HEAR MY PEOPLE’S CRY: ISLAM NEEDS GOSPEL OF PEACE
The Very Rev. Canon
Patrick P. Augustine, D.Min, DD.
(EDITOR'S NOTE: This is a guest article from my friend, Canon Patrick Augustine, Rector of Christ Episcopal Church in Lacrosse,Wisconsin, USA. Patrick and I were youth delegates to the 5th Assembly of the World Council of Churches held in Nairobi, Kenya and the WCC Youth Conference in Arusha, Tanzania in 1975. He was delegate from Pakistan and I was delegate from Philippines. We both pursued the ordained ministry, he with the Anglican Church of Pakistan and me with the Iglesia Filipina Independiente. We have not seen each other for forty years. We finally found each other at the meeting of the South Asian Convocation held in Christ Church Cathedral in Cincinnati, Ohio last August 20-22, 2014 and discovered that both of us are now working with the Episcopal Church. What a small world indeed.- Fred Vergara)
Today’s mail brought me a passionate plea from
the Vicar of Baghdad, Rev. Andrew White. He wrote, “I’m almost in tears
because I’ve just had
somebody in my room whose little child was cut in half. I baptized his child in
my church in Baghdad. This little boy, they named him after me – he was called
Andrew.” We mourn for the
persecuted Christians in Iraq and elsewhere.
Christians and Muslims have been neighbors in the Middle East for many
centuries. History is filled with
incidents that have challenged Christians to fulfill their vocation of “loving thy neighbor.” To live in harmony and respect for the
dignity of our fellow human beings is taught us as followers of Jesus
Christ. Yet the world around us is full
of the news of war, hatred and persecution.
We wonder at times how this madness comes into play in the global
village of the twenty-first century. We
are meant to live in harmony and peace and to respect the rights of those with
whom we may differ.
ISIS the Islamic State is butchering in the name of Islam thousands of
children, raping Christian and Yazdi women, beheading thousands of men, looting
their properties, bombing, and desecrating their holy shrines and worship
places. It is all supposedly done in the
name of religion quoting from Qur’an: “There is no God but Allah, and his prophet is Muhammad.” I find nothing
wrong with this statement itself, as part of the profession of faith for each
Muslim. It is a continuation of the
tradition of the Abrahamic faith communities.
At least 27 Biblical passages explicitly teach and clearly declare
this cardinal truth that there is one and only one true living God. Here are
two examples:
“To you it was shown
so that you would acknowledge that the Lord is God; there no other beside him” (Deuteronomy 4:35).
“I am the first and
I am the last: beside me there is no god”
(Isaiah 44:6).
The Christian profession of faith in the Nicene Creed is: “I believe in one God...” Jews, Christians and Muslims come from a
common tradition of believing in one God.
According to the Qur’an, God has spoken
to humankind through many prophets and messengers, including Biblical figures
like Noah, Abraham, Moses, David and John the Baptist. Jesus is one of the most important and
prominent figures in the Qur’an; he is mentioned
93 times by name in the sacred scripture of Islam.
There is no ambiguity there. Jews, Christians, and Muslims are talking
about the same deity.[1]
Yet Pakistan designates itself the “Fort of Islam” and has passed blasphemy law to persecute, massacre, jail and harass
religious minorities. Boko Hararm in
Nigeria, in the name of Islam, has kidnapped hundreds of innocent Christian
girls to rape and to force into converting to Islam. In Iran Bah’is, Christians,
Sunni and Dervish Muslims are persecuted.
In Egypt Coptic Christians, a most ancient community, are systematically
harassed and tortured. Sudan Islamic
government has killed over two million Christians and Darfurian black Muslims
and displaced millions as refugees.
Now the newest player, ISIS the Islamic State, is on stage with a
vicious agenda to purify the Middle East by committing outrages on the
Christian and Yazdi communities. These
communities lived in Iraq and Syria before the dawn of Islam. His Holiness Louis Rapheal Sako, the
Christian Chaldean patriarch of Babylon has said there are over 150,000
Christians who have fled their homes toward the Kurdish cities of Erbil, Duhok
and Soulaymiya.
In Mosul, Iraq, ISIS offered Christians an ultimatum to (1) convert to
Islam: (2) pay a religious submission tax, (3) face the sword, or (4) leave.
Christian homes are marked with red paint with the Arabic letter “N” (Nazarene) for
extermination or expropriation. This
community has had to run for their lives. Some of their men were crucified and
women were forcibly given to militants as booty. Now Mosul has no Christians and their
churches have been desecrated. Thirty
churches and monasteries in Mosul and the Syriac Orthodox cathedral have been
converted into mosques.
A Yazidi woman Vian Dahkeel, a member of the Iraqi Parliament, gave a
very emotional speech in the Parliament on August 5, 2014 about the
extermination of her community in the name of Islam: “There is a genocide taking against Yazidis. We are being butchered under the name “There is no God but Allah.” Our women are being sold in slave
markets. We are being wiped out by
ISIS. I am speaking in the name of
humanity. Please save us.”
We hear the cries of innocent people from
Nigeria, Sudan, Pakistan and throughout the Middle East. Atrocities are being committed in the name of
religion. We are often reminded in the
West that “Islam is the
religion of peace.” Qur’an teaches “Let there be no compulsion in religion” (Surah al-Baqarah 256). Then what is wrong with this picture?
I remember growing up in a Muslim country
where the Imam on Friday in his sermon often made statements such as “Death to Jews, Death to Christians, Death
to Hindus, Death to America.” Graffiti on the walls would also show such hateful religious
propaganda. Decades of preaching hate
has created dangerous militants acting as human missiles of hate to destroy
their own existence and their neighbors too.
This hate is an acid which diminishes the face of humanity.
Christianity was once widespread in
Babylonia, Susiana, Fars, Khuzistan, on the eastern coast of Arabia, in
Bahrain, and in Oman; it had infiltrated as far as Afghanistan and China.[2]
In the seventh century there were large numbers of Christians in Saudi Arabia. By the time of
Prophet Muhammad’s death (632)
Muslims had conquered these territories and they were not tolerant of other
faith communities. Arab Idolaters had to
choose between death or conversion; as for Jews, Christians, and Zoroastrians,
if they paid tribute and accepted the conditions of conquest, they could buy
back their right to life, freedom of worship, and security of property.[3] The history of religion has many bloody
chapters. Christians have their own dark
ages of Crusades in the middle ages.
Now we live in the
21st century, where the reality has changed. Millions of Muslims have by choice
migrated to the west. They live next
door to Jews, Agnostics, Atheists, Hindus, Buddhists and Christians as good
neighbors. In western countries, we are engaged in inter-faith dialogue for
building better understanding. But we
confront a very serious situation as the Middle East is burning and Christians
in many majority Muslim countries are facing extermination.
So far, not a
single leader of an Islamic nation, not an Imam or Sheikh, has condemned
atrocities being committed in the name of “There is no God but Allah.” Muslim religious and civil rights groups exercise full freedom of
religion in the west. I believe there
are people of goodwill among Islamic community. I beg them and all people of
goodwill not to stay silent spectators.
Elie Wiesel during his Noble Peace Prize acceptance speech in 1986 said
these famous words:
“I swore never to be silent whenever and
wherever human beings endure suffering and
humiliation.
We must always take sides. Neutrality
helps the oppressor, never the
victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the
tormented.”
Islam does not need
to be hijacked by extremists but needs the “Gospel of Peace” The Christian Church is empowered by
Jesus Christ to proclaim his message of healing and reconciliation. Please join
us to build bonds of friendship and break down the walls of hatred which separate
us. Christ calls us to focus on the
two-fold mandate -- to love God and to love our neighbors. We can do both by recognizing and repeating
these truths among people of all faiths, even the faithless.
Without doubt,
religion is the most powerful force on earth.
When religion becomes corrupt and begins to kill and destroy, it turns
evil. Following God’s precepts we can
work together for peace and goodwill on earth.
The Qur’an provides wise
word that celebrates our diversity: “If God had so willed, He would have
created you one community, but [has not done so] that He may test you in what
He has given you; so compete with one another in good works. To God you shall all return and He will tell
you the truth about that which you have been disputing” (al-Ma`idah 5:48) We beg our Muslim
brothers to join hands with us to pray and work together for peace and
brotherhood on earth.
[1]
Charles Kimball, When Religion Becomes Evil, HarperSanFrancisco, 2002,
p.50.
[2]
Francois Nau, L’Expansion Nestorienne en Asie (Paris 1914); Michael G.
Morony, Iraq after the Muslim Conquest (Princeton 1984).
[3]
Bat Ye’or, The Decline of Eastern Christianity under Islam, Associated
University Presses, 1996, PP.33-39
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