Vatican shifts the prism on Mideast Christians
(Published in The International Herald Tribune, June 5, 2006)
The French newspaper La Croix is a solid and cautious daily that looks at the world from a self-described position of 'Christian conviction.' Part of a large Roman Catholic-oriented publishing house, its journalistic professionalism and strong financial backing make for a confident voice.
Because it has been reporting something of real magnitude lately on the church's vision of the Middle East, you could ask if La Croix might get a development involving the
Usually most comfortable in defending old truths, La Croix has been saying something very new over the past month.
The newspaper has focused attention on the idea that the Christian presence in the
'There's an upheaval in the church's attitude,' Dominique Quinio, La Croix's editor, said by telephone. 'Traditionally, the church minimized Christians' difficulties in the
'Now, with Islam's assertiveness and the rise of Hamas, there's a much harder tone from the
While this is not a forecast of a Clash of Civilizations a year into the pontificate of Benedict XVI, it involves an altered realization by the church about
An example of that language: In a statement last month on Christians' place in the Middle East, Archbishop Giovanni Lajola, who heads the
A bold approach was necessary, he said, because 'we know very well that radical Islam exploits anything that it interprets as a sign of weakness.'
Cardinal Jean Louis Tauran, Lajola's predecessor and now the
An even more direct evaluation came from Monsignor Philippe Brizard, who heads Oeuvre d'Orient, a French charitable organization supporting Christian communities throughout the
'Islam's radicalization is the principal cause of the Christian exodus,' Brizard told a French reporter. 'The Muslims' identity crisis has resulted in one for the Christians.'
La Croix's reporting, alongside the Vatican's changing emphasis, has been a break with the traditional French approach to the Middle East that lays the basic cause of Christians' problems at the feet of the Israeli occupation of Palestinian land. Rather, in an article from
At the same time, another article told of Monsignor Luis Sako, archbishop of
Compacted, the sense I took from the newspaper's series was that if the Christian presence in the Middle East was a gauge of its potential for openness and tolerance, Islamic fundamentalism was now confronting it in circumstances where the
Would the papal nuncio in
Basically, there was fascination with what appeared to be a significant development, but also discomfort and uncertainty. For the American bishops, it looked as though the
For the Bush administration, which is not granting temporary refugee status here to Christians from
The senior administration official insisted that Washington had been active and effective diplomatically on behalf of Copts in Egypt, Maronites and Iraqi Christians, but said, illustrating the United States' real dilemma, 'we want to avoid the charge we privilege the situation of Christians and play into the propaganda themes of the Islamists.'
On the issue of the survival of the Middle East's Christians in the face of radical Islam, Pope Benedict has given solid indications of toughening the
Stalin was once quoted as asking, contemptuously, How many divisions does the pope have? In the case of Benedict, his strongest weapon in entering a traditional zone of maximum caution may be in having laid out a strategy based both on truth and surprise.