SEPTEMBER 11
&
THE TRUE FACE OF ISLAM
By Father Emily
The events that struck the United States on Monday the 11th of September shocked the world both by the sheer violence as well as by the cool and calculated determination with which the emblems of the “invincible American power” have been hit. It is not our intention to propose a political analysis of these events, since it has been done already by more qualified and authorized persons. It is our duty rather as Catholics, to analyse these events in the light of our faith and to draw conclusions for our Christian life. Indeed, if the 11th of September is an open declaration of war against the western world, it is obvious that all of us should be concerned by what will happen in the near future and we must prepare ourselves for this new situation. Actually, an event, such as the one on the 11th of September was not a random event; it simply marks a new step in the escalation of a war with the intended conquest of the western countries by the Islamic world. This attack against the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon, should exemplify for many the striking opposition, which exists between two civilizations, two cultures, two different worlds; the Islamic one and the one we call simply, Judeo-Christian Democracy (although we know these terms to be so alien to one another!). Many have refused to admit this opposition, others have simply ignored it and a large number have never realized the inherent intensity. After the 11th of September, it is no longer possible to be oblivious to such a reality.
That is why it is very important for us as Catholics to understand the implications of this battle, since, for various reasons the actual political and religious stakes are deliberately concealed by our leaders. Indeed, the leader of the interfaith dialogue in the United States, Bishop Brown, just signed a joint declaration with the Muslim religious leaders, which states: “We believe that the One God has called us to be men of peace. There is nothing which is Christian or Muslim, that could justify the terrorist actions”. At the same time and in the same vein, the European bishops strongly condemned this unprecedented attack on the American people, saying: “There is no justification for violence and destruction; there is no theological foundation for terrorism - not in the Christian, Jewish or Muslim faith”. Mr. Tony Blair holds exactly the same discourse and declares with a learned assurance: “ . . . such acts of infamy and cruelty are wholly contrary to the Islamic faith.
Since, we still want to believe that these leaders are sufficiently educated and cultured to know the true nature of Islam, we are obliged, unfortunately, to say that they athe coward fears the battle, he says to his enemy: “we are friends.” “Yes, we are”, the enemy answers, ”that is why, if you do not want me to continue to destroy your cities and your countries, you just have to surrender!” So, whatever may be the reasons that motivate our political and religious leaders to vindicate Islam of their capacity for terrorism, they simply continue to lie and to refuse to address the true source of this problem. That is why the Islamitization of our western countries will continue to spread until the Blessed Virgin Mary intercedes to save what remains of Christian civilization.
Allow me to present a few quotations from the Koran (alternate spelling: Qur’an, which is the religious charter of Islam from which the Moslems draw all their moral and political tenets). The quotes that should suffice to convince us of the real threat that Islam represents for the Church and Christian Civilization. Let us first quote Mr. Patrick Sookhdeo, director of the Institute for the Study of Islam and Christianity, speaking of the extremist, violent nature of Islam:
“ ‘. . . then fight and slay the Pagans wherever ye find them, and seize them, beleaguer them, and lie in wait for them, in every stratagem (of war).” (Surah 9, verse 5) The note that accompanies this verse in the respected translation by Abdullah Yusuf Ali states that, “when war becomes inevitable it must be pursued with vigour . . . The fighting may take the form of slaughter, or capture, or siege, or ambush and other stratagems.” The World Trade Centre attack cannot be dismissed as merely the work of a small group of extremists. The Muslims celebrating the tragedy in America are doubtless recalling the words of the Koran, urging Muslims to ‘fight a mighty nation, fight them until they embrace Islam’.” (The Daily Telegraph, 17 September 2001)
Ultimately, the aim of Islam is the Islamitization of the world as God revealed it to His Prophet: “He has sent his apostles wit the rule of the true religion to make it triumph over all other religions.” (48, 28) “Fight in God’s way until all cults will be the one of the unique God”. God then, sends his believers for the conquest of the world in His name: it is the Holy War, the well-known Islamic Jihad that commands: “to fight until they embrace Islam.” “The enemy combatants will, as well, be conquered: they will be captured and killed according to the custom that God held previously toward their precursors, for you will not find any change in God’s custom.”(33, 61) “Believers, fight the unbelievers who are in your neighbourhood and may they find you harsh.” (9, 123) But the god of Islam promises reward for his combatants: “God bought for the believers their persons and their wealth to give them paradise in exchange. They kill or they are killed. Promise of God in the Thora, in the Gospel and in the Koran.” (9, 111) Finally, let us quote these last verses of the Koran, which will give us much to ponder following the events of September 11th and for those to come? “But, how man cities did we destroy, which were living in luxury? . . . your Lord would not have destroyed these cities without having sent in their metropolis, an apostle to recite our verses” (28, 58-59) “They did not believ many Christians of the Western nations through naivety and a mind-set moulded by the pervasive influences to ‘think in a politically correct manner’. Indeed, the actual leaders of the Islamic countries do not leave us any doubt as to how to interpret these verses of the Koran. Mr. Alija Izetbegovic, the President of Bosnia, published an Islamic Declaration wherein he wrote:
“ . . . there is an incompatibility between Islam and the non-Islamic systems; there is no peace nor coexistence between the ‘Islamic faith’ and the social and political institutions which are non-Islamic . . . The Islamic renewal cannot begin without the religious revolution, but it cannot go ahead and succeed without the political revolution. Our way does not begin with the conquest of the political power, but with the conquest of the people. . . Thus, we must be, first of all, preachers and then soldiers . . . The Islamic movement must and can take power as soon as it will be naturally and numerically strong enough for not only to destroy the existing power, but also to build the new Islamic power . . .”
Upon reading the above passage, the inevitable question remains: How can any religious or political leader, after such a declaration and an honest consideration of these quotations from the Koran, dare to proclaim “there is nothing in Islam which can justify these actions”, when the propagation of Islam, through subversion and violence, remains the ultimate objective in all their efforts. The specialists of Islam acknowledge the expansionist propensity and blatant aggression with which Islam has proceeded to engulf the West since the time of its’ foundation to the present day. History, itself, provides the testimony for this assertion. The leaders of the Western nations are so blinded by the rhetoric of their own democratic principles, they refuse to identify the enemies of the people for whom they were elected to govern. This blindness and cowardice, on the part of the leaders, leave wide open the way for Islam, which, in turn, takes advantage of this weakness to make (through terrorism, for example) a revolution to overthrow the West. It is, then, just one step in a premeditated revolutionary process, a part of which the world witnessed on September 11th, and yet, the Western nations do not appear to see or, at least, do not want to see!
A few years ago, Father Vincent Serralda, a French priest who lived for fifty years in North Africa and who can be considered to be an expert on the Islamic World, prepared a study to analyze the Koran and to warn French families of the danger of Islam. He wrote in the preface of his study, the following:
“Islam is always at war, even when it tries smiling. His war is the extinction of Christianity. That is what a careful reading of the Koran revealed to me. It is this combat to death that I am proposing to unveil to the French families who have not yet suffered the Moslem hostility and who cannot suspect the pretension of their Imams for a world imperialism”.
What then, can we do to save the Church, to save what remains of our Christian Civilization, from such a peril? Humanly speaking, the battle appears to have been lost. It should be obvious that it is not a war in Afghanistan that will solve the problem since Islam has spread worldwide and has been welcomed in all the Western countries in the name of Democracy. The democratic system is, indeed, so absurd that in the name of its principles, acquired through the French Revolution, the democratic countries grant to their enemies protection and liberty to establish and to develop within their own nations. Ironically, what kind of hospitality would these same democratic leaders receive if they would attempt to institute a western democracy within an Islamic country, for instance Saudi Arabia or North Sudan, and build there, according to their religion, a Catholic church, a Protestant Temple or a Synagogue? We know obviously that this inane hospitality of our present Western world would certainly not be reciprocated.
Oh the madness of the modern-democratic man; he is now imprisoned, blinded, tied by the system that he invented in 1789, a system ‘to make him free’! To free himself from the sweet yoke of God, man replaced the Rights of God with the ‘rights of man’, so-called, and he is now the chained slave ensnared by his proud and deceptive motto: Liberty-Equality-Fraternity. Islam has exploited to the fullest extent this non-sense and weakness of this system and like a worm, has devoured the fruit from the inside. In fact, it is very convenient for Islam that the political and the religious leaders in the democratic nations dissociate it from these acts of terrorism. Thus, the day approaches, when powerful enough, Islam will assume control within the various Western nations through any means conducive to its thirst for conquest. Until that dreadful time, it continues its clandestine conquest unimpeded. Interestingly enough, even the literature of the Sikhs contain references to forewarn the sleeping democratic countries: “ . . . they aim to make France an Islamic Republic by the year 2015, and Britain by 2025, through conversions, immigration and high Muslim birth rates.” The former President of Algeria adds strength to this statement when he said during a UN tribune: “We will overcome you by the wombs of our women!” They have the boldness to publicly announce their intention and our leaders remain complacent, having lost completely any sense of honour and patriotism; they even work to vindicate Islam!
Christian civilization, caught between a dying democracy and a vigorous Islam, appears to be condemned to imminent death. Islam, like a cancer growing faster and more efficiently on a weak and sick body, develops and grows on the ruins of democracy and Christianity. Democracy and Christianity, having nothing left to oppose Islam, like the fatally wounded man, imploring the mercy of his torturer, tries in desperation to avoid the deathblow, offers him . . . dialogue! It is pitiful, but it is the discourse, unfortunately, that we hear everywhere: “Let us fight against terrorism. Islam has nothing to do with it, and thus, let us dialogue with Islam for peace in the world!” The discourse of the Pope, the recent visit of President Bush to the Islamic Centre of America, the declaration of Mr. Kissinger, the joint declaration of the Christian-Islamic Committee; they are all uniting their voices in this foolish concert, the purpose, of which, serves only to give a good, but none-the-less false, conscience to those who join this tiresome chorus.
Yet, my dear Faithful, let us not become discouraged and let us, more than ever, have confidence in the might of Our Queen of Heaven, the Blessed Virgin Mary, and in the efficacy of her powerful weapon, the Holy Rosary. If humanly speaking, the situation for the Church and the remnants of a Christian Civilization appear to be desperate, we know, then, that our hope and our strength cannot rely on human power, but only on a divine protection. “The gates of hell will not prevail” and “in the end Her Immaculate Heart will triumph”. Our combat for the reign of Christ the King in our society is the true and just cause; this cause will lead us infallibly to victory.
At the opposite, the war of the western-democratic nations against terrorism is a useless and false battle, because it only considers the consequences of the problem and not the cause of it. For it to be a useful battle, the centre and cause of the problem must be attacked. While the West may address to some extent an aspect of the problem, it leaves, in the name and for the sake of Democracy, the source of the problem is untouched. They are hitting the nail, but not on the head. Thus Islam, methodically perseveres with the Holy War to render western civilization impotent, to subject him, and annihilate him for the triumph of its false god.
Thus, on a natural level, the fate of democratic nations is inevitable. These nations, having betrayed in 1789 their Christian heritage, will pay under the Islamic yoke for their perversities and revolt against the One, True God. Let us not forget the still, very relevant warning of Our Lady at Fatima: “Wars are God’s chastisement because of sin”. Who would deny that the Western nations do not have to pay for their iniquitous laws of abortion, divorce, contraception, homosexuality and their licentiousness and immoral behaviour against Christian modesty? This immorality which is now spread everywhere like a filthy wind by sexual education in the schools, television, movies, books, magazines, immoral dress, etc., is leading so many souls to hell. Alas, we know that this corruption has been propagated by the enemies of the Church to de-Christianize our countries and to annihilate Christian Civilization, and all under the banner of ‘liberty and democracy’.
Thus, we are, in fact, witnessing two forces radically opposed to each other: on one side, democracy, which under the banner of the UN and the Charter for the Rights of Man, works to establish a One World Government and to provide people with a corrupt and luxurious materialistic paradise on earth; on the other side, Islam, which under the banner of the Koran, works to establish a One World Islamic Government and to provide its believers with the same kind of paradise, but as an idyllic one in the new garden of Eden in the next life (9, 44-52-55-78). A confrontation is inevitable and it is not dialogue that will prevent it, but it is only the conversion of both parties to the true God and to His Church, which will save the world from disaster.
In order that this conversion occurs (and it will occur when Russia is consecrated to the Immaculate Heart of Mary), this blatant revolt against God and His Christ will have to be eradicated from the surface of the earth. Unfortunately, a lot of blood may be shed, as the Blessed Virgin Mary warned us:
“France, Italy, Spain and England will be at war. Blood will flow in the streets. Frenchman will fight Frenchman, Italian with fight Italian. A general war will follow which will be appalling. For a time, God will cease to remember France and Italy because the Gospel of Jesus Christ has been forgotten. The wicked will make use of all their evil ways. Men will kill each other, massacre each other even in their homes.” (Our Lady, at La Salette, 1846)
Are the events of September 11th marking a signal for the beginning of civil wars in the western nations as our Lady speaks of? God knows! but what we do know is that this persecution of Christianity by Islam has been raging for years in the Third World to the complete indifference of the western nations. The following is a list of the slaughters, perpetuated in the name of Islam; though not exhaustive, it is sufficiently alarming and speaks for itself:
-Egypt, 1999:
-Senegal, 1999: Interdiction to build any Christian schools and the transformation of churches into mosques.
-Indonesia, 2000: In Ambon, 800 Christians were killed and more than 20 churches destroyed. In Jabok, government troups massacred 22 faithful refugees in a church. Four hundred and seventy thousand refugees have been obliged to flee from the Muslim militia to arrive at Ujung Prabang, an island of the Archipelago. The village of Waai, one of the last Christian villages of Molluscs, was completely burnt. At Christmas, in Jakarta and its suburbs, 18 bomb attacks on churches killing 14 people and wounding 119.
-Saudi-Arabia, 2000: 10 Christians, including 5 children, were imprisoned for meeting in a private place to pray.
-Sudan, 2000: With an estimated 2 million deaths, the civil war in Sudan is by far the bloodiest in Africa's recent history. In spite of repeated condemnations by other nations and human rights groups, the Islamic government in Khartoum shows no sign of lessening its brutal conduct. The Arab-dominated Islamic fundamentalist government in Sudan's north has declared a jihad against the south, which is dominated by animists and Christians. In one day, 122 women and children were deported to the North, all the men having been killed and their villages razed to the ground. Yei, the most important city in the South was bombed: 14 dead and 50 wounded. A Christian school was bombed: 20 children were killed with their teachers.
-Philippines, 2000: The Muslim group, Abu Sayyaf abducted 22 children and 8 Christian adults. The body of Father Gallardo was found with traces of torture. Twenty one Christians were kidnapped by the Muslim group of Milf, led to a mosque, tortured and killed. Sept 19, 2001 - Fear of Muslim guerrillas has compelled a community of Carmelite nuns in Marawi, southern Philippines, to abandon their convent. The Carmelite nuns arrived in the area in 1981. In 1986, some of them were kidnapped by Muslim extremists. Last month, a Columbian missionary from Ireland was killed in Marawi.
-Algeria, 1996-2001: Police in Algeria recently arrested 16 young people for possessing Bibles and other Christian documents. Proselytism by Christians is considered a crime in predominantly Muslim Algeria. Muslims who convert to another religion risk a death sentence. In May 1996, an armed Islamic group murdered seven Trappist monks at the monastery in Thibirine. The following August the same group used a bomb to kill Bishop Pierre Claverie of Oran.
If we are horrified by this worldwide Islamic persecution against Christianity, we should be even more scandalized by the fact that for years, our western nations did absolutely nothing to protect all these poor people from the slaughter. So, as a logical consequence, the list is now extended:
-U.S.A., 11th September 01: More than 6000 people dead and thousands still missing in the attack against the World Trade Centre and that our list of horrors will continue to grow. The western political leaders are perfectly aware of the inevitable issue of this process, otherwise they would not put all their police and armies on maximum alert. Still, they will make a war that will not hit the heart of the problem. Honestly, it is really difficult to imagine more cowardice, more blindness and more hypocrisy in so many people and all at the same time! Such are the fruits of liberal democracy!
What can we do then, in such a desperate situation for the Church and Christian civilization, which seem to be like defenceless victims waiting for the lion (democratic West) or the tiger (Islam) to devour them? It is very important, my dear friends, not to have a defeatist mentality, since, as we said above, we are going to win this battle. We might have to give our life for it, but what is life compared to the reward to come, as St. Paul says. If Muslims are able to sacrifice their lives hoping to get a paradise of carnal pleasures, how much more should Catholics be ready to sacrifice their lives to surely obtain the paradise of eternal and infinite spiritual joys!
That is why, in this gigantic battle that Lucifer wages against everything bearing the name of Christian, I urge you, once more, to take up with faith, courage and strength the weapons of the spiritual combat. This spiritual fight is the first and strongest way to really repel the evil forces. This is not the first battle that the Church has had against the enemies of God and Jesus Christ, and in each battle the Church has won resounding victories when Her ministers and faithful fervently took the spiritual weapons of prayer and penance.
The story of Judith, which we have just read in the Breviary, is quite informative and a relevant example for our time. I strongly encourage you to read and to meditate on this wonderful story, which shows how God delivered His people from a situation no less desperate than the one in which we find ourselves. God listened to the prayers and penance of the priests and people, and sent Judith, (image of the Blessed Virgin Mary) to cut off the head of Holofernes (image of the devil). Her Immaculate Heart will triumph, she will crush the head of the serpent.
“And all the people cried to the Lord with great earnestness, and they humbled their souls in fasting and prayers, both they and their wives…And they cried to the Lord the God of Israel with one accord, that their children might not be made a prey, and their wives carried off, and their cities destroyed, and their holy things profaned, and that they might not be made a reproach to the Gentiles. Then Eliachim the high priest of the Lord went about all Israel and spoke to them, saying: Know ye that the Lord will hear your prayers, if you continue with perseverance in fasting and prayers in the sight of the Lord. Remember Moses the servant of the Lord, who overcame Amalec that trusted in his own strength, and in his power, and in his army, and in his shields, and in his chariots, and his horsemen, not by fighting with the sword, but by holy prayers”. (Judith, 4, 7-12)
What a similitude between the situation of the Israelites and ours today, and what a consoling promise from God through his high priest Eliachim! To the same causes, the same effects. I assure you that we will win this battle, if, like the Israelites, we have recourse to prayer and penance. God will then send us the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Judith of the New Testament, who, by Her prayers and Her intercession, will deliver us from the infernal enemy. Our Lady is as powerful as an army arrayed in battle and she will lead the combat for us against the enemies of the Church and Christian Civilization.
Let us not forget, that when Europe was threaten by the Islamic invasions, the popes organized Rosary Crusades, urging the faithful to have recourse to Mary. When the people began to pray the Rosary to plead for mercy through Our Lady, Europe was saved and Islam invariably defeated by the intercession of Mary. She, to Whom nothing can be denied, is so willing to deliver our petitions to the foot of the Divine Throne when we do as she asks: “pray the daily Rosary” and “penance, penance, penance”!
In 1571, Pope St. Pius V organized a great Rosary Crusade throughout all of Christendom. The graces obtained through this Rosary Crusade enabled the famous victory of the battle of Lepanto against the Turks. This great victory, attributed to the intercession of Our Lady, is commemorated on the Feast of the Most Holy Rosary, the 7th of October. It is because of this victory against Islam that St. Pius V gave to Our Lady the glorious title of Our Lady of Victory.
A century later, the Turks threatened again to invade Europe. This time it was Pope Innocent XI who organized another great Rosary Crusade. The victory of Vienna was the fruit of this Rosary Crusade, we celebrate it on the Feast of the Holy Name of Mary, the 12th of September.
Again, a century later, Islam, like an aggressive ram, was pounding on the doors of Europe. Pope Clement XI in 1717, faithful to the example of his predecessors, organized another great Rosary Crusade for all Christians and obtained yet another great victory over Islam. The pope decided in gratitude to the Blessed Virgin Mary, to extend the feast of 7 October to the Universal Church, and to change its name to The feast of the Holy Rosary in order to remind mankind that it was truly thanks to this powerful prayer that victory was won.
The commemoration of these victories of Mary through Her Holy Rosary, enable the Church to teach her faithful, each and every year, an important lesson on the power of the Rosary in the History of the Church thus encouraging us to follow the example of our Fathers in the Faith. This is why, following the example of these great Popes (Saint Pius V, Innocent XI, and Clement XI) who saved Christendom from the peril of Islam by organizing the Rosary Crusade, we must as well, since the peril of the Islam is more imminent than ever, continue to preach and to spread the Rosary with all our strength. The Rosary won battles in the past, it is as powerful as ever and it will win the present battle if only we want to make the effort “to say it well”, as St. Francis of Sales says.
During this month of October, the month of the Holy Rosary, I ask you all to make a special effort to pray your daily Rosary, as Our Lady asks for with so much insistence. Join the Rosary Crusade that we have organised in our district for this purpose and send back to the District House the Enrolment Form that we regularly put on the back page of this bulletin. This apostolate is of crucial importance.
My dear friends, let us realize that the times are serious and the situation of the world and of the Church is tragic; we must come to our knees and beg God and the Immaculate Heart of Mary to protect and to save us. “If my requests are heard”, says Our Lady at Fatima, “Russia will convert and we will have peace”. Let us heed these requests of Our Lady who desires peace and the salvation of souls. She wants us to convert, (cf. her message at La Salette), she wants us to change our life, to practise virtue, to go regularly to confession (promises of the five First Saturdays) and, of course, she wants us to pray the daily Rosary. This is the Crusade for which we are all called and for which Archbishop Lefebvre called priests and faithful: for the re-conquest of Christian Civilization. This is our Holy War for the Reign of Christ the King and the triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
We Catholics have the monopoly in this Holy War, but, how much different are our weapons from those of our enemies and how much more different are the fruits and the results of our combat! “Give me an army which prays the Rosary”, says Saint Pius X, “and I will conquer the world.” Let us form then, this army in Great Britain, and may we all spread and promote the Rosary Crusade. I wish that the parents enrol their children and all the members of their family in the Crusade; let zealous people take the initiative to organize groups to pray the Rosary. I would wish as well, when it is possible, that in our Churches and Mass Centres of the District, the Holy Rosary be recited before the beginning of the Holy Mass in order to manifest the commitment of all our faithful in the Rosary Crusade and to bring down upon the Church and the World the blessings which will come from it. Pope Leo XIII confirms the strength of the Rosary prayed in public, when he said: “public prayers are much more excellent and more efficacious than private ones, so ecclesiastical writers have given to the Rosary Sodality the title of ‘the army of prayer, enrolled by St. Dominic, under the banner of the Mother of God’."
Above all, it is in each of our families that we want to implant the holy custom of the daily Rosary.
“It is not by force, nor by arms, nor by any human power, but only by the divine assistance, obtained through the prayer of the Rosary, that the Church, strong like David with his sling, will be able to stand up without trembling against the infernal enemy.
“It is especially in the home that we wish to see the widespread recitation of the Rosary, for we will seek in vain to consolidate the crumbling bases of civil society, if domestic society, the principle and foundation of the Human Community, does not rest on the laws of the Gospel. To attain such a difficult end, we affirm that there is no more fitting means than the recitation of the Family Rosary.” (S.S. Pope Pius XII, 1951)
Most sincerely yours in Our Lady of the Holy Rosary,