Pope To Muslims: Religion Rejects Violence

Pontiff Meets Muslim Leaders In Cameroon To Uphold Peace Between Christianity, Islam

(AP)  Pope Benedict XVI told Muslim leaders on Thursday that true religion rejects violence, and he held up peaceful coexistence between Christianity and Islam in Cameroon as "a beacon to other African nations."

In a morning meeting with 22 representatives of Cameroon's sizable Muslim minority, Benedict said religion is the basis of human civilization and he returned to one of the key themes of his papacy, saying there is no incompatibility between faith and reason.

"Genuine religion ... stands at the base of any authentically human culture," he said. "It rejects all forms of violence and totalitarianism: not only on principles of faith but also of right reason."

The pope said that "religion and reason mutually reinforce one another" and urged Catholics and Muslims to work together "to build a civilization of love."

Unlike in neighboring Nigeria, where religious strife has often broken into violence, Christians and Muslims largely coexist without problems in Cameroon, a situation that drew Benedict's praise.

"May the enthusiastic cooperation of Muslims, Catholics and other Christians in Cameroon, be a beacon to other African nations of the enormous potential of an inter-religious commitment to peace, justice and the common good," he said.

The pope has often spoken of the need for religion to shun violence, but has refrained from pointing any finger at specific faiths since a 2006 speech delivered in Germany in which he linked Islam to violence.

Amid angry reactions from the Islamic world, Benedict expressed regret for any offense caused by his remarks and has since met several times with Muslim leaders from various countries.

Thursday's meeting with Muslim representatives at the Apostolic Nunciature, where Benedict has been lodging on his first African pilgrimage as pope, was closed to the press.

The Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi said the atmosphere was "cordial and friendly" and that the Muslims issued a "warm greeting to the pope."

Muslims make up some 22 percent of Cameroon's population; Roman Catholics account for 27 percent of the West African nation's people. Animists account for some 27 percent, while Protestants make up 18 percent.

Benedict, like his predecessor John Paul, has set aside time in his foreign pilgrimages to meet with, or at least greet, representatives from various Christian communities as well as non-Christians.

The pope was next scheduled to celebrate Mass for thousands of faithful from Africa's expanding, vibrant Catholic flock in the capital's football stadium.

Yaounde's Amadou Ahidjo stadium holds 40,000 people, and thousands of men and women gathered at the site early Thursday, many wearing flowing robes with writing in French that celebrated the pope's visit.

Benedict's open-air Mass will be his first occasion as pope to be among a great crowd of faithful on the continent that is witnessing the church's biggest growth.

Before the visit, Benedict said he was traveling in Africa as a pilgrimage of peace, in hopes of inspiring faithful to work for social justice and fight the hunger and disease that afflict millions on the continent.

Since stepping off the papal plane on Tuesday, attention to Benedict's pilgrimage has been largely focused on the Vatican's refusal to advocate condoms as a way to help stop the spread of AIDS, which is ravaging Africa in a pandemic that affects millions.

On Wednesday, France and Germany sharply criticized Benedict's declaration aboard the papal plane that distributing condoms "increases" the AIDS problem.

The French Foreign Ministry said the statement could "endanger public health policies and the imperative to protect human life." The U.N. agency charged with fighting AIDS also spoke out in favor of condom use.

[Shihadah]

Wasn't he in the Nazi Youth? The pope mother should have worn a condom...

[fleabag75]

I think that is one of the funniest things I ever heard. When the Pope commented about Islam being a violent religion,,,,,,,, "........... they got angry and rioted, there were fatalities". Boy, guess they showed him how wrong he was, ey?

[sly_64]

Hmmm...really....does that mean Catholic history is rejected?
Posted by tomadams99

I guess it does.

[scydka]

"Pope To Muslims: Religion Rejects Violence"

Muslims to Pope: " We do reject it, but why not urge the misfits among your followers to quit advocating and committing it against us, and then we will deal with our own misfits."

I've never heard of Catholics blowing themselves up in the name of their religion.

We shouldn't even waste time with Muslims. Their religion is based on hatred for infidels, their culture strongly holds contempt for America, and yet they still try to say that their religion is not violent and the extremists among them are a minority.
I know damn well they view the suicide bombers with admiration.

Despite what the Catholic church has done, you have to be realistic about Islam. Why should you defend people that would spit on you and consider you worthless? If you're white, you're evil. If you're anything other than Muslim, evil. They have no tolerance for you.

This is fact. I've had to live around massive amounts of Muslim Somalis.

[brianbwb-2009]

"Just the other day I read on msnbc where in England they have an Islamic organization for the implimation of Shariah law in that country. It's comming here but most Americans are too short sighted and liberal minded to see." Posted by sillywilly4

Your sig is most apropos.

If a group of people want to apply the tenets of their religion to their lives, that is called freedom of religion. In America they cannot force their laws upon you for the same reason. If you don't want to live by Syariah, you will never have to, just the same as in you don't want to be forced to live by "Christian" laws, you don't have to.

"The boogieman is coming to getcha" is dead, it died when the Communist boogieman didn't nuke us. Rational adults don't live in fear of such hysterical BS, find some other reason for the spewing of your hate.

[brianbwb-2009]

"Just the other day I read on msnbc where in England they have an Islamic organization for the implimation of Shariah law in that country. It's comming here but most Americans are too short sighted and liberal minded to see." Posted by sillywilly4

Your sig is most apropos.

If a group of people want to apply the tenets of their religion to their lives, that is called freedom of religion. In America they cannot force their laws upon you for the same reason. If you don't want to live by Syariah, you will never have to, just the same as in you don't want to be forced to live by "Christian" laws, you don't have to.

"The boogieman is coming to getcha" is dead, it died when the Communist boogieman didn't nuke us. Rational adults don't live in fear of such hysterical BS, find some other reason for the spewing of your hate.

[brianbwb-2009]

"Pope To Muslims: Religion Rejects Violence"

Muslims to Pope: " We do reject it, but why not urge the misfits among your followers to quit advocating and committing it against us, and then we will deal with our own misfits."

[tomadams99]

Hmmm...really....does that mean Catholic history is rejected?

[displeased]

If you don't believe, you get violence. If you leave the religion, you get violence. If you sin, you get violence.
Posted by sillywilly4

How is that different than Christianity? Wouldn't a person burn in helll for eternity for the same reasons?

[jsf14]

Because The Roman Catholic Church rejects violence, the Inquisition turned its victims over to the local government for execution. They did not count torture as violence. As for the Crusades, someone else will have to explain their violence as somehow having nothing to do with religion. But then this pope is a theologian not a historian.

[gunownerdan]

Adolf Hitler and the Catholic Church.........
http://www.nobeliefs.com/nazis.htm

[displeased]

Maybe a hydrogen bomb on Mecca would free a billion people from the fascist slavery called Islam. They wouldn't have to put their faces in the mud 5 times a day to pray to an imaginary spirit that lives in a hole in a meteorite there.
Posted by johnb8888

You are no different than them.

[grumpas]

He is a fine one to be moralizing to someone about violence! The Catholic Church is so tainted with innocents blood it renders anything he has to say on the subject moot!

[johnb8888]

It's impossible for Islam for "peacefully coexist" with other religions. Their book doesn't allow it. It teaches them to kill anyone who won't convert, anyone who wants to leave Islam for freedom of conscience.

The only reason the Catholics aren't still doing exactly the same thing is that the West has largely thrown off the slavery of religion.

Maybe a hydrogen bomb on Mecca would free a billion people from the fascist slavery called Islam. They wouldn't have to put their faces in the mud 5 times a day to pray to an imaginary spirit that lives in a hole in a meteorite there.

[honestabe8]

q: what kind of s-e-x does the pope have?

a: nun

[honestabe8]

Spiritual and moral suggestions? Coming from the w-h-o-r-e of Rome?

[perk235]

Yes, and the universe revolves around the earth.

[cs4466]

Religion poisons everything.

[brianbwb-2009]

"...He said that while the church does not propose specific economic solutions, it can give "spiritual and moral" suggestions."

Which, coming from the ex-Hitler Youth member, who is now the leader of an organization that for centuries protected child abusers, is not worth the paper it was reported on.

[diamruby]

The only soultion for all of this is mass sterilization, then all these breeders, poverty, religous nuts can have all they want in sex without producing.