Jihadism: The fear hovering over Europe!

Monday, January 12, 2015

According to Dr. K. V. Zormpas, General Director of the Orthodox Academy of Crete,

The recent dramatic terrorist attacks in Paris have put in the limelight again serious issues pertaining to the future of local communities, but also of the whole of Europe. Unfortunately, the influence of extreme religious forces from the Middle East and their promotion in Europe are currently not only dangerous, but they also overshadow human dignity, human existence, and, of course, all human rights. Thus, religion turns into a system of extreme totalitarianism, rather than having an attitude of life and reconciliation.

The last meeting of the Council of the Representatives of Religions in France - with the representation of the Orthodox Church by the Metropolitan of France, Emmanuel, in his capacity as President of the Conference of Orthodox Bishops of France - with the French President Francois Hollande, is significant and noteworthy, when the whole of France, shocked and in the middle of national mourning, was trying to come to terms with the unprecedented terrorist attack against the newspaper, ‘Charlie Hebdo’. The Council of the Representatives of Religions in France published an announcement in which it condemned the criminal act and expressed support for all the Churches and religions represented there for reconciliation and the peaceful cohabitation of the residents of France. Similar announcements were made by the various ecclesiastical and religious organizations, including both the Conference of Orthodox Bishops of France, the Conference of Roman Catholic Bishops of France and the Protestant Federation, but also the Council of Muslims of France, the Council of European Churches, and the World Council of Churches.

Religious fanaticism, with intense elements of conservatism, comes as a plague and hovers over European societies. It has spread through all religions, without any discrimination. Extremism threatens the social cohesion of all communities. Its uniqueness is based on the fact that it functions like cancer cells, which destroy the human body from which they originate, distorting thought, the emptiness of its substance, before returning to itself, in a process of destruction and complete eradication of any aspect of human life.

At the same time, these recent dramatic developments in Europe function as a force of disintegration in a society which is not merely in crisis, but in a crisis of values. The desired integration could never be achieved. And not only was Europe unable to integrate foreign civilizations, but also the austerity policy adopted in the last few years has pushed human beings towards the margins even further.

This is no time for controversy or for turning against Muslims, developing anti-Islamic feelings. It is the time for healing the wounds caused to our civilization by barbarism, violence and fear. The actual spiritual needs of every religion must stand against the deadly ideas hidden within fanaticism.

We believe that, in the light of the world terrorism, which is radically developing in all societies, the Islamic religious conscience cannot remain idle and silent. Especially when many Islamists write and declare that their religion shows tolerance towards all other religions and respects differences.

We are, thus, called to delimit the frames between social distortion and ontologically integrated ecclesiastical reality, which is described through what we call ecclesiastical morale, which does not identify with a specific form of moral conduct, but with a specified manner of life, i.e. with an ecclesiastical culture. The world today does not need ethics, but morality! Not programming, but an attitude to life and a change of mentality. Not legislation, but a new civilization, the civilization of life.