Pope Francis Offers Litmus Test for Religion that Excludes Radical Islam

In his most biting condemnation yet of the jihadists of the Islamic State, Pope Francis told members of the international diplomatic corps in the Vatican Monday that every true religion promotes peace, and by contrast, religious extremists who kill in God’s name—such as the Islamic Caliphate—are a perversion of real religion.

 

“One may never kill in the name of God,” Francis declared. “Only a distorted ideological form of religion can think that justice is done in the name of the Almighty by deliberately slaughtering defenseless persons, as in the brutal terrorist attacks which occurred in recent months in Africa, Europe and the Middle East.”

 

Referencing the recent celebration of Christmas, the Pope said that the “mystery of the Incarnation shows us the real face of God, for whom power does not mean force or destruction but love, and for whom justice is not vengeance but mercy.”

 

Francis reiterated an expression he used during his recent visit to the Central African Republic, noting that “where God’s name has been misused to perpetrate injustice,” it is essential to proclaim that “those who claim to believe in God must also be men and women of peace.”

 

The Pope’s words stand in stark contrast to news coming out of the Islamic State, such as two recent “religious” rulings, one of which authorized the slaughter of children born with disabilities and the other regulating the correct way to rape female captives. Moreover, last week ended with the news of a young jihadi who killed his mother in cold blood because she opposed his membership in the Islamic State, shooting her in the head before a crowd of hundreds of onlookers.

 

Read More: Pope Francis Offers Litmus Test for Religion that Excludes Radical Islam – Breitbart

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