www.byzcath.org Forums News & Events Church News Turkish Official Compares Pope to Hitler

We have seen for years the true face of Islam. The fatwas calling for the killing of Salmon Rushdie should have sufficed to make us understand the it is a religion of war and warriors. Some of us, myself included, needed several years to open our eyes.

If Muslims desired peace, they would offer to replace two towers in New York City.

Better to fight and die defending the faith as in Constantinople in 1453 than to accept Islam.

Viva il Papa Benedetto!

[quote}But the Foreign Ministry in Islamabad termed the remarks "regrettable."

"Anyone who describes Islam as a religion as intolerant encourages violence," Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Tasnim Aslam said.[/quote]

I don't know if anyone else posted this quote, but this is the response from the "peaceful" religion.

We have seen, for more than one thousand years, the true face of Islam.

Islam has not changed one bit. I am sick and tired of the pictures in the newspapers and on TV of young angry Muslims screaming and often rioting in the streets.

Islam is a "cult of the sword". it has always been and it will always be so.

Archbishop Fulton Sheen said that peace will come to the world when the Muslims convert to Christianity.

He was right.

On the tilma of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico City, the Mother of God is atop the Crescent Moon.
The Crescent Moon is the symbol of Islam.

There will probably be some on this forum who will react in defense of the muslims, but the bottom line is that for islam everone else should keep their mouths shut and say nothing! Dhimmi!

Ah, the dear, sweet, kind, gentle, friendly, peace-oloving, secular Turks! Yeah, right.

When Paul VI knelt and prayed in Agia Sophia during his visit to Constantinople, that prayer was definitely not on the agreed agenda - and the dear, sweet, kind, gentle, friendly, peace-oloving, secular Turks were in Agia Sophia the next day offering Muslim prayers in an effort to "cleanse" the place from the "profanation" which Paul VI committed. It is wildly unlikely that Pope Benedict will be allowed to set foot in the Great Church without a firm commitment that he will not utter any prayer audibly, or make any gensture of reverence. Patriarch Bartholomew certainly will not go there, with or without the Pope - it would be far too dangerous.

Upon reflection, I do have one objection to Pope Benedict's address in Regensburg. According to the version that I have, he spoke of "Ankara". The Christian name of that city in Ancyra and it is associated with many martyrs and other Saints.

Meanwhile, we may all rejoice that the Pope, in that address, has stated firly that the bond between Christianity and what is authentically Greek cannot be dissolved.

Fr. Serge

Originally posted by Mr. Clean:

Actually, the crescent moon was/is a Christian symbol � specifically a Marian symbol � which explains its presence in the tilma (along with the stars). The blessed Theotokos was the patroness of Constantinople and her symbol in that city was the crescent moon and star. The reasons for the selection of these symbols is interesting (as always she and her images/symbols point towards Christ), but a topic for another thread. In times of war, banners depicting this symbol were flown from the ramparts of the city. The muslims usurped the symbol of the Theotokos after the Turkish conquest of the city as a not so subtle means of trumpeting to the world their conquest of the Byzantines. If anything, we ought to reclaim Our Lady�s co-opted symbol and return it to its rightful Christian usage.


~Isaac

Isaac, as I was unaware of that piece of information, thank you for your post.

As the Muslims had usurped the crescent by the time of the apparitions in 1531, the Image is a clear sign of what is rightfully due to the Theotokos.

Just another reason to strip them of the Hagia Sophia.

I hope and want to believe that what the Pope said could be an opening to dialogue with the Muslims. I think it's about time. You know the Arabs do have their problems, and if we think we are the one's that are the most threatened by what's going on in the Arab world, we are very wrong. The royalty in the Arab states, know very well that their society is failing. All their immense wealth comes from oil, and that may stop very quickly. They don't want to be swallowed by the impulsive, ignorant and fanatical Arab 'street'..

As for Turkey, it has many problems. It refuses to allow Cypriot ships to enter it's ports, and Cypriot planes to land at it's airfields unless Cyprus recognizes the Turkish occupied part of Cyprus as a separate nation. These are Turkey's 'demands', yet it wants to enter the EU.

Turkey also 'demands' that France remove from it's records the Armenian genocide, and Turkey had also demanded that in order for it to enter the EU, the EU could not mention Christianity as being the basis for European civilization. Well guess what? They might have kept Christianity out of the constitution, but the EU is now demanding Turkey recognize the Armenian genocide.

Turkey did manage to do a great deal of what the EU demandeed, but because of Cyprus and Turkey's failure on human rights, it is doubtful that Turkey will become a full member. In the meantime, England does not want to isolate Turkey, because that would be too dangerous, (who knows what it will do without the constraints of the EU), so they are trying to accomodate Turkey by creating some sort of partial membership.

Now one can just imagine the chagrin of a nation such as Turkey who feels that it can freely make demands, being forced to accept the fact that it's demands are not going to be met. :rolleyes:

I can't help but feel that the invitation to the Pope was because of Turkey's hopes of entering the EU, but now that it's falling apart, they are looking for some sort of excuse. I feel bad for the Patriarch. No doubt the Greeks will be blamed for all this. I hope they don't hang him, but with the Turks who knows. He risks his life each day he's there.

Zenovia

As I heard the story, the hierarchs were celebrating the Divine Liturgy as the Agarenes broke into the Temple of the Holy Wisdom. They disappeared into the walls and will come out to finish the Liturgy when Agia Sophia becomes Christian again! God speed the day!

Here is a link to a petition [hagiasophiablog.com] for Agia Sophia to be returned to the Church as a precondition of Turkey's admission to the EU.

According to tradition, the concelebrants of the Divine Liturgy on Tuesday, 29 May 1453, were not hierarchs but two presbyters, Catholic and Orthodox. When the invaders approached the Holy Table, the southern wall opened and, at the direction of an angel, the presbyters passed through it with the Holy Gifts in hand.

The wall closed behind them, not to reopen until the Interrupted Liturgy can be resumed, when the presbyters will re-enter through the wall by which they departed.

Many years,

Neil

Quite an interesting detail considering the current state of affairs.

After the publication of the full text of the Pope's speech and after reading it, perhaps, Muslim countries, initially "offended," have come around, especially Turkey and Iran.

Saudi Arabia and Indonesia have also called for "dialogue with reason" as the Pope suggested in his speech.

By AsiaNews:

Full story:

http://www.asianews.it/view.php?l=en&art=7253

Amado

One prominent Moslem scholar is calling for a world wide day of non-violent action to protest the remarks made by Pope Benedict http://www.islam-online.net/English/News/2006-09/18/01.shtml

Hopefully people will begin displaying pictures of the Pope in there front windows to show there support.

Aside from the expected reaction of the Islamic world, I saw in another fora something I've seen in other quotes in the news. That is the outpouring of hatred of the church by the self-loathing, secular west. Comments like "how can the Pope say anything when the Catholic Church has done XYZ in the past". This helped my crystallize my thoughts on the matter, and this is what I said in reply.

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This is the sort of nonsense in reaction to the above statement about the history of the Catholic Church that I have been seeing come from the western secularists. The fact is the Papacy has been extremely forthright in accounting and atoning for the things it has done wrong in the past. It has reached out to many groups, my church included. The Papacy has been a voice for confroning the culture of death and violence in our present reality, and that is really what we're talking about. What is happening righ now.

The Papacy has moral authority to speak, because it is matching that speech with actions, not empty words, and not violent rhetoric. That is why I said the Pope is speaking with a prophetic voice. He is showing true leadership and Christian values, and I say God bless and protect him, and I pray for the soul of Nun who gave her life for others in Somalia.

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That is why I think the Pope can and should speak. He is speaking the truth, and he is speaking words that need to be heard.

Andrew