Rome Getting It Right on Islam

Two weeks ago I posted on Pope Benedict's leadership in Rehabilitating the Crusades. Just a few days after that post was written, Benedict met with his cardinals. As Italian journalist and scholar Sandro Magister of Chiesa notes, one of the four topics under discussion during their day of "prayer and reflection" of the consistory was Islam. Benedict also played an instrumental role in the release of Afghan Christian convert Abdul Rahman from custody and his subsequent asylum in Italy.

Magister also cites a recent article in the Italian Catholic journal, Stadium, entitled "The Islamic Question". The article is authored by two prominent Catholic scholars, Roberto A.M. Bertacchini and Piersandro Vanzan. Vanzan is a Jesuit professor and a contributor to the La Civiltà Cattolica Roman Jesuit magazine that has each issue approved directly by the Vatican. These are no mere independent Catholic academics; they are writing on behalf of the Church of Rome.

In their extensive article (only portions of which are available on the Chiesa site), Bertacchini and Vanzan identify six trends of the Islamization of the West:

1) The attacks against Western interests from Morocco to the Philippines;

2) The escalation of terrorism in the West (such as 9/11 and the 7/5 London bombings);

3) The rise of anti-Semetic propaganda (something Islam picked up from Enlightenment Europe; I'll write on that later);

4) Outright missionary activity by Muslims in the West;

5) Immigration;

6) The public expressions of elation by Muslims at the misfortunes of the West, such as Hurricane Katrina.

The authors make three additional points worth mentioning here:

1) The shift in Islamist thinking from "modernizing Islam" to "Islamizing modernity", which was a policy that came about in the dispute between Osama bin Laden's mentor and founder of al-Qaeda, Abdullah Azza, and the man who would eventually become bin Laden's right-hand man, Ayman al-Zawahiri. Zawahiri had Azzam assassinated, which allowed the "Islamizing modernity" position to dominate Islamist discourse.

2) The utterly inability for self-criticism in Islam (see David Pryce-Jones' book, The Closed Circle, for the cultural implications of this factor).

3) The incompatibility of the Islamic ideology and system with notions of individuality and personal freedom. They note that there was no word for "freedom" in the Arabic language for more than a thousand years after the founding of Islam; and the word used for it today, "hurriyya", means "entitlement", as if freedoms come by grant (of the sultan or the caliph).

Many Roman Catholic countries in the West (primarily in Europe, but also in Latin America) are facing the immediate threat of Islamization. Pope Benedict, unlike his predecessor, is right to express his concern and openly identifying this threat. He is actively promoting a dialogue and a policy shift regarding Islam as radical as the shift made within Islamist circles itself with the rise of Zawahiri's ideological position.

As I've said before, no one will ever confuse me with an apologist for the Church of Rome, but the rising threat from Islam should convince us of the maxim established by our American Founding Fathers that if we don't hang together in this battle, we shall surely all hang separately. Secularists have neither the cultural tools nor the ability of vision to defeat this threat. The response to the Islamist challenge must come from within Christendom itself. Regardless of the significant religious differences between Protestant, Roman Catholic and Orthodox (distincitions that should not be glossed over), we must understand that nothing less than the existence of Christianity itself is presently at stake. Mutual cooperation between the respective branches of the Christian faith is imperative.