Yet again it has returned, the sublime and hallowed month of Ramadan – a beautiful and particularly sacred period that was an original part of the magnificent revelation handed down by Allah to the Prophet himself (peace be upon him) in the Holy Quran. Indeed, it has been widely postulated by many of our holiest of men that the precious text of that sacred volume was revealed to the Prophet himself (even more peace be upon him) during the very first Ramadan.
Needless to say, this is an exceedingly special and sanctified period of the year, a period of grace and majesty as well as of prayer and charity – a time during which the eternally beloved people of Allah are encouraged to demonstrate the depth and strength of their faith by engaging in sawm, or fasting, from dawn until sunset, as well as by strictly avoiding the intake of food and beverages, the use of tobacco, and any kind of carnal activity, although the standard acts of incestuous intercourse with minors and, naturally, the brutal sexual violation of the wives and offspring of infidels can be safely pursued per usual. Furthermore, it is to be hoped that the faithful will manifest the great extent of their self-restraint during this period by scheduling such activities as female genital mutilation, wife-beating, and the theologically obligatory honor killing of wives, sisters, and daughters for the hours following sundown – that is to say, after the iftar, the solemn supper taken in the wake of the sinking of the sun below the horizon, and before the suhur, the consecrated common meal that is directed to take place just prior to the rising of the sun.
It is particularly vital that the people of God make a special effort during the holy month of Ramadan not to engage in any act of unkindness, injustice, or insensitivity directed at their fellow believers – although, of course, the tossing of homosexuals from the roofs of buildings, the remorseless stoning to death of rape victims, and the violent execution of apostates may proceed as usual, preferably during the hours of darkness. It it crucial, moreover, to underscore that Ramadan is a time during which the followers of the Prophet are enjoined to take part in even a more extensive and profound degree of spiritual reflection than is their usual practice during the remainder of the year: they are, for instance, called upon to recite the special Ramadan prayers, known as the Tarawih, during the nights of this dearest of months, and even, if they are capable of such an accomplishment, to read prayerfully through the entire Holy Quran from start to finish. All of this contemplative and devout activity, to be sure, should not be permitted to distract the children of Allah from such equally urgent and virtuous tasks as mowing down infidels with cars, trucks, and other vehicles, shooting deadly rockets into the heart of urban areas where civilian non-believers are wont to gather, and committing sundry acts of mass annihilation and bloodshed involving such handy implements as machetes and Kalashnikovs.
Most important of all, the consummate lessons of self-control that the people of the Holy Quran are expected to take to heart during Ramadan should not be misconstrued in such a way as to prevent them from setting off bombs at major sporting events, high-profile musical performances, and other large public events at which there is a good chance of reducing large numbers of infidels, especially the small and helpless children of the infidels, to random splatters of blood and to charred, unidentifiable bits and pieces of flesh and bone. On the contrary, the followers of Allah and disciples of the Prophet (peace, yet again, be upon him) should never lose sight of the fact that it is during Ramadan, above all times, that acts of righteous slaughter and virtuous extirpartion – those blessed sanguinary proofs of Islamic piety and allegiance – bring even more joy to Allah in His Heaven than they do during the remainder of the year.
We do not yet know enough about the three terrorists who, saying "This is for Allah!", killed and wounded so many in London on June 4, but consider these two recent scenes:
Scene one: Manchester, United Kingdom, the "free world". A British-born Muslim terrorist prays in a former church. All around him, the Christian sites and congregations accepted being turned into Islamic sites. The day after, this terrorist goes on a rampage, murdering 22 concert-goers.
Scene two: Minya, Egypt, the "unfree world". An Islamist terror group stops a bus full of Christian pilgrims. The terrorists demand that their victims recite the Islamic creed, the shahaada. The Christians refuse to abandon Christianity and become Muslims. The Islamists murder them, one by one.
What do these scenes tell us? Christians resist Islam more in the Middle East than in Europe.
Salman Abedi, the British terrorist who massacred 22 innocent men, women and children at the Manchester Arena, could, every day, enter what was once a beautiful Christian church, consecrated in 1883. It was desecrated in the 1960s, during a great wave of secularization. People still remember the Methodist Church that it was until it was bought by the local Syrian Muslim community to make it a place of Islamic worship, the Didsbury Mosque. One can still see the typical architecture of a church, from the bell tower to the windows. But inside, instead of an altar, Abedi would be headed to the mihrab, the niche in the mosque that indicates the direction of Mecca. The pulpit is still there, but it is no longer used by a Christian pastor. It is used by the imam for the Khutba, the Islamic prayer.
A few days after the Manchester attack, Islamists again struck Christians; this time, pilgrims in Egypt. That attack took place after Pope Francis's trip to Egypt, where he offered the local suffering Christians only a vague condemnation of "every form of hatred in the name of religion". The head of the Catholic Church evidently did not have the courage to address the question of Islamic fundamentalism, as had his predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI, at Regensburg.
"Religions do not cause violence and terrorism", assured the new head of Italian bishops, Cardinal Gualtiero Bassetti, after the massacre in Manchester, adding: "Muslims, Jews and Christians believe in a single creator". Unfortunately, the terrorists murdered the Christians in Minya because they believe Allah is superior to the Judeo-Christian religion, and gives them the right to take the lives of "disbelievers".
About terrorism and Islamist violence, Christian leaders offer only words of relativism and moral equivalence. Is it possible that after two big massacres of Christians, Catholic leaders have not a single word of courage and honor, but only the same offer of the other cheek?
These Islamic fighters, such as those who hit Manchester and Minya, are not "radicalized"; they follow an Islamic religious dictate according to a literal reading of the Koran. They attack Europeans because they believe that Islam is superior and stronger than Europe. They feel that Allah and history are on their side. They want to see the flag of Islam flying across Western capitals.
The jihadists might think they can do to Europe what they did to Christians in Niniveh, Iraq. The only way we can win is by defeating them; no compromise is possible. But Europe speaks of "inclusion" and "integration", never of victory.
While Muslims pray in Europe's former Christian sites, Christians in the Middle East are murdered for refusing to renounce Christianity and convert to Islam. Father Antonio Gabriel, of the San Mina parish of the Coptic church in Rome, in the course of an interview with Tg2000, revealed the dynamics of the new Islamist aggression against the Egyptian Coptic community. The terrorists, before killing the passengers of two buses traveling to the San Samuele monastery, "asked them to give up Christ and become Muslims". But, at the demand for apostasy, the Christian Copts responded negatively. The rejection of conversion to Islam triggered the fury of terrorists, who "put the gun on the head and neck" of pilgrims "to kill them directly".
The same strong-arming took place in Iraq. When ISIS militants gave four Iraqi children the choice of converting to Islam or death by beheading, the children chose to follow Jesus and were murdered.
But these amazing stories never reach the European mainstream newspapers and televisions, as if the information might disturb our self-righteous certainties.
It is impossible for any observer to deny that Christianity is descending into a terminal crisis in Europe. Catholic leaders in the Netherlands estimate that two-thirds of their 1,600 churches will be out of use in a decade, and that 700 Dutch Protestant churches will be closed within four years. The Church of England closes around 20 churches a year. The Catholic Church in Germany has closed about 515 churches over the last ten years. You find the same scenario everywhere in Europe.
"I have often heard from Muslims that their goal is to conquer Europe with two weapons: their faith and their birthrate," said the Maronite patriarch of Antioch, Cardinal Bechara Boutros Rai. "So when they come to Europe and see the empty churches, and find the unbelief of Europeans, they immediately think that they will fill that void".
Make no mistake; these Islamists are very clear in their goal: eradicating Christians not only from Mosul, as they did in 2014, but also uprooting Christians from Manchester, where churches are already converted to Islam. The pumped-up forces who drove Christians out of their ancestral lands rightly thought: Why not continue in the West the work begun so well in the East?
Here’s a handy graphic for people who don’t have time or patience for tables and datasets, even though they ‘effing love science’. Does anything jump out at you?
Let’s see…
Europe appears to have broken out with a bad case of measles, except for one area. Poland.
Is anything in Poland happening differently than the rest of Europe?
There’s THIS story about Poland telling Brussels to pound sand.
or THIS headline…
Do you think it’s ‘scientific’ to dismiss the fact that the biggest empty space on the map — where no terrorists blew themselves up — ‘just happens’ to be a country that is NOT throwing out the welcome mat to the ‘refugees’?
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