A Serbian Apology to Muslims

Someone is always apologizing to Islam. More often than not it’s a Christian who does it, and we’ve seen both Catholics and Protestants step up to the podium to take their turns begging forgiveness for their sins against the Ummah.

Now it’s the turn of the Orthodox Church. The Orthodox Patriarch in Serbia said certain things in a newspaper interview that offended Muslims, and as a result has to eat some crow. A lot of it.

According to ANSAmed:

Serbia: Patriarch Apologises to Offended Muslims

BELGRADE, JANUARY 29 — On the day following a tide of protest from Serbia’s Muslim community over some of the statements made about Islam by the new Serb Orthodox Patriarch, Irinej, the Patriarch himself has offered an apology, thus quenching a row which might well have spread to damage relations between representatives of the two religious groups.

“I express my deepest regret for the statements I made and for the consequences they had, and I apologise sincerely to our Muslim fellow citizens and brethren”, Irinej said in a communiqué issued by the Patriarchate. The head of the Serb Orthodox Church stressed in his missive that he fully recognised and respected the identity, standing and integrity of Muslims as individuals and of the Moslem community as a whole.

The Patriarch is engaging in the customary Full Grovel, an act that has become depressingly familiar to those of us who live in the more western regions of Christendom. He’s very, very sorry; he failed to show respect; but he promises to make up for it.

So what was it that Patriarch Irinej did that was so terribly, grievously, wrong?
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The Muslim community had raised a protest at Irinej’s words spoken during an interview on Wednesday given to the Belgrade daily Blic. Replying to a question about Kosovo, (whose population has an Albanian majority of Muslim faith) he noted, among other things, that: “the Serbs (of Kosovo) are a minority in their own land. Apart from which, we know what the philosophy and psychology of Islam is. When they (the Muslims) are a minority they are capable of behaving well. But when they are on equal numerical terms they start to lift their heads, and once they are in the majority they start to turn the screw”. [emphasis added]

If these statements are offensive, then we are all in deep trouble.

Anyone who has studied the history of Islamic infiltration and conquest knows that the Patriarch spoke the simple factual truth: Muslims remain quiescent in any given population until their numbers are sufficient, and then they begin making demands and acting aggressively until they finally assume political power.

These patterns may be easily ascertained by studying the history of Islam. The process is not occluded or mysterious; it is simply the behavior mandated by Islam’s own sacred texts, and has been actualized repeatedly over the centuries in those regions which eventually became part of Dar al-Islam.

However, the world’s 8.89 septillion Muslims immediately became upset, as is their wont:

The Muslim community reacted quickly by calling these words ‘offensive’ and calling for an apology from the Patriarch.

In today’s communiqué of apology, Irinej nonetheless pointed out that the paper had omitted several passages from the interview in which he had pointedly said that “we are all part of God’s creation and so we are called upon to overcome all existing differences through human compassion and to live together in love and mutual respect”.

I have a dream.

In my dream, a Christian leader of great standing, dressed in full regalia — a pope, say, or a patriarch, or a cardinal, or an archbishop — draws his sword from its scabbard and holds it high, proclaiming defiantly:

“The legions of Mohammed are the servants of Satan, and I vow to fight them to my last breath!”

But it’s just a dream. It’s not going to happen, not in my lifetime.


Hat tip: Insubria.