There was more than just the quote...

After finally reading the Holy Father Pope Benedict’s address at the University of Regensburg, where he quoted “the erudite Byzantine emperor Manuel II Paleologus” on Islam and the concept of holy war, I have to say that I am not disgusted with Pope Benedict one bit. In fact, I enjoyed the speech, as it deals with an issue far beyond what the media and the rest of the world has claimed. From what I understand, he was talking about how we have tried to separate faith and rationality, thus limiting ourselves as humans and our capabilities to find truth.

“Not to act in accordance with reason is contrary to God’s nature,” he says in the fourth paragraph of his speech. After all, the beginning of the Gospel of John, in addressing the creation of the world, says:

In the beginning was the Word; the Word was in God’s presence, and the Word was God. He was present to God in the beginning. Through him all things came into being and apart from him nothing came to be.

Hence, rationality has been around since the beginning of time. Who are we to deny its use, much less limit it to only a certain area of acceptability? But it seems that this is exactly what a portion of the Muslim world, along with many others (including some Protestants), has done.

The Arabs used to be so well versed in philosophy and other sciences. If I am not mistaken, they are the ones who originally brought back Aristotle and devised the numbering system we have today. Yet, now they are people “of the ‘Book’”, as the Holy Father referred to them at Regensburg. It seems as if they limit themselves to a book, completely ignoring what sets them apart from the other animals of the world—the rational capacity, the ability to think! And with that, they have found that spreading faith by the sword is ok. In fact, may I be so brave as to say that this sounds a lot like President Bush and many evangelicals, though not all of them.

Simply put, the Holy Father was addressing the dehellenization of Christianity—that is, the removal of rational thought and philosophy (primarily Greek) from matters of theology and faith. With this separation, the two sides become limited and are made taboo in different areas. How, then, can true dialogue between cultures ever take place?