride will not let them admit that they are victims.
As for the Mexican immigrant problem, I don't see what that has to do with the problem of Islam. I thought Mexicans were for the most part Catholic, or at least Christian.
Posted by: Andrea Harris at Feb 21, 2006 12:17:56 PM
Sandro Magister is a poor guide to the immediate future and the challenge of a revitalized Islam and its implications for the Church and the West.
1. His view that Islam is part of "Europe" cannot be supported. The aperiodic alliances of various European rulers before, during, and immediately after the Reformation represented not an inclusivist notion of "Europe" but a treasonous betrayal of Christendom by preferring an idolatrous nationalism. This was wrong for the same reason that Cardinal Richilieu's betrayal of his vocation and the Church, preferring the interests of France by persecuting Huegonots while making alliances with foreign Protestants - all in the name of love of France and a deep preference for its interests as over against those of the Church founded by Christ. The problem with the Crusades is not that they were a betrayal of Christian values, but that they were too late (a long delayed defensive war against an embattled Christendom) and too weak a response. "Christian" powers often preferred warring against fellow Christians than against those who had a long range goal of reducing all of Christendom to dhimmi status.
2. Magistro's reading of the avant garde cathedral is also quite wrong. The problem is not the absence of transcendence, but the absence of sacramentalism. Islam is an anti-sacramental, anti-incarnational vision of theism - aniconic to the core. Its understanding of transcendence without the balance of immanence has created distinct forms of art and archetecture. The same is true, MUTATIS MUTANDIS, of the false transcendence of post-Christian Europe. The various "isms" celebrated in modern art and architecture (materialism, secularism, individualism, spiritualism, relativism, nihilism) are spiritual powers (as in principalities and powers!) that have their own reasons for hating the Christian roots of Europe. They are unintelligible apart from rebellion against the Church and the deeply sacramental art froms associated with Christian Europe. Discernment involves understanding the appeal of this false transcence and how deeply 'spiritual' it is - too deeply spiritual! Satan is spiritual and into 'spirituality' and 'transcendence'.
3. A certain shallow critique of Vatican II will weaken the proper response to the challenge of our times. Integralists and traditionalists are not in any way representatives of a "return to the sources", but, as even a cursory look at the textbooks used in Lefebvrist seminaries reveals, but of an unacceptable attachment to relatively recent traditions (those scholastic enterprises resistant to the completely orthodox "return to the sources" theologies that were discerned by an ecumenical council to be completely orthodox and to be preferred to business as usual - integralism and the decadent forms of scholasticism).
4. Magistro understands that the defeat of Fatah is the waning of Western style secularism and nationalism of the neo-Nazi type in the area. His underdeveloped critique of Hamas is his attachment to the view that there are "moderate" Muslims (who presumably are the descendents of the 'Muslims as part of Europe' idea). His misunderstanding of Benedict XVI's seminar on Islam can be corrected by perusing Fr. Fessio's indiscretions about the meeting.
5. Absent from so many of these discussions about Islam and Europe is the perspective of Orthodox Christians. Works like Serge Trifkovic's THE SWORD OF THE PROPHET (published by Regina ORTHODOX press) can begin the process of disabusing one of the confident optimism that sees Islam as a religion of peace or seeing the Islamic-Christian dialogue as a vehicle for the prevention of a clash of civilizations.
6. The complexities of this problematic can, to some extent, be reduced to manageable proportions by delineating the challenges facing the Church and the West. The former is faced with the task of evangelizing the adherents of a false religion (demonizing Islam without demonizing Muslims - a huge challenge calling for brainstorming ecumenically, especially with evangelicals). The challenge of the West is to understand that Jihadism and Islamism is the dominant expression of Islam in the world today, that it is in direct continuity with the central thrust of past expressions of Islam and more faithful to the Quran and the Hadith than "moderate" Islam, and that it represents more of a military threat to the West than something that can be combatted at an ideological level. The states of the West do not have the resources to conduct an ideological crusade against militant Islam, for reasons that Magistro DOES understand - modern Europe's timidity about acknowledging its Chrsitian roots. The secular West is mired in religious indifferentism; the renewed Catholicism of Vatican II, understood with a hermeneutic of continuity, defends religious freedom without succombing to relativism. It also defends reason as an ally in the search for truth (unlike Islam that is wedded to fideism).
Posted by: Tom Haessler at Feb 21, 2006 12:35:31 PM
Sandro Magister is a poor guide to the immediate future and the challenge of a revitalized Islam and its implications for the Church and the West.
1. His view that Islam is part of "Europe" cannot be supported. The aperiodic alliances of various European rulers before, during, and immediately after the Reformation represented not an inclusivist notion of "Europe" but a treasonous betrayal of Christendom by preferring an idolatrous nationalism. This was wrong for the same reason that Cardinal Richilieu's betrayal of his vocation and the Church, preferring the interests of France by persecuting Huegonots while making alliances with foreign Protestants - all in the name of love of France and a deep preference for its interests as over against those of the Church founded by Christ. The problem with the Crusades is not that they were a betrayal of Christian values, but that they were too late (a long delayed defensive war against an embattled Christendom) and too weak a response. "Christian" powers often preferred warring against fellow Christians than against those who had a long range goal of reducing all of Christendom to dhimmi status.
2. Magistro's reading of the avant garde cathedral is also quite wrong. The problem is not the absence of transcendence, but the absence of sacramentalism. Islam is an anti-sacramental, anti-incarnational vision of theism - aniconic to the core. Its understanding of transcendence without the balance of immanence has created distinct forms of art and archetecture. The same is true, MUTATIS MUTANDIS, of the false transcendence of post-Christian Europe. The various "isms" celebrated in modern art and architecture (materialism, secularism, individualism, spiritualism, relativism, nihilism) are spiritual powers (as in principalities and powers!) that have their own reasons for hating the Christian roots of Europe. They are unintelligible apart from rebellion against the Church and the deeply sacramental art froms associated with Christian Europe. Discernment involves understanding the appeal of this false transcence and how deeply 'spiritual' it is - too deeply spiritual! Satan is spiritual and into 'spirituality' and 'transcendence'.
3. A certain shallow critique of Vatican II will weaken the proper response to the challenge of our times. Integralists and traditionalists are not in any way representatives of a "return to the sources", but, as even a cursory look at the textbooks used in Lefebvrist seminaries reveals, but of an unacceptable attachment to relatively recent traditions (those scholastic enterprises resistant to the completely orthodox "return to the sources" theologies that were discerned by an ecumenical council to be completely orthodox and to be preferred to business as usual - integralism and the decadent forms of scholasticism).
4. Magistro understands that the defeat of Fatah is the waning of Western style secularism and nationalism of the neo-Nazi type in the area. His underdeveloped critique of Hamas is his attachment to the view that there are "moderate" Muslims (who presumably are the descendents of the 'Muslims as part of Europe' idea). His misunderstanding of Benedict XVI's seminar on Islam can be corrected by perusing Fr. Fessio's indiscretions about the meeting.
5. Absent from so many of these discussions about Islam and Europe is the perspective of Orthodox Christians. Works like Serge Trifkovic's THE SWORD OF THE PROPHET (published by Regina ORTHODOX press) can begin the process of disabusing one of the confident optimism that sees Islam as a religion of peace or seeing the Islamic-Christian dialogue as a vehicle for the prevention of a clash of civilizations.
6. The complexities of this problematic can, to some extent, be reduced to manageable proportions by delineating the challenges facing the Church and the West. The former is faced with the task of evangelizing the adherents of a false religion (demonizing Islam without demonizing Muslims - a huge challenge calling for brainstorming ecumenically, especially with evangelicals). The challenge of the West is to understand that Jihadism and Islamism is the dominant expression of Islam in the world today, that it is in direct continuity with the central thrust of past expressions of Islam and more faithful to the Quran and the Hadith than "moderate" Islam, and that it represents more of a military threat to the West than something that can be combatted at an ideological level. The states of the West do not have the resources to conduct an ideological crusade against militant Islam, for reasons that Magistro DOES understand - modern Europe's timidity about acknowledging its Chrsitian roots. The secular West is mired in religious indifferentism; the renewed Catholicism of Vatican II, understood with a hermeneutic of continuity, defends religious freedom without succombing to relativism. It also defends reason as an ally in the search for truth (unlike Islam that is wedded to fideism).
Posted by: Tom Haessler at Feb 21, 2006 12:36:03 PM
Sorry for the accidental double post.
Posted by: Tom Haessler at Feb 21, 2006 12:40:04 PM
A bold Christianity wouldn't make an ampitheatre to the absurd. That colossal wreck looks like the bottom half of the Titanic sinking into the ocean.
No, it's a gasholder that got sliced off at an angle by a Martian Fighting Machine (to the sound of seven chords on an electric guitar played backwards).
I'm more and more convinced that some sort of Cult of Ugliness that's taken over the Western world.
Posted by: Ken at Feb 21, 2006 12:54:37 PM
Great post, Tom. I agree with it all,especially the last bit about Vatican II.
Posted by: Mary at Feb 21, 2006 1:25:36 PM
I can't help but cringe as I read a couple posts aligning Protestant Christianity with Islam. I realize they are done within a certain context, and thus a "valid" alignment, but I cringe still. I am a yet-Protestant, who loves and feels drawn to the Catholocism I was baptized in (but raised Lutheran as my father refused to join my mother in the Catholic Church and my mother wanted us children to be raised in the Christian faith nonetheless). I cannot comprehend my "version" of the Christian faith placed alongside Islam! (Again, I'm only speaking my "feelings", I understand the context of the two comments somewhere above.)
I have been trying to read about Islam amidst the uproar of the cartoons, the threats from bin-Ladin, the "falling" of Europe, and I am trying to understand the religion... and separate my fears from what is reality. Yet I find myself praying that God will allow me and my children to stand firm, should a day come in the near future that we be required to deny Christ or die. That is, if the Islamic militants don't nuke or gas us first. Sorry, but I am having a difficult time in managing my fears regarding Islam...and trusting that the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob will protect us. I live in the Detroit area with a large Muslim population. You should read some of the editorials in our Detroit News and Free Press from some of the local Imams...scary. I saw a woman dressed in a berka while shopping in a local Target the other day! May Christ strengthen each one of us. Thanks for letting me vent. I love this blog.
Posted by: Nancy at Feb 21, 2006 1:35:07 PM
And interesting interview with the author of "The Catholic Martyrs of the Twentieth Century"
http://www.zenit.org/english/visualizza.phtml?sid=84431
Posted by: chris K at Feb 21, 2006 2:05:05 PM
Ew, I just re-read my comment above. Forgive me please... I'm pregnant and a bit over-emotional right now. I'll refrain from emoting in the future.
Posted by: Nancy at Feb 21, 2006 2:05:07 PM
Hello, Nancy,
Please don't apologize for sharing an insightful post made more passionate by the wonder and joy of being in a family way.
Apparently, the view of Providence is that we Catholics won't be able to get our act together vis a vis Islam apart from the only recently beginning dialogue with evangelical Christianity (and some Lutherans belong here for sure!) which is less likely to engage in false eirenicism with Islam than many Catholic proponents of dialogue with Islam as a peace strategy.
Posted by: Tom Haessler at Feb 21, 2006 2:17:32 PM
There have been some people who say that the Muslims will be brought to Christ via Mary. After all, it was Mary who brought the Indians to Christ through the peasant Juan Diego.
Posted by: JP at Feb 21, 2006 5:35:36 PM
Hello Tom,
Good post. Thank you for sharing.
hello Nancy,
You don't have anything to be defensive about.
Inside the echo chamber we sometimes forget who's listening in.
Posted by: Richard at Feb 21, 2006 5:57:27 PM
'There have been some people who say that the Muslims will be brought to Christ via Mary. After all, it was Mary who brought the Indians to Christ through the peasant Juan Diego.'
Tell me more....
Posted by: Pas at Feb 21, 2006 5:57:41 PM
Tom:
"the renewed Catholicism of Vatican II, understood with a hermeneutic of continuity, defends religious freedom without succombing to relativism."
Not to quibble, but "renewed Catholicism" and "without succumbing to relativism" give one pause, certainly. In our obsession to vindicate VII in any discussion about the problems in the Church, and our ongoing hagiography of JPII, I think we have a developed a blind spot.
When JPII kissed the Koran, people ran around trying to make sense of it. Excuse it, if you will. Well, if you take the "ruptured" view of VII, it made perfect sense.
Oh, but we can't imagine JPII and VII as part of the problem, and so we continue the charade by creating a new boogie man: the "discontinuity and rupture" of VII.
Whew! Finally we have an out. We'll just redefine VII to be completely in sync with the pre-conciliar Church, and dump the problems at the feet of the "spirit of VII" renagades.
Oh, but don't bring up the fact that we tolerated the dissenters and, to insure the problems metasticized, promoted them into positions of authority in the Church. But, gee, don't blame us! It was all them rascally "spirit of VII" people running around rupturing stuff! Yeah, it was all their fault!
Hmmm...really. Then in the last forty years of crisis in the Church, no one at the Vatican thought to say that VII didn't, in fact, change anything? But now that it has been said, we can put all the chaos to bed?
If anyone would just look at the energy in the Church focused on Christian unity and interreligious dialogue and compare it with the ongoing efforts at evangelization...Wait! There are no efforts at evangelization!
Do you start to see the problem?
OK, so if one points the finger at VII, you are no longer Catholic, and you'll turn into a pillar of salt. OK. I won't point the finger.
But, at some point people given the responsiblity to run an organization have to ACCEPT RESPONSIBILITY when things go south. In the last 40 years, not only did the Church begin working to reconcile with dying protestant congregations, it promoted or, at the very least, tolerated the rupture as it tore the Church and society apart.
In short, leaders must lead. If your leader is kissing the Koran, and not explaining it in the "hermeneutic of continuity", certainly he bears some responsibility for the outcome.
Since the Church, for all intents and purposes, abandoned the "great commission" it shouldn't be surprised with what is going in the Church, much less in Europe or in the Muslim world.
In fact, it might be refreshing, or "renewing" to have the Church actually take some responsibility for the chaos of the last forty years.
Posted by: Michael Hugo at Feb 21, 2006 6:00:09 PM
'There have been some people who say that the Muslims will be brought to Christ via Mary. After all, it was Mary who brought the Indians to Christ through the peasant Juan Diego.'
I don't see how, considering the position of women in most Muslim cultures. Despite the lip service paid to individual female figures in Muslim history the attitude of most Muslims towards womanhood in all of its aspects seems to be one of contempt laced with fear. Of course this has been the case for most cultures throughout the history of the human race (its linked to our fear of weakness and being vulnerable), but a particularly distilled version of this failing seems to run through the Muslim world.
Posted by: Andrea Harris at Feb 21, 2006 7:06:11 PM
Andrea and Pas,
Most of what I read concerned Muslims who visit Fatima. A few years ago, there was a dust up when it was revealed that the rector of this site made allowances for Hindi and Islamic pilgrims. What struck me was that Muslims would visit a site devoted to Our Lady-esp when one considers thier views on women.
However, many Muslims site the fact that Mary is mentioned in thier writings, and has always given Her reference. If you do a Google Search you may find some decent sites concerning Fatima and Islam. In any event, the Mother always calls her children to Her Son.
Posted by: JP at Feb 21, 2006 8:20:54 PM
'The advice I give my Catholic colleagues is to ask themselves why their faithful don’t live their spirituality'
His Catholic colleagues may even have an answer but they probably don't feel like exploding any time soon.
Posted by: reluctant penitent at Feb 21, 2006 8:41:51 PM
How are we going to explain it to the Moslems that the same Mary who defeated them at Lepanto is going to be the Mary of the Koran drawing them to her Divine Son? Whatever the real Mary does, she does; but the Moslems have to laugh at the way we try to utilize Mary as we imagine her to promote our interests.
Do we think we honor Mary by seeking to use her name, her image for our purposes of conquest--Indians in the Americas, of ideological warfare --Russian Communism, or even of defense--corsairs in the Mediterranean and now terrorists and jihad?
Posted by: Caroline at Feb 21, 2006 8:50:26 PM
How are we going to explain it to the Moslems that the same Mary who defeated them at Lepanto is going to be the Mary of the Koran drawing them to her Divine Son? Whatever the real Mary does, she does; but the Moslems have to laugh at the way we try to utilize Mary as we imagine her to promote our interests.
Do we think we honor Mary by seeking to use her name, her image for our purposes of conquest--Indians in the Americas, of ideological warfare --Russian Communism, or even of defense--corsairs in the Mediterranean and now terrorists and jihad?
Posted by: Caroline at Feb 21, 2006 8:51:04 PM
Marion and Mary,
I have been too hard on VII. I agree with B16, but get frustrated when people don't take responsibility in an organization. I am a business owner and it drives me up the wall! Arghhh...
I agree with the idea of Aggiornamento. The question is whether the Church is going to follow or lead. It seemed to me that VII was too much about following the world. It marked the end of evangelization and started 40 years of experimentation. We have been piling up theological treatise and encyclicals, but we're stuck in the mud. We need to pull free of the mud and get back to basics: Scripture, Tradition and Magisterial Teaching....TEACHING!
But, Marion, your analogy is beautiful, and I pray you are right. Sorry for sounding so negative. Yuck.
Posted by: Michael Hugo at Feb 21, 2006 8:51:21 PM
"Do we think we honor Mary by seeking to use her name, her image for our purposes of conquest--Indians in the Americas, of ideological warfare --Russian Communism, or even of defense--corsairs in the Mediterranean and now terrorists and jihad? "
Our Lady of Victory, pray for us all, even those who think the Communists were victims.
PVO
Posted by: mulopwepaul at Feb 21, 2006 10:28:50 PM
The "Tor" reminded me of 11th century parts of churches in s. France, towers with notches for archers. The cathedral at Albi is built like a fortress, and resembles in some ways the "Tor." As far as filling the churches, there is also the problem of numbers of buildings. Within a block of the cathedral in Albi are 2 other large churches. In one of the large market towns we visited there were 3 churches within a block of each other: a collegial church, a modern church, and an older ordinary church. They couldn't all be filled every Sunday!
Posted by: ann r at Feb 22, 2006 12:34:26 AM
Hello, Michael Hugo,
I'd like to make the case against your thoughtful post for a vigorous endorsement of Vatican II and John Paul the Great.
1. Kissing the Quran is the easiest of your concerns to address. There are few posting here who could be more negative than I in assessing Islam. And yet, if an Arab gave me a copy of the Quran as a personal gift, I wouldn't hesitate to kiss it as a culturally determined expression of gratitude. It has to do with manners, not morals. When the Holy Father greets the "Archbishop" of Canterbury, it's not an acknowledgment of the validity of Anglican orders.
2. It's very important to understand exactly what Benedict XVI means when he speaks of a hermeneutic of continuity. He's insisting that the world episcopate in endorsing the nouvelle theologie of a return to the biblical and patristic source for a renewal of theology was a legitimate expression of Tradition. The traditionalist and integralist critique of Vatican II confuses "Tradition" with manual theology (the kind that was taught in seminaries that didn't encourage students to see Catholic theology as a living phenomenon, but something set in stone in very recent manuals of neo-scholastic theology.
3. There are no "new ideas" in the documents of Vatican II. There's not a single doctrinal emphasis that was not thoroughly discussed in European AND American theological journals decades before the Council. Of course, some of it would come as a surprise to those who are not theological animals, but the basic thrust was something very familiar to anyone who read even one first rate theological journal. Some have argued that "theologians" or "periti" highjacked the Council. The truth is that many of the leading thinkers of the Council were bishops who were world class theologians themselves, and the bishops made it their business to make a judgment on the orthodoxy and the truth of the return to the sources theology.
4. AFTER the Council, some progressive theologians, influenced by the rapid radicalization of the student movements of the late sixties and the mystique of Marxism, abandoned the nouvelle theologie and charted a new path - hence, the spurious "spirit of Vatican II" and calls for Vatican III. This tendency is clearly heterodox, but even apart from its focus on the pelvic issues (with the wrong answer to some real questions) it ends up denying many dogmas, both defined and undefined.
5. Michael, what you see as a tolerance of dissent was a conscious decision on the part of John Paul II (and, though it will disappoint many conservative Catholics, I think it will continue to be the policy of Benedict XVI) to emphasize high quality teaching and adult catechesis and wait for the appeal of the truth to make itself felt. The Church is not like a business organization. The Church is a family. When you're the dad, and you have five or six kids, and are in a position to set disciplinary policy from the beginning, it's quite easy to have success and control rebellion through policies of consistency and firmness. But when you're the dad and you have a billion kids (LOL), and when you know that many of them in industrialized countries have suffered spiritual abuse (through faulty or, in some instances, no, catechesis), sexual abuse (sometimes from clerics and religious), - you might decide to be gentle with the flock and try to place emphasis on teaching rather than interdicts, excommunications, and suspensions. I live in a city where the seminary faculty was very liberal, dissenting on many issues. Already, there are very significant changes, and in some cases, even formerly dissenting theologians have begun to see the light. This is a process which is occuring everywhere - think of the new president of Notre Dame.
6. The correct reception of Vatican II is a work in process. It is threatened by heterodox progressives on the left and the ahistorical orthodoxy of traditionalism and integralism on the right. As always, the truth is in the Catholic center.
7. The ecumenical emphasis of Vatican II has already born significant fruit. Even the failures of some of the dialogues are occasions for progress. The short-sightedness of defining ecumenism in this country primarily as dialogue with mainline Protestant denominations to the neglect of pentecostal, evangelical, and fundamentalist currents (so characteristic of much of American Protestantism with counterparts in large parts of Latin America) is now clear to all. Providence is calling all Christians to contribute to the great challenge facing Christians - Islamism. The Eastern Orthodox will help us see that living in a dhimmi is not all that great; the evangelicals will remind us that Islam is not just another aspect of the marvelous diversity of the rich mosaic of world religions; and Catholics will be able to synthesize insights of other Christians in our own rich doctrinal tradition. If a significant aspect of the phenomenon of Islam is the surfacing of the demonic, then another major feature of the demonic was the splits in Christendom, something that Catholics are partially responsible for, as the preparatory commission at the Council of Trent insisted. The Catholic Church cannot confront Islam alone. We need to brain storm with our brothers and sisters in other Christian traditions to develop sensible and spiritually wise strategies.
8. Far from abandoning the Great Commission, the Catholic Church today is growing very rapidly in Africa and Asia. I strongly recommend a prayerful reading of John Paul II's REDEMPTORIS MISSIO. He explains how interreligious dialogue is part of the Church's evangelizing mission. Evangelization is never a mere rejection of the religious views of others, but a sensitive sifting of truth from error in proclaiming Christ. And today we approach the task by establishing friendships with those targeted for evangelization through respectful discussion about our own religious heritages. This is a beginning. Evangelization is a process. There are many, many reasons to be cautiously optimistic about the immediate future of the Church, not the least reason being the tremendous gift of truly great and holy popes.
Posted by: Tom Haessler at Feb 22, 2006 2:35:40 AM
Tom,
Yeah, but what do really think? : )
Granted, I was being overly negative. I think you are accentuating the positive. Refreshingly so.
The only points on which I have to disagree with you:
Points 3 and 4. You are saying something that I have heard many times, and I CAN'T for the life of me accept this. It wasn't as if all the theology being batted around prior to VII was ALL good stuff! I recently read "Turmoil and Truth" by Philip Trower. Many of the theologians that influenced the council were not Catholic. Many left the Church. Many had lost their faith. Much of what they published was considered "unacceptable", and "gagged" by popes before and after the council. Of course we know what happened afterward.
What you and others are expecting me to believe is:
Dissent Before VII => No problems during VII => Dissent after Council.
Of course(!) the problems that existed before the Council had their affect during the Council. And, yes, the fruits of the Council are obvious. I simply cannot accept that there was NOT a continuum of dissent and heterodoxy before, during and after the council. It defies logic.
Does that mean the WORDS expressed in the VII dox are wrong? No. As a Catholic, I can't believe that. Or, more accurately, I faithfully accept that it is true, despite the obvious evidence to the contrary.
The only other thing I can't agree with you about, is ecumenism. Maybe, somewhere, at some time it has "born fruit", but I can't for the live of me, see it. And it is difficult to assess the quality fruit, is it not?
I mean, if your house is on fire, you can point out that is a miracle that your kids didn't get hurt in the fire. But what if your kids set the fire?
The Church is burning, and you point to fruit of ecumenism. But what if the focus and energy spent on ecumenism has sapped the life out of the Church's evangelical zeal? Rotten fruit?
Admittedly, it is difficult to biopsy the problem. Lots of complicating factors.
You did a good job of spinning JPII's Koran smooch. If Allah is Baal, as many assert, I would not have been AS polite. If the vinegar vs. honey reasoning is behind the wimpiness of the Church's handling of heretics and such, well history will tell our grandkids if you are right.
You could be right about all of it. I don't know. You said that the Church is not a business. Fair enough. But you can't deny that it is an organization, and THAT I know about. And the admisitration of the Church's organization has been abysmal. I do see some hope in B16, though. All I can do is pray.
One good thing about being a Catholic. We can all proudly say that we don't believe in an organized religion.
Thanks for your thoughtful response, Tom.
Posted by: Michael Hugo at Feb 22, 2006 5:45:16 AM
"Do we think we honor Mary by seeking to use her name, her image for our purposes of conquest--Indians in the Americas, of ideological warfare --Russian Communism, or even of defense--corsairs in the Mediterranean and now terrorists and jihad? "
Whoaa.....what kind of misunderstanding of Mary is this? The CHURCH was not the "conqueror" of the Indians! Mary HERSELF asked for prayers that Russia be converted (at Fatima); I will continue to pray to Mary for the conversion of the demonic, Satanic evil of the type of "jihad" that kills innocent people, and children, on buses, at weddings, etc.....
Actually, I am babbling incoherently because that comment was so bizarre, susch a twisted view of why people pray to Mary. If someone DID use the word "conquest" in regard to the Indians (and I haven't read every word of every post), well, I have no trouble with martial words SINCE THE BIBLE USES THEM SO OFTEN. This kind of "conquest" - to be won over to the love of God - is NOT an evil thing!
Posted by: anon4 at Feb 22, 2006 10:13:43 AM
realist,
Acknowledging past Christian anti-Semitism and making every effort to chart a new path is, indeed, a noble enterprise. However, it should not take the path of deviation from dogmatically defined Catholic truth. This is the problem with authors such as Carroll and others who imagine that correcting matters in this area is connected with abandoning our Christology and ecclesiology. This path is a dead end because it ends up away from Christ and His Church.
Posted by: Tom Haessler at Feb 22, 2006 11:11:24 AM
