Breaking Eggs and Making Omelets
Maybe Pope Benedict XVI is smarter than we think. Maybe he is sending Muslims a not so subtle message. Maybe he’s saying he isn’t going to let them get away with proclaiming Islam a religion of peace against a backdrop of carnage. Maybe he wants them to take a look at themselves as the spectacle unfolds. They demand an apology for characterizing their religion as one of violence while they fire bomb churches to make the point. Maybe by quoting a 14th century emperor whose domain was about to be consumed in the fire of Islamic conquest, he was pointing out that this isn’t something new. It has been going on from the beginning of Islam and it’s time for it to stop. Maybe he’s saying he wants a dialog but it will have to be a serious one.
Benedict is a scholar. As a theologian he is a heavyweight even by Papal standards. He thinks and speaks at a level I frankly have trouble following. I suspect that’s true of most people but he made his recent controversial remarks to an audience of fellow scholars at a time when he is planning a trip to Turkey, his first to a predominantly Islamic country. It is reasonable to think his choice of time and place was no coincidence. He would have expected that if he were to comment on Islam anything he had to say would be followed with interest by Muslims. He would also have known that xenophobes among them would react as they have, with intemperate outrage and violence. But nothing he could possibly say would mollify that sort of mindlessness. The question becomes, if the Pope wants a dialog, with whom? To whom were his remarks directed? To Islamic scholars?
Well, why not? It’s easy for us to get caught up in the constant barrage of vituperative from fire breathing Muslim clerics and to think they are all like that. They aren’t. There are thinkers among them too. They’ve just been on the sidelines for a while. Too many of them have been so busy pretending there is no problem with Islam they have forgotten their own responsibility. If their religion is to be brought into the twenty first century it is they who will lead it. Benedict can preach as long as he likes but the average Muslim isn’t listening. They will listen to their own however, and if the Pope can appeal to an Islamic intellectual elite he could accomplish more than we might imagine. The offending lecture was a call to renounce violence and reconcile reason, theology, science, and faith. Islamic scholars are no different from their western peers in priding themselves on rational thinking. One view of the speech is as an attempt to open a discussion with all the pertinent issues on the table. So long as Islamic violence is a forbidden topic there isn’t much to talk about.
When news of the quote from Manuel II Paleollogus became public I assumed the trip to Turkey was off. As Muslims call on the Pope to apologize, lots of western commentators have been eager to apologize for him. All Benedict has said is he regrets the reaction to his remarks, not that he is sorry he made them. Now I am surprised to see reports of a letter from the Turkish foreign minister asking him not to cancel the visit. He views it as an important opportunity for dialog between cultures. Is there hope for this after all? I’m going to go back and read that transcript again.
Benedict is a scholar. As a theologian he is a heavyweight even by Papal standards. He thinks and speaks at a level I frankly have trouble following. I suspect that’s true of most people but he made his recent controversial remarks to an audience of fellow scholars at a time when he is planning a trip to Turkey, his first to a predominantly Islamic country. It is reasonable to think his choice of time and place was no coincidence. He would have expected that if he were to comment on Islam anything he had to say would be followed with interest by Muslims. He would also have known that xenophobes among them would react as they have, with intemperate outrage and violence. But nothing he could possibly say would mollify that sort of mindlessness. The question becomes, if the Pope wants a dialog, with whom? To whom were his remarks directed? To Islamic scholars?
Well, why not? It’s easy for us to get caught up in the constant barrage of vituperative from fire breathing Muslim clerics and to think they are all like that. They aren’t. There are thinkers among them too. They’ve just been on the sidelines for a while. Too many of them have been so busy pretending there is no problem with Islam they have forgotten their own responsibility. If their religion is to be brought into the twenty first century it is they who will lead it. Benedict can preach as long as he likes but the average Muslim isn’t listening. They will listen to their own however, and if the Pope can appeal to an Islamic intellectual elite he could accomplish more than we might imagine. The offending lecture was a call to renounce violence and reconcile reason, theology, science, and faith. Islamic scholars are no different from their western peers in priding themselves on rational thinking. One view of the speech is as an attempt to open a discussion with all the pertinent issues on the table. So long as Islamic violence is a forbidden topic there isn’t much to talk about.
When news of the quote from Manuel II Paleollogus became public I assumed the trip to Turkey was off. As Muslims call on the Pope to apologize, lots of western commentators have been eager to apologize for him. All Benedict has said is he regrets the reaction to his remarks, not that he is sorry he made them. Now I am surprised to see reports of a letter from the Turkish foreign minister asking him not to cancel the visit. He views it as an important opportunity for dialog between cultures. Is there hope for this after all? I’m going to go back and read that transcript again.
posted by Onfoot at 11:59 AM
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