ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
Thursday, March 27 2008

Why the Pope has bin Laden running scared
By Colleen Carroll Campbell

The release last week of Osama bin Laden's latest rant — which featured
fulminations over cartoon images of the Prophet Mohammed and charges that Pope
Benedict XVI is leading a "new crusade" against Islam — sparked a fresh round
of head-scratching worldwide.

Even for a cave-dwelling terrorist, the tirade seemed odd. Hadn't Benedict
criticized the very cartoons that bin Laden cited as his grievance du jour?
Hadn't Benedict condemned the violence in Iraq for years and again this month,
during an impassioned Palm Sunday address in which he lamented the death of
kidnapped Iraqi Archbishop Paulos Faraj Rahho?

Sure, Benedict had drawn the ire of Muslims in 2006, when radical Islamist
clerics used an out-of-context quote from his Regensburg lecture on faith and
reason to incite mob violence against Christians. But Benedict apologized
repeatedly for that perceived slight against Islam. And the 80-year-old former
professor — who chose his papal name in honor of the pope who pleaded for peace
during World War I — has spent the past three years doggedly pursuing
interfaith understanding.

So why does Benedict infuriate bin Laden?

A glimpse of an answer came Saturday, during the Easter vigil Mass that
Benedict celebrated in Rome. Among seven converts to the Catholic faith whom he
baptized was a former Muslim named Magdi Allam, an Egyptian-born Italian
journalist known for his outspoken criticism of Islamist extremism.

Allam has been a leading voice of moderate Islam, a staunch supporter of Israel
and a fierce critic of Islamist jihadists who murder in the name of God. Death
threats have forced Allam to travel with armed guards, and he expects that his
Christian conversion will lead to more calls for his head. But Allam says the
risk is worthwhile, and he cites Benedict's message about the compatibility of
faith and reason as an inspiration for his conversion.

Predictably, Benedict's decision to personally and publicly baptize Allam was
blasted by several Muslim leaders. The Vatican newspaper responded by
describing the baptism as Benedict's attempt to affirm "in a gentle and clear
way, religious freedom."

The message was clear, indeed. The baptism signaled Benedict's belief that
religious tolerance must be a two-way street. As he proclaimed in his
Regensburg speech, authentic interfaith dialogue, like authentic religious
conversion, can happen only when violence is rejected as a means of persuasion
and reason is embraced as a means of finding common ground.

Benedict's penchant for promoting peace with strength and telling the truth in
charity has irked some Muslim leaders, but it has allowed him to make
remarkable inroads with others. Earlier this month, some 10,000 Catholics
attended the opening Mass of the first Catholic church ever built in the Sunni
Muslim country of Qatar, where Christians have been forced to worship
underground for decades. A few days later, Vatican officials confirmed that
they are in talks with Saudi Arabia to open a Catholic church in that country,
where Christianity remains officially illegal. And the interfaith dialogue that
Benedict began with a rocky start at Regensburg has blossomed into a
significant initiative that will bring 48 Muslim and Catholic scholars together
at the Vatican this fall to discuss the theme, "Love of God, Love of Neighbor."

Like Pope John Paul II, whose persistent reminders of the link between faith
and freedom emboldened grassroots resistance to communism and enraged communist
leaders, Pope Benedict has infuriated the global bullies of his day. To
Islamist extremists who murder innocents in the name of their irrational and
bloodthirsty god, Benedict's message about the compatibility of faith and
reason undermines their efforts in a way no military campaign or secular leader
could.

No wonder bin Laden is worried.

Colleen Carroll Campbell is an author, television and radio host and St.
Louis-based fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. Her website is
www.colleen-campbell.com.

This column was reprinted in the Tampa Tribune on April 13, 2008.