Turkish Film about Fall of Constantinople Incites Hatred of Christians

The Eponymous Flower:

The Turkish film, Faith 1453 tells of the dramatic, and for Christians traumatic, sack of Constantinople by the Mohammedan Ottomans in 1453.  Constantinople which was the Capital of the Roman Empire for more than 1,100 years was with Rome the most important city of Christendom.  The    $17 million-dollar-film which drew enthusiasm in Turkey, incited hard critics from Christians in the Orient.  The film has numerous historical errors and barbs of hate against Christians.

The film is to be shown in theaters in Beruit.  The Christian community of the Land of the Cedars have thus called for a boycott   They are calling it a “Propaganda film”.  The 160 minute production of the Turkish director Faruk Aksoy begins with a flashback to Mohamed in exile from Medina, promising his  followers “eternal happiness” if they conquered the Byzantine capital.  The Ottoman Sultan took up this prophesy of Mohamed symbolically, according to the film, and began his operations against Constantinople which had defied Islam for 800 years.

Politico-Religious Propaganda Film Far Removed from Historical Reality

The combination of religious prophesy and Ottoman conquest in the film clearly speaks to Turkish national pride, as sold-out theater sales since February show.

One historical appraisal praised the film, say critics, but didn’t stand.  The historical errors represented therein have rewritten the glorification of Islam and the Sultan’s politico-religious leadership.  With that the film is not only a historical, but also more in a poltical dimension. A political dimension which which occurs in the re-islamicization of Turkey and connected with the beginning of the 20th century’s declining Ottoman Empire and Turkey as a great power in the Orient.

Rodrigo Khoury, the founder of the Christian Lebanese party Al-Machreq is among the first to see the film in a preview.  The Lebanese Christians were shocked.  He forwarded an introductory film review with a detailed explanation of historical errors to General Surete, the censor of the Lebanese government.  Khoury addressed himself to numerous journalists, to allow the release of the film in the name of freedom of expression and art.

The Film Shows the Struggle Between Christian and Muslim Culture — Christendom is a Grotesque Caricature

“The Film” says Khoury, “doesn’t tell the struggle between two kingdoms, as the subtitle maintains, rather it’s the struggle between two cultures, the Christian and the Muslim.  The Christian culture is distorted as a grotesque culture and the origin of all evil, while the Muslim culture on the other hand as perfect, faultless and portrayed therefore as the superior culture.”  The young Christians of Lebanon are rejecting this film, because it “clearly calls for open hatred against Christians”, says Khoury.

Father Abdo Abou Kassem is of the same opinion as the press agent for the Catholic Church in Lebanon.  “The Christian religion will be disparaged through numerous and substantial historical errors, and unjustly portrayed.”  One scene shows, says the Catholic priest, how Sultan Mehmed (Mohammed) II entered the Basilica of Hagia Sofia and pushed among thousands of faithful, who had fled there in terror.  The Sultan hugged and silenced then a child and explained that the conqueror will also be a protector.  “As we know from the chronicles and the history, this is absolute fabrication.  As the Sultan entered the largest church in the city, he gave the order to slaughter all of the Christians there, more than 3,000, and let his soldiers rape Christian women there as a sign of the occupation.  The Basilica was then turned into a mosque,” says Father Abdo.

“Fetih 1453″ was released some weeks after protests against a short private film against Mohamed in Arabic lands. Because of a “blasphemous” disparagement of Mohammed and of Islam hundreds of thousands of Muslims in many states went to the streets.  The protests which were at times violent, costed more than 50 human lives, among them the American ambassador in Libya and hundreds of wounded.

 

Will Russia Ban YouTube?

The Huffington Post reports:

Moscow (Reuters) – Access to YouTube across Russia could be blocked under a new law that takes effect on November 1 if the portal does not remove a video mocking the Prophet Mohammad, the country’s communications minister said on Tuesday.

The video, which sparked violent protests in many Muslim countries, has been deemed extremist by Russian prosecutors who have now asked the court to ban it.

Under new legislation, Internet sites carrying content banned in Russia would be included on a special register, after which Internet providers would have one day to block access.

“Because of this video, YouTube could be blocked throughout the territory of Russia,” Communications Minister Nikolai Nikiforov, one of the opponents of the new law, wrote in his Twitter microblog. “If a law is passed it should be enforced.”

Google Inc, the owner of YouTube, rejected a request by the White House to remove the video but decided to block it in a number of Muslim countries including Egypt and Libya where U.S. embassies have been stormed by protesters. Russia is home to 20 million Muslims.

The court now has five days to make a ruling on whether the film is extremist but legal practice shows that on such matters Russian courts usually side with the prosecutors.

“If they abide by the court decision (and remove the video) no one will (need to) close them (YouTube) down,” said parliament member Ruslan Gattarov from pro-Kremlin United Russia who first raised the issue with the prosecutors. “Do we have to wait until violence comes here?”

Google’s Moscow office confirmed they received the prosecutors’ warning but said that such matters are handled at the company’s headquarters. Previously Russia has never blocked access to Google services.

Some influential Russian politicians, including former Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin, blamed social networks and popular Internet services for helping to stir dissent in developing countries including Russia.

Last year Russia’s domestic security service called for access to encrypted communication providers such as Gmail, Hotmail and Skype, saying the uncontrolled use of such services could threaten national security.

Anti-Kremlin opposition groups, which staged the biggest protests during President Vladimir Putin’s 12-year rule over the past several months, has extensively used Internet services to organize mass rallies and spread their message.

The Kremlin responded by rushing through parliament a string of restrictive laws which opposition described as a crackdown on dissent.

 

Forgiving Monsters

George Conger:

One of the most notorious criminal cases in modern European history has returned to the public eye, dominating the front pages and leaders of Belgium’s newspapers. A judge has agreed to release Michelle Martin from prison on the condition she enter the Convent of the Les Soeurs Clarisses de Malonne (Poor Clares) and remain under police supervision.

The news of the parole has prompted an appeal by state prosecutors, public protests, outrage in the press — and the mayor of Namur has ordered police to guard the convent. Why such a fuss? The opening paragraphs of a solid AP story tells us why.

BRUSSELS — The ex-wife of a notorious pedophile who aided her husband’s horrific abuse and murder of young girls – and who let two children starve to death while her husband was in jail – was approved Tuesday for early release from prison, infuriating the victims’ parents and reopening a dark chapter in Belgian history.

Michelle Martin, who is now 52, received a 30-year prison term in 2004 for not freeing girls her then-husband Marc Dutroux held captive behind a secret door in their decrepit, dirty basement in Marcinelle, 40 miles south of Brussels.

Dutroux, 55, is serving a life term for kidnapping, torturing and abusing six girls in 1995 and 1996, and murdering four of them.

During those years, Dutroux also spent four months in jail for theft, leaving it to his wife to feed Julie Lejeune and Melissa Russo, a pair of friends imprisoned in the basement. Martin let the girls starve to death. They were 8 years old.

Bumbling police work and claims by Dutroux that he was part of a wider pedophile network that included politicians, judges and police officials prompted public protests in Belgium and nearly led to the fall of the government. King Albert intervened and ordered a reorganization of the criminal justice system. The Dutroux affair had a profound effect on Belgium’s national psyche, some have argued, damaging public trust in the country’s civil institutions. Sixteen years into her 30 year sentence, Michelle Martin may be leaving prison to enter a convent.

While this has been a gruesome true crime, political intrigue and corruption story, it has now become a religious liberty story with faith taking center stage in this drama. The AP article closes with these paragraphs:

Under the terms of her release, Martin will have to remain at the convent and be assigned a task daily. Moreau, Martin’s lawyer, said it took some time for the convent to agree to have her live there. But in the end they realized that no one else would take her in, he said.

“They accepted because their vocation is to welcome people nobody wants,” he said.

The convent’s decision to give refuge to Michelle Martin has not been warmly received by the Belgian press…

Objections to her release were founded upon a belief that Michelle Martin was the incarnation of absolute evil — “l’incarnation du mal absolu” — the conservative national daily La Libre Belgiquereported. But no person was beyond redemption, the newspaper argued, saying the law must not “deprive anyone, not even the most heinous criminal, of any hope of getting out of jail…

De Standaard printed a letter from the Abbess of Malonne, where the sisters explained their decision to give Michelle Martin a home. They stated they had agreed to take her in as she has no family and no half-way house or other institution would have her due to the notoriety of her crimes. They stated that while she would be residing at the convent under the supervision of the judicial authorities, she would not be a entering the order but would be the guest of the Poor Clares. And, they felt it was their Christian duty to act as they did.

Nous avons la profonde conviction qu’enfermer définitivement le déviant dans son passé délictueux et l’acculer à la désespérance ne serait utile à personne et serait au contraire une marche en arrière pour notre société. Michèle Martin est un être humain capable, comme nous tous, du pire comme du meilleur.

Ideology plays its part in the coverage of this story. Self-identified Catholic newspapers have stressed the theme of penitence and redemption. Some secular newspapers have objected to the intrusion of Catholic sensibilities into the parole of a “monster”, but others have advanced ethical theories of crime and punishment. No one newspaper encompasses all of these views, but collectively the debate over the parole of Michelle Martin is an example of the best of the European press.

Can Michelle Martin be forgiven? Is parole a form of forgiveness? Should the church be accorded a custodial role in a secular state? All great questions. What say you?

 

Devilish ‘Energy Drink’ Blasphemes the Mass

In Poland, where things seem to have gotten way bad.

Edit: We got this from an organizer at Polish Facebook group Satanizm nie przejdzie – bojkot produktów Agros Nova, to ban satanic advertisement of an energy drink and its insult to the Mass in Poland of all places. It just goes to show you that things are getting bad all over.

Catholics, Christians, all believers in God! Poland is under an assault of corporate-sponsored satanism in the form of the “Demon Energy Drink” advertisement campaign. Our young are being corrupted with praises of demonic values and occult symbolism. We have to put an end to it! Our page promotes a boycott of all the grocery products of Agros-Nova, a company that makes “Demon Energy Drink” in Poland. The more likes we have, the bigger chance we have to be successful. I urge you to add your “like” to this page [called "Satanism shall not pass - boycott of Agros Nova products"], even if you are not from Poland. This is very important! Satan is attacking the last major Catholic country in Europe. We need to stand up and defend it!

Contact information, here.

We live in dark and evil days…

 

Vatican Gets Fox Media Adviser

The Huffington Post is reporting that the Vatican has brought in a Fox News correspondent to help improve its communications strategy.

Red Bull Jesus Advert

Blasphemous, and rightly to be protested:

Johannesburg – The Red Bull energy drink’s “Jesus walks on water” campaign should be cancelled, the SA Catholic Bishops’ Conference (SACBC) said on Tuesday.

“We question the timing of the release of the advert – which seems to be part of an international campaign,” spokesperson Cardinal Wilfred Napier said in a statement.

“While the Red Bull adverts are characterised by their cleverness, we believe that Red Bull South Africa have overstepped a mark.”
Napier said the SACBC welcomed the halting of the campaign, but asked Red Bull SA to cancel it completely.

Sensitivity training

“We also suggest that the marketing team and their advertising and public relations companies make a serious effort to attend sensitivity training. People are more than consumers and faith-based symbols are more than marketing opportunities.”

The advert depicts a cartoon “Jesus” in a boat with two disciples. He proclaims he is bored and steps out of the boat and walks on the water.

A disciple asks whether he is able to do so because he has drunk Red Bull, which “gives you wings”, or because it is a miracle.
“It’s no miracle, you just have to know where the stepping stones are,” Jesus replies.

He nearly slips and says, “Jesus!”

Napier said the SACBC was grateful that many South Africans, from different faiths and religions, had registered their displeasure with the campaign at Red Bull SA, and with the Advertising Standards Authority of SA.

Dangerous territory

“In a multi-faith country like South Africa, where over 70% of people profess to be people of faith, the use of faith-based symbols in a satirical, if tongue-in-check manner, is guaranteed to cause a reaction.”

Napier said Catholics should “fast” from displaying and consuming Red Bull until Easter, to send a message to the company.

“In this way, Red Bull SA will understand that the idea that there is ‘no such thing as bad publicity’ is dangerous territory when it comes to mocking religious symbols,” he said.

Napier suggested that people donate the money they would have spent on Red Bull to charities.

Red Bull SA was not immediately available for comment.

The ad is here (I won’t embed it).

See also, Time Live: Viewers clip Red Bull’s wings.

I must say that I’m glad I have never drunk the unhealthy (and expensive) drink… And I certainly won’t stop to buy it now!

 

Encyclopedia Britannica Goes Out of Print

This was inevitable.  You can get the whole thing on a CD or online. And let us not forget about Wikipedia:

Wow.  It really is an end of an era:

After 244 years, the Encyclopaedia Britannica is going out of print.

Those  coolly authoritative, gold-lettered sets of reference books that were  once sold door to door by a fleet of traveling salesmen and displayed as  proud fixtures in American homes will be discontinued, the company is  expected to announce on Wednesday.

In a nod to the realities of  the digital age — and, in particular, the competition from the hugely  popular Wikipedia — Encyclopaedia Britannica will focus primarily on its  online encyclopedias and educational curriculum for schools, company  executives said.

The last edition of the encyclopedia will be the  2010 edition, a 32-volume set that weighs in at 129 pounds and includes  new entries on global warming and the Human Genome Project.

“It’s a  rite of passage in this new era,” Jorge Cauz, the president of  Encyclopaedia Britannica Inc., a Chicago-based company, said in an  interview. “Some people will feel sad about it and nostalgic about it.  But we have a better tool now. The Web site is continuously updated,  it’s much more expansive and it has multimedia.”

In  the 1950s and 1960s, a set of encyclopedias on the bookshelf was akin  to a station wagon in the garage or a black-and-white Zenith in the den,  an object coveted not only for its usefulness but as a goalpost for an  aspirational middle class. The books were often a financial stretch,  with many families paying for their encyclopedias in monthly  installments.

Wanna buy a set?  The cost: $1,395.

Read more.

 

NY Times Ad Accused of ‘Hate Speech’ Against Catholics

A secularist group’s New York Times ad that urges Catholics to leave the Church over its’ resistance to the contraception mandate is being called “hate speech” by critics.

“Not a single Catholic who reads this ad will be impelled to leave the Church. That is not the issue,” said Catholic League president Bill Donohue. “The issue is the increase in hate speech directed at Catholics.”

The Madison, Wisconsin-based Freedom from Religion Foundation ad “It’s Time to Quit the Catholic Church” ran on March 9 and billed itself as an “open letter to ‘liberal’ and ‘nominal’ Catholics”…

The foundation’s website says it raised $52,000 to place the ad on page 10 of the Times’ front section.

Donohue harshly criticized the newspaper ad, saying it engages in a “palpable” demonization of the Catholic Church and uses the HHS mandate as a “pretext” to attack the Church.

Source (and rest).

 

Vatican Accused of Plagiarism from Wikipedia

The Vatican has been caught plundering Wikipedia for background on 22 new cardinals announced by the Pope.

The Telegraph reports on the ‘cut and paste job’.

The Vatican put out a press release following Benedict XVI’s announcement of the new ‘princes of the Church’, but much of it appeared to have been lifted word for word from Wikipedia.

One giveaway was that Vatican officials did not even bother to amend the online entries, solemnly informing that the new appointees were all Catholics – a somewhat redundant detail given the context.

The hasty cut-and-paste job was spotted by a sharp-eyed blogger, Sandro Magister, a journalist from the news magazine Espresso and an expert on the Vatican.

Typical of the profiles sent to journalists was one about Willem Jacobus Eijk, a Dutch archbishop, who was described in the Vatican briefing notes as “distinguishing himself by having greatly improved the situation of the dioceses of Groningen, which had experienced turbulent times.” The sentence was taken directly from the Wikipedia entry in Italian on the archbishop, as was the observation that he had “a strong leaning towards conservatism, particularly in regards to abortion and homosexuality”.

Father Federico Lombardi, the Vatican spokesman, said his staff had simply been trying to help correspondents when they released details on the cardinals following the Pope’s announcement last Friday.

He said his staff were in a hurry because they had not been told the list of appointees in advance.

Of the 22 new cardinals, 18 are under the age of 80, meaning that they will be eligible to vote for the next Pope, once the 84-year-old Benedict passes away.

Cardinals aged over 80 are not permitted to cast a vote in the conclave.

The new appointees included seven Italians, as well as bishops from Brazil, Hong Kong, the United States and India. They will be formally elected at a ceremony next month.

The lesson: Always properly acknowledge your sources.

 

The Truth About Falsely Accused Priests

The accused are often presumed guilty until proven innocent, while the media distorts the narrative of child abuse in the US.

The Catholic World Report:

Dave Pierre is a journalist who operates TheMediaReport.com, which examines anti-Catholicism and bias in today’s media, and the author of two books,  Double Standard: Abuse Scandals and the Attack on the Catholic Church and Catholic Priests Falsely Accused: The Facts, The Fraud, The Stories. Dave is also a contributing writer to NewsBusters.org, a blog of the Media Research Center covering media bias. In this Catholic World Report interview, he discusses his new book, Catholic Priests Falsely Accused, and offers his thoughts about the media’s coverage of the Catholic Church abuse narrative…

Give it a read here.