Sunni scholars break off dialogue with Vatican

Reuters reports that the highest authority of Sunni Islam, the Islamic University of al-Azhar in Cairo, has frozen all dialogue with the Roman Catholic Church over what it called Pope Benedict’s repeated insults towards Islam.

[Benedict's] remarks followed a New Year bombing outside a church in the Egyptian city of Alexandria that left 23 people dead and dozens injured and prompted demonstrations by both Christians and Muslims against sectarian violence. The pope urged Christian communities to persevere in a non-violent manner in the face of what he described as “a strategy of violence that has Christians as a target”.

Al-Azhar’s Islamic Research Council “reviewed in an emergency meeting on Thursday the repeatedly insulting remarks issued by the Vatican Pope towards Islam and his statement that Muslims are discriminating against others who live with them in the Middle East,” al-Azhar said in a statement. “The council decided to freeze dialogue between al-Azhar and the Vatican for an indefinite period,” it added....

...Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi said on Thursday that al-Azhar’s move would not change the Vatican’s “policy of openness and desire for dialogue” with Islam. The freeze came a few weeks before the next scheduled meeting of the Joint Committee for Dialogue of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue and the Permanent Committee of al-Azhar for Dialogue among the Monotheistic Religions.

Posted by Andrew Gerns on January 22, 2011 1:00 PM | |
Comments (2)

Yes, how dare the Pope speak out against killing Christians...

Bill Dilworth

Posted by billydinpvd [TypeKey Profile Page] | January 22, 2011 2:14 PM

Good heavens, was something lost in translation? (Italian to Arabic)

I don't know how otherwise one goes from "a strategy of violence that has Christians as a target" to "[all] Muslims are discriminating against others who live with them in the Middle East"!

God of Abraham, bring peace to your fractious children...

JC Fisher

Posted by tgflux [TypeKey Profile Page] | January 23, 2011 2:58 AM

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