In a move that should be shocking to precisely no one, the Islamic State has issued a critique of Pope Francis’ recent denial that the violence they perpetrate is justified by the Islamic religion:
In the most recent issue of Dabiq, the propaganda magazine of the Islamic State, ISIS criticizes Pope Francis for his naïveté in clinging to the conviction that Muslims want peace and that acts of Islamic terror are economically motivated.
“This is a divinely-warranted war between the Muslim nation and the nations of disbelief,” the authors state in an article titled “By the Sword.”
The Islamic State directly attacks Francis for claiming that “authentic Islam and the proper reading of the Quran are opposed to every form of violence,” saying that by doing this, “Francis continues to hide behind a deceptive veil of ‘good will,’ covering his actual intentions of pacifying the Muslim nation.”
Pope Francis “has struggled against reality” in his efforts to portray Islam as a religion of peace, the article insists, before going on to urge all Muslims to take up the sword of jihad, the “greatest obligation” of a true Muslim.
Despite the obviously religious nature of their attacks, the article states, “many people in Crusader countries express shock and even disgust that Islamic State leadership ‘uses religion to justify violence.’”
“Indeed, waging jihad – spreading the rule of Allah by the sword – is an obligation found in the Quran, the word of our Lord,” it reads.
“The blood of the disbelievers is obligatory to spill by default. The command is clear. Kill the disbelievers, as Allah said, ‘Then kill the polytheists wherever you find them.’”
The Islamic State also reacted to Pope Francis’s description of recent acts of Islamic terror as “senseless violence,” insisting that there is nothing senseless about it.
“The gist of the matter is that there is indeed a rhyme to our terrorism, warfare, ruthlessness, and brutality,” they declare, adding that their hatred for the Christian West is absolute and implacable.
The fact is, even if you were to stop bombing us, imprisoning us, torturing us, vilifying us, and usurping our lands, we would continue to hate you because our primary reason for hating you will not cease to exist until you embrace Islam. Even if you were to pay jizyah [tax for infidels] and live under the authority of Islam in humiliation, we would continue to hate you.
I tweeted about this last month, when Francis called the beheading of Fr. Hamel “absurd”:
It’s only absurd if it doesn’t make sense. This does. https://t.co/27AvwpOMPnhttps://t.co/UKSmMLg7EK
— Steve Skojec (@SteveSkojec) July 26, 2016
Last year, I wrote about the Islamic State’s ambitions for the Vatican, and how the bureaucrats in Rome had better wake up:
In what is an ongoing frustration for many Catholics, the Vatican continues to insist on friendly relations with Islam. It started with Nostra Aetate #3 and Lumen Gentium #16, neither of which are particularly compatible with what the saints previously said about Islam. Since the Second Vatican Council, this innovative understanding of a religion Catholic thinkers like Belloc have characterized as a “great heresy” continues to spiral. In Evangelii Gaudium #253, Pope Francis asserts that “authentic Islam and the proper reading of the Koran are opposed to every form of violence.” More recently, there has been common prayer in the Vatican gardens (where the imam went off-script and used subversive, anti-Trinitarian language in Arabic).
Meanwhile various Islamic groups have been talking about conquering Rome.
[…]
It’s time for Catholics — and especially our leaders in Rome — to wake up. These militants intended to target Pope Benedict in 2010; some believe that Pope Francis may be an even bigger target today.
We are called to love our enemies. This is why the message in the video we posted earlier this week is so powerful. But we must also be honest enough to call our enemies enemies.
Catholics have sought the conversion of Muslims for fourteen centuries. But they have also fought them with arms. The reason Europe is not under Sharia law (yet) today is because of the valiant armies that marched under the banner of the Cross, who won critical battles against Islamic armies at Lepanto, at Malta, at Zenta, at Vienna, and more. The Spanish fought Islamic invasion in their own country for eight hundred years. Islam is a religion that spreads, assimilates, and consumes. If it is not resisted, it conquers. The very word “Islam” itself means “submission.”
When your house is broken into in the middle of the night by a man who has been publicly proclaiming that he’s going to come in and kill you and your family, it might not be in your best interest to attempt “dialogue” with him once he’s already inside. Still, if you feel that it’s important to talk him out of doing something stupid, your side of the conversation is going to be a lot more persuasive if you’re pointing a loaded gun.
I don’t know if Francis is aware, but there’s no charism of the papal office that makes a pope infallible when it comes to his interpretation of another religion. When it comes to a toss-up between listening to the people who are actual, Koran-carrying Muslims from the Middle East vs. a Modernist Jesuit in Rome who doesn’t even understand his own religious teachings, I’m going to go with those closer to the source.
Islam is supremacist ideology writ large: they will convert you, conquer (and subjugate) you, or kill you. Whatever it takes. But they will never tolerate you being anything other than a Muslim. We need to get that through our heads. They’re telling us out loud, in public. We just have to listen.
