[
InterFaith]
By
Caroline Drees
(Reuters) - For centuries, Catholic-Muslim relations were dominated by distrust and resentment born of painful memories of a history of mutual repression.
But Pope John Paul spearheaded a campaign in the past two decades that helped turn conflict into cooperation between the 1.1 billion-strong Catholic Church and the world's 1.2 billion Muslims.
For some, the Pope's efforts helped avert a "clash of civilisations" that many feared would erupt after the September 11, 2001, attacks by Muslim militants on the United States.
His outspoken opposition to the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 was particularly appreciated in the Islamic world.
Now, Muslims will be watching closely to see if the man who succeeds Pope John Paul as the leader of the world's Catholics will continue to strengthen
interfaith dialogue.
"The Pope's successor must continue what this Pope has begun," Mahmoud Hamdi Zakzouk, Egypt's minister of religious endowments, told Reuters. "This would contribute to peace."
Islamic clerics, theologians and many ordinary Muslims say Pope John Paul launched a new era in relations between the Muslim and Christian worlds.
They say his travels to more than 20 Islamic countries, his efforts to promote dialogue, his calls for peace in the Holy Land, and his strong opposition to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq endeared him to many Muslims.
"Hopefully his successors will continue his policy of creating an understanding and furthering cooperation with Muslims," said Zaki Badawi, principal of London's Muslim College, adding his achievements would be hard to match.
French Cardinal Paul Poupard, who heads the Vatican's Council for Culture, said Muslim-Catholic relations would be a major issue for the next pontiff.
"You saw the Pope's position during the war in Iraq. He wanted to avoid at all costs having this be seen as a war of religions, which it wasn't, and he made desperate efforts to do that. This is crucial for the future," he said.
Rapprochement
Improving relations with Muslims did not seem to be a priority of John Paul's at the start of his papacy.
"In the beginning, the Pope was a little bit on the side of the orthodox, the unmoveable positions and dogmas," said Mario Scialoja, head of Italy's Muslim community.
A milestone was passed in 1986 when the Pope invited Muslims and adherents of other faiths to Assisi to pray together for world peace. In May 2001 he became the first pontiff to make an official visit to a mosque.
"It is my ardent hope that Muslim and Christian religious leaders and teachers will present our two great religious communities as communities in respectful dialogue, never more as communities in conflict," the Pope said at the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus.
"For all the times that Muslims and Christians have offended one another, we need to seek forgiveness from the Almighty and to offer each other forgiveness," he said, just a few steps away from the tomb of Saladin, who drove Christian Crusaders out of the East.
Frank van der Velden, a Catholic theologian in Cairo, said the Pope's trips to the Middle East - where the three monotheistic faiths were born and have so often clashed - had been a turning point in relations.
"He opened the doors of the Vatican and went out to the people as a sign of respect. To see an elderly, feeble person (doing this) means a lot in Oriental culture," he said.
After the September 11 attacks by Muslim radicals, when the concept of a "clash of civilisations" gained popularity in the West, the Pope won more respect among Muslims by drawing a clear line between the faith and extremists who abused it.
"The Pope repeatedly expressed respect for Islam... and always made a sharp distinction between Islam as a great religion, culture and civilisation, and terrorist groups that act for political motivations," Scialoja said.
Problems AheadBut some Muslims say the Pope's efforts have only been a drop in the ocean.
The Crusades, the torture and expulsion of Muslims under the Spanish Inquisition as well as religious conflict in the colonial era remain powerful communal memories. Some Muslims view more recent conflicts like the Afghanistan and Iraq wars as a renewed Western crusade against their faith.
Principal Badawi said all priests learned about Judaism because they read the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) but many knew too little about Islam.
Some Catholics, for their part, say the rapprochement has undermined the identity of the Catholic Church and a few of the Pope's gestures - like kissing a Koran - seemed to deny important differences between Islam and Catholicism.
The arrival of millions of Muslim immigrants in Western Europe has also upset some Catholics there, who feel the newcomers are trying to impose their religious customs - such as veiling women or taking time out for five prayers a day - on traditionally Christian cultures.
With traditional practices fading in many countries, some Catholics are embarrassed to see that young Europeans often know about the Muslim fasting month Ramadan but have no idea about the Church's 40-day pre-Easter fast called Lent.
Some Christian communities in Islamic countries say the Vatican's approach has been out of touch with the sometimes difficult realities of living as a minority in Muslim states.
In Saudi Arabia, which enforces strict Islamic law and bans the practise of other religions, Christians must meet in secret and fear prosecution if caught. Many of Egypt's roughly 10 percent Christians say they feel like second-class citizens.
Christians have been the victims of killing sprees by fundamentalist Muslims in Pakistan.
Father Dan Madigan, the head of the institute for religions and culture at Rome's Pontifical Gregorian University and an expert on Islam, dialogue was better than ignoring each other.
"I think it is true that we are not going to have a series of negotiations which bring us to a common faith... but at the same time my experience also shows me strongly that we can actually come to respect one another as believers and move somewhat closer to understanding each other," he said.
