NEWS STORY: Christian, Muslim Leaders Condemn Attacks on Iraqi Churches

c. 2004 Religion News Service (UNDATED) Christian and Muslim leaders condemned bombings at five Iraqi churches on Sunday (Aug. 1) that left at least 11 people dead and 50 injured in the first coordinated attacks on Iraq’s minority Christian population. Car bombs targeted four churches in Baghdad and one in Mosul as worshippers gathered for […]

c. 2004 Religion News Service

(UNDATED) Christian and Muslim leaders condemned bombings at five Iraqi churches on Sunday (Aug. 1) that left at least 11 people dead and 50 injured in the first coordinated attacks on Iraq’s minority Christian population.

Car bombs targeted four churches in Baghdad and one in Mosul as worshippers gathered for evening Mass. At least half of those killed were Muslims who lived near the churches.


“This action further undermines efforts to rebuild Iraq as a democratic society where all religious communities and peoples can live in harmony,” said the Rev. Samuel Kobia, general secretary of the World Council of Churches.

Government leaders immediately blamed Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, an al-Qaida ally who officials say has orchestrated much of the violence in the 15-month insurgency. The churches were not random targets, officials said.

“Zarqawi and his extremists are basically trying to drive a wedge between Muslims and Christians in Iraq,” Iraqi national security adviser Mowafaq al-Rubaie told the Reuters news agency. “It’s clear they want to drive Christians out of the country.”

The first blast hit an Armenian Catholic church in Baghdad’s Karrada district, and the second came a few minutes later at a nearby Catholic church. About 20 minutes later, a Chaldean seminary compound in the Doura neighborhood was hit by two car bombs. A fourth bomb struck a Catholic church in the New Baghdad neighborhood.

The Baghdad bombings killed at least 10 people, including at least two children and five members of a Muslim family. More than 40 people were injured. A third bomb in Karrada was disarmed before it could be detonated, reports said.

A fifth attack in the northern city of Mosul killed one person and injured at least seven others as parishioners were leaving Mass at a Catholic church.

Reports said some of the churches were badly damaged by the blasts, with stained glass shattering on worshippers as they lined up to receive Communion. The World Council of Churches said the bombings damaged the offices of the humanitarian group ACT _ Action by Churches Together, and the Middle East Council of Churches.


It also shook the faith of worshippers.

“Never, I’m never going to church again on Sunday,” Khawla Yawo Odishah told The New York Times outside the St. Peter Seminary compound in Doura.

Others remained resolute.

“This is God’s house. Those who did this may think they will go to heaven, but they will go to hell,” Reemon Merghi, a Christian, told The Washington Post after the Armenian church was hit.

Iraq’s estimated 800,000 Christians _ about 3 percent of the population _ have lived peacefully with the Muslim majority for years. Islamic militants have recently targeted Christian-owned liquor stores and destroyed their contents.

At the Vatican, Pope John Paul II sent a message of condolence to Iraqi Christians. “In this hour of trial, I am spiritually close to the church and to Iraqi society, and I renew … my firm commitment to the establishment of a climate of peace and reconciliation as soon as possible in that beloved country.”

In Washington, the bombings were condemned by the Council on American-Islamic Relations as a perversion of Islam. “Harming those engaged in religious worship violates the principles of all faiths,” the group said in a statement.

The bombings raised concern for the struggling Christian churches in the Middle East, who have seen continuing declines only grow worse as violence in Iraq and Israel-Palestine continues to fester.


“Christians are an integral part of the society they are living in, they are not newcomers, they are not there for any superficial reason,” said Bishop Nareg Alemezian of the Armenian Apostolic Church. “Middle Eastern Christians are the people of the land where Christ was born.”

_ Peggy Polk contributed to this report from the Vatican.

DEA/JL END ECKSTROM

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