Friday, February 29, 2008

Catholic Archbishop kidnapped in Iraq

Just breaking.

And who said this wasn't a war of religions? I mean really, when was the last time you heard of Catholics kidnapping a Moslem Imam?

Gunmen on Friday kidnapped Chaldean Catholic Archbishop Faraj Rahho in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, a provincial police officer said.

The gunmen also killed three people who were with Rahho at the time of the kidnapping after a Mass at a nearby church, said Iraqi Brigadier Gen. Khalid Abdul Sattar, a spokesman for the Ninevah province police. And here is the rest of it.

Other Religion of Peace sponsored kidnappings against church officials in Iraq:

Last June gunmen murdered Catholic priest Ragheed Aziz Kani and three assistants in Mosul, 240 miles north of Baghdad, after stopping his car near a church in the eastern part of the city.

The assailants dragged out the priest and his assistants and shot them dead in an attack that was condemned by Pope Benedict.

A former Archbishop of Mosul, Basile Georges Casmoussa, was kidnapped at gunpoint in 2005, but was released after one day of captivity and said no ransom was paid.

And those Catholics, aren't they just ALWAYS bombing other churches?

In January, bombs exploded outside two Chaldean churches, an Assyrian church and a monastery in Mosul, wounding four people.

....

Nothing from the Pope yet but I did find this statement from:

Last June, Pope Benedict XVI expressed deep concern about the plight of Christians caught in the deadly sectarian crossfire in Iraq and pressed U.S. President George W. Bush in a meeting to keep their safety in mind.

As opposed to "pressing President George W. Bush' perhaps his eminence or whatever they call him should be speaking to his Moslem buddies about this - their fingerprints are all over it. Islamic scholars to hold talks with Vatican.

Islamic scholars are to meet Vatican officials for the first time since warning the Pope that world survival was at stake if Muslims and Christians could not make peace with each other.

The delegation, comprising four academics and theologians, will arrive in Rome on March 3 to discuss A Common Word Between Us and You, an open letter sent to the Pope last October urging him and other Christian leaders to unite on the shared essentials of the two faiths. It used quotations from the Bible and the Qur'an to illustrate the similarities between the religions, and drew 138 signatures, many from grand muftis each representing tens of millions of Muslims.