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Enemy Islam. An Interview with the Bishop of Rumbek, Sudan
Like the parsons egg, good in partsOn May 26 in Naivasha, Kenya, the Arab-Islamic government of Khartoum signed a peace agreement with Christian and animist separatists from southern Sudan, ending twenty years of civil war. Other than the south, the accord concerns the three bordering regions of Abyei, the Blue Nile and the Nuba Mountains. The agreement does not affect Darfur, which lies to the west along the Chad border where another bitter war between Arabs and black African tribes is being waged. The long war in the south has put the Catholic Church found in these regions to a difficult test, as an extremely high number of Christians have been among the conflict's two million victims. But as Msgr. Cesare Mazzolari, the Italian-born bishop of Rumbek (in southern Sudan) said in a recent interview: "A new Christianity will arise from the blood of martyrs." The interview — conducted by Stefano Lorenzetto and printed in the May 23 Sunday issue of the Milan-based daily, "Il Giornale" — is republished below in its full, original version. The interview is an exceptional report, offering a perfect portrait of a frontier-land bishop who knows "his" Islam very well, sees it in practice and describes it without reticence as an Islam made also of crucifixions, slavery, forced conversions and trickery. According to bishop Mazzolari there is a world of difference between Islam and Christianity: Allah is not the same God who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit. However the bishop does not idealize Christian warriors who have taken up arms against Muslims from Khartoum. Even they have committed their share of wrongdoings. The bishop reported such instances, and has subsequently endured problems on account of this. Even less so does the bishop praise the West and Western Christianity while lashing out vicious accusations against the United States. Following the attacks of September 11, the bishop views Americans as waging a furious hunt based on vengeance, which he says leads only to hatred. The bishop explains how his extremely poor African faithful "experience September 11 everyday" in their lives. Yet they take no revenge. "They suffer injustice and disease without any bitterness. You can only learn from them," he said.
Posted by: tipper 2004-07-27 |
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