Cardinal Vincent Nichols, president of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of England and Wales (CBCEW), joined in the Iftar ritual breaking of the Ramadan fast at sunset on Wednesday, for the fourth year in a row.Because of the Wuhan virus pandemic, Nichols, who hosted a Ramadan Iftar meal at Archbishop's House in 2017, was forced to partake in the Islamic ritual meal at home while joining Muslim, Protestant and Jewish leaders in an online celebration.
The Commentary:
While I certainly do not favor being impolite in our conversations with Muslims, I fail to see what is to be gained by any Christian observance of an Islamic holiday. In fact, it is not simply unseemly but scandalous that a Christian leader and a Roman Catholic Bishop and a Cardinal at that, would observe any part of Ramadan. Furthermore, it is even more shocking that Protestant and Jewish leaders would have joined in such celebration in the past or, in the case of this year, online. Would we expect Muslims to watch during Advent or kneel at the Manger at Christmas or worship at the cross at Lent or join in the Easter Alleluias? Would we presume that they would observe at home some form of the family side of these particular Christian holy days?
I would be offended if any Muslim would treat Christian holy days as some sort of meaningless ritual that could be observed without faith. I would expect Muslims to be equally offended by Christians observing what is alone an Islamic ritual. Such play acting does not further any real ecumenism and, if it is not play acting, then it is something far more nefarious and worthy of the worst condemnation. Maybe those who think spiritual but not religious and who display their coexist bumper stickers under the banner of no real truth could get away with it, but why a Roman Catholic Cardinal or any other Christian religious leaders?
It would seem to me that such foolishness would be eschewed by both sides -- those who hold their rituals sacred and those who wish not to offend. It would be best if we took each other seriously but did not stoop to play acting when it comes to our sacred holidays and piety. Frankly, I cannot imagine who sat down and thought about this and decided this was a good idea.
4 comments:
"Frankly, I cannot imagine who sat down and thought about this and decided this was a good idea."
It's like thinking about and then deciding it would be a good idea as a Missouri Synod pastor to co-officiate at a syncretistic prayer service with nonLutheran clerics.
The word is "Capitulation."
Fr. D+
Pastor Peters,
There is nothing to be gained from observing anything that relates to islam, period. That a Cardinal participates in this is tantamount to bowing to pachamamma at the Vatican (another scandal), I love it when Christians say that islam is an Abrahamic faith and that we worship the same God. NOT. I have two copies of the koran and just reading the first pages of that book is is not hard for people with any knowledge of the Bible to realize that mohammed borrowed from the Bible as he had nothing to draw upon since he created the religion that didn’t exist prior to his birth. He borrowed and then twisted the scriptures into something that is the complete antithesis of our Sacred Book. I apologize for the rant but if Christians, both Catholic or otherwise don’t wake up to this, we are in trouble, period. Their god is not the God we worship.
No need to travel across the Atlantic to see syncretistic garbage. Here in the U.S., on its April 23rd Facebook page, the XXXA described the Koran as a "revelation" and announced, "We wish all of our Muslim neighbors a generous and blessed Ramadan." Numerous XXXA congregations also included similar greetings on their websites or facebook pages prior to the opening of Ramadan Bombathon 2020, which as of Day 19 included 87 attacks and 329 kills.
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