Christian theologian: “Christians should be delighted” at Hagia Sophia becoming a mosque
July 11, 2020 1:00 PM BY ROBERT SPENCER
Useful Idiots such as Giles Fraser, who couch their capitulation in the guise of being broadminded, tolerant, and generous, will be the death of us.
Giles Fraser has offered an argument from authority, which is the weakest of all arguments: Christians and Muslims worship the same God because the Pope Francis and the Second Vatican Council say so. In reality, there are immediate and obvious differences: the Trinity, the crucifixion, and the divinity of Christ. Beyond that, Islam in its traditional theological formulations denies free will, the nature of good and evil (both of which, says the Qur’an [91:7-8], are placed in the soul by Allah, while the Christian idea is that evil stems from a rejection of God), and the nature of the deity. Allah is absolute will; Islamic theologians throughout Islamic history have held that even to expect consistency in moral or physical laws would be placing restraints on his sovereignty.
All this was known in the Christian world up until the 1960s. Vatican II’s affirmation that Muslims and Christians together worship the one God, and pointed omission of any discussion of what had led the two to be in conflict for 1,400 years, was a radical departure from the statements of many popes, as well as of saints and martyrs.
“Theologian: Vatican II Justifies Hagia Sophia As Mosque,” by Jules Gomes, ChurchMilitant.com, July 10, 2020:
ISTANBUL ( ChurchMilitant.com) – A controversial theologian is quoting Pope Francis and Vatican II to justify Turkey’s decision returning the world’s largest Byzantine basilica to its conquered status as a mosque.
Giles Fraser, a liberal Anglican, says he “cannot but applaud” radical Islamic president Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s “desire to return this once holy place back to a mosque.”
“Christians should be delighted” if Hagia Sophia reverts to being a mosque because “Muslims are our brothers and sisters with whom we share a faith in the living God,” Fraser argues.
Church Militant reported Thursday that the Council of State, Turkey’s top administrative court, reached a unanimous verdict declaring that secularist President Kemal Atatürk’s 1934 decision to turn Hagia Sophia into a museum was unlawful.
Fraser, a Nietzsche scholar, claims he is offering “no less an authority than the pope himself,” to “those Christians who believe that Muslims and Christians worship something different.”
The former columnist for The Guardianquotes Pope Francis’ tweet ahead of his trip to Morocco last year to make his case that Christians and Muslims worship the same God: “We Christians and Muslims believe in God, the Creator and the Merciful, who created people to live like brothers and sisters, respecting each other in their diversity and helping one another in their needs,” the pontiff tweetedin March 2019.
“This view goes back to the Second Vatican Council, where it was affirmed that Muslims, ‘together with us adore the one, merciful God,'” writes Fraser, citing Lumen Gentium.
“And from the Muslim side, the Qur’an makes it clear that Muslims worship the same God as the Jews,” notes Fraser, providing a hyperlink to the Koran (2:132).
“Giles Fraser has offered an argument from authority, which is the weakest of all arguments: Christians and Muslims worship the same God because Pope Francis and the Second Vatican Council say so,” distinguished Islamic scholar Robert Spencer told Church Militant.
“In reality, there are immediate and obvious differences — the Trinity, the Crucifixion, and the divinity of Christ,” said Spencer, author of over 20 books including Inside Islam: A Guide for Catholics: 100 Questions and Answers. “All this was known in the Christian world up until the 1960s.”
Spencer explains:
Vatican II’s affirmation that Muslims and Christians together worship the one God — and pointed omission of any discussion of what had led the two to be in conflict for 1,400 years — was a radical departure from the statements of many popes, as well as of saints and martyrs…. |
