Catherine,
Code: Select all
Let me assure you that I was not "mocking" Mohammed or Islam, and certainly not feeling at all [i]amused[/i] about the subject of Islam. I have spent many years studying the history of the Orthodox Christian Byzantine Empire and the Islamic religion which destroyed it. I have also travelled in Turkey and visited the Orthodox holy sites of Constantinople, including the Phanar and Hagia Sophia. The Phanar was firebombed by Moslems the year before I visited Istanbul, and the entrance to the Phanar was guarded by an armed soldier. When I attended the divine liturgy at an Orthodox Church in Galata, Turkey the doors were bolted with chains immediately after the liturgy. So much for Moslem hospitality, eh? Moslems have routinely persecuted and murdered Coptic Christians in Egypt, even in recent years, and under Moslem sharia Christians are second class citizens, unable to hold public office, and required to pay a dhimmy, or religious tax. Under sharia, it is also not a capital crime for a Moslem to kill a Christian, but it is a capital offense for a Moslem to convert to Christianity!
Have you read any of the hagiographical works about the many Orthodox saints and martyrs who were persecuted and killed by the Moslems in the Ottoman Empire-- including the Balkans? For example, there is a book available as a paper back entitled[i] New Martyrs of the Turkish Yoke.[/i] There are also many hagiographical references to Orthodox saints slain by Moslems in the [i]Prologue from Ochrid[/i] compiled by St. Nikolai Velimirovich, of blessed memory. How can an Orthodox Christian not consider Mohammed and the Moslem religion more than an abomination? Look upon the great icons of Christ God and the Theotokos at Hagia Sophia which were covered by the Moslems with plaster for centuries, and tell me that this Moslem religion is not an abomination! If Christ came into the world, suffered, and was crucified for the sake of His Church and our salvation, shall we not consider an abomination that which specifically plastered over icons of Christ, and destroyed the Church? We might just as well say that Bolshevism was a good thing in the sight of God, worthy of respect and admiration!
