JOHN Paul 11, throughout his pontificate, was a model of peace and love for humanity, whose dignity he believed should be restored. This he did by simple positive actions like embracing persons with HIV/AIDS at the time when people were most reluctant to touch them. John Paul 11 extended the arms of oneness, friendship, dialogue and ecumenism by praying at the Wailing Wall as well as in the Mosque in Jerusalem while respecting the decorum of each religion; and it was during his era that a mighty Mosque was built in Rome.

Because of these and more, Pope John Paul 11 won the admiration of many including non-Christians. Besides, John Paul 11 made series of apologies to those concerned, and stressed the importance of the right of peaceful co-existence of all groups of people. The fact that Muslims and Jews see him as a great man is indeed an indication of a man of God who strove to make peace between opposing people who indeed should have been friends.

Pope Benedict XVI is quite aware of the charisma of John Paul 11; unfortunately, the good gesture of John Paul 11 towards non-Christians has hardly been reciprocated. No apology has ever been made for the evil committed against Christians, and there is still continuous havoc being committed each day against the minority Christians in the Middle East and other places where Christians are the minority. John Paul lI’s era saw a big erection of a mighty mosque in

Rome (even with the initial plan by Muslims to make the dome of the mosque taller than that of Saint Peter’s Basilica). More so, Muslims have representatives in the various parliaments in America and Europe. On the other hand, history makes it clear that the last Catholic Priest in Saudi Arabia was expelled in 1985 and ever since Christians have been denied the right to practise their faith publicly and those who go contrary face continual persecutions. For instance, in

February 2003, a foreign Christian of unknown nationality was expelled for giving a Bible in Arabic language to a Saudi citizen; in fact owning a Bible in

Arabic language is tantamount to proselytising which is punishable with a jail sentence. Likewise, in the early 2003, four Pakistani Christians were arrested for unknown reason, while two were later released and  expelled; nothing is known of the other two till today. Similarly, in October 2003, the Saudi Religious police called the Muttawah arrested two Egyptian Christians, but were later released a month later. On 20 November 2004, a Saudi citizen who converted to

Christianity was arrested and jailed, and further investigation revealed that many other Saudi citizens who converted to Christianity are also languishing in Saudi prisons for no other reason than just for being Christians. Furthermore, on 5 April 2006, Father George Joshua from Kerala, India, was arrested while saying Mass privately with Catholics in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Father Joshua was imprisoned for four days because he had gone to Saudi Arabia (with the permission of his bishop) to provide pastoral care in the run up to 2006 Easter celebrations, as part of a mission to support Catholics in the Kingdom.

The exact nature of the treatment of Fr. Joshua at the hands of the Saudi police is unkknown. However, Fr. Joshua was released on Saturday 8 April 2006 with the order to leave Saudi Arabia immediately. In addition, on 29 January 2009, Perpetual of Cartage reported that a daughter of a member of Saudi Arabia’s religious police was killed for writing about her faith in Christ. Much later, the Saudi authority equally arrested a 28-year old Christian man, Hamoud Bin Saleh for describing his conversion and criticising the Saudi’s judiciary on his website. Bin Saleh was not only arrested, his website was equally blocked and no one is sure if Bin Saleh has ever been released since his arrest. However, one could say that some foreign Christians with diplomatic status who worship in their homes are partially lucky in the sense that they do not go into jaiI but are immediately deported if they are caught.

For Christians in Saudi Arabian prisons to obtain their freedom, the prison guards constantly ask them to get converted to Islam; even their Muslim counterparts who are Shiites are equally asked to become Sunni Muslims which is the Islamic sect of the majority of Saudis. More astonishing is that even

Muslim migrants in Christendom wield enormous power to the extent that in 2003, the Muslims in Abmuzzo, Italy, said that crucifixes should be removed from the public schools. The Muslims’ argument is that their children are frightened by the crucifixes on the walls of their classrooms which remind them of ghosts or walking skeletons.

The Muslims did go to  court and the verdict was ruled in their favour. Even some Italian priests were tolerant enough to say that the Muslims can as well put their religious signs in public schools if they want. Well, the verdict was later reverted in the second week of December, 2004, by the higher court in Italy, saying that the crucifixes should remain as they are part of Italian culture. On 20 November 2003 the Ex Imam of Carmagnola, Italy (a migrant from Senegal), at Secolo Abdul Qadir Fall Mamour, openly said that Italy must become an  Islamic state. Some years later in 2007, some Muslims in Italy demonstrated that Christian religious signs be removed from cemeteries.

Not only that, Muslims carry their banners publicly in Rome and on the banners are the boldly written Arabic words, “Allah is the only God and Mohammed is his prophet.” The freedom that Muslim migrants enjoy in Christendom is never accorded to Christians in the Muslim world. Synagogues, Mosques and Shrines are built in the Christian world and there have been no persecution of converts from Christianity to other religions, but what converts from other religions, paticularly Islam, to Christianity get in return are series of persecutions, hatred and death.

For the above mentioned reasons, one can say with certainty again that the good gesture of John Paul 11 has never been reciprocated, except the admiration of his charisma.

• John A. Oyewole wrote from  Rho, Italy.

Comments (0)

Show/hide comments

Show/hide comment form

Name

Email

Website

Title

Comment

smaller | bigger

Subscribe via email (registered users only)

I have read and agree to the Terms of Usage.

Write the displayed characters

Add Comment