Pope marks Easter with nod to Muslims, China

c. 2008 Religion News Service VATICAN CITY _ Easter is the most sacred feast in the Christian calendar, when believers of all denominations celebrate the death and resurrection of Jesus. But for Pope Benedict XVI, this year’s Easter celebrations were fraught with significance for the Catholic Church’s relations with the non-Christian world _ particularly Islam […]

c. 2008 Religion News Service

VATICAN CITY _ Easter is the most sacred feast in the Christian calendar, when believers of all denominations celebrate the death and resurrection of Jesus.

But for Pope Benedict XVI, this year’s Easter celebrations were fraught with significance for the Catholic Church’s relations with the non-Christian world _ particularly Islam and China.


In his traditional “Urbi et Orbi” message on Sunday (March 23), addressed “to the city (of Rome) and the world,” Benedict appealed for peace in a half dozen countries or regions of Africa and the Middle East, most of them lands with Muslim majorities and beleaguered Christian minorities, including Darfur and Iraq.

The references echoed Benedict’s plea from one week earlier, at the start of Holy Week, when he demanded an end to the “slaughters,” “violence” and “hatred” in Iraq. The Chaldean Catholic archbishop of Mosul had been recently found dead, two weeks after being kidnapped in front of his cathedral.

The pope’s Easter message also came one day after he personally baptized journalist Magdi Allam, who until his conversion to Catholicism was one of Italy’s most prominent Muslims. A native of Egypt, Allam has been an outspoken critic of Muslim intolerance of Christianity and other faiths.

Religious freedom for Christians is a top priority for the Vatican in its relations with Islamic states. Earlier this month, the first Christian church opened in the Persian Gulf country of Qatar; last week, the Vatican confirmed ongoing talks to open a church in Saudi Arabia, where public Christian worship has long been forbidden.

Benedict’s Easter message also mentioned Tibet, where anti-government protestors have been clashing with Chinese security forces. It was his second reference to Tibet in less than a week, following his appeal last Wednesday (March 19) for “dialogue” and “tolerance” to resolve the conflict there.

Some Italian newspapers had criticized the pope for not commenting sooner on the violence in Tibet, suggesting that the Vatican was hesitant to undermine the church’s tenuous position in China.

Chinese Catholics, who are estimated to number between 12 million and 15 million, have been divided for half a century between an “official” church controlled by Beijing and an “underground” church loyal to Rome, many of whose leaders have been imprisoned by the government.


Benedict made a prominent though indirect reference to the plight of Chinese Catholics this Holy Week, choosing Hong Kong’s Cardinal Joseph Zen to write the meditations for the traditional Good Friday Stations of the Cross service in Rome’s Colosseum.

Zen, a prominent critic of the Chinese government, told the Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano that he thought the pope had chosen him for the task in order to “bring to the Colosseum the voice of the church in China.”

“As we walk behind Jesus on the Via dolorosa,” Zen said, “we feel close to our Chinese brothers, in a prelude to the resurrection.”

KRE/CM END ROCCA

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