Newsgroup: it.politica.internazionale
Titolo: Fondamentalisti cristiani in Iraq

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2003/12/27/wirq27.xml
Bible Belt missionaries set out on a 'war for souls' in Iraq
(Filed: 27/12/2003)
US Christian evangelists want to "save Muslim souls" in Iraq, writes David
Rennie in Cleveland
American Christian missionaries have declared a "war for souls" in Iraq,
telling supporters that the formal end of the US-led occupation next June
will close an historic "window of opportunity".
Organising in secrecy, and emphasising their humanitarian aid work,
Christian groups are pouring into the country, which is 97 per cent Muslim,
bearing Arabic Bibles, videos and religious tracts designed to "save"
Muslims from their "false" religion.
Mission from god: Jon Hanna and Jackie Cone after they visited Iraq
The International Mission Board, the missionary arm of the Southern
Baptists, is one of those leading the charge.
John Brady, the IMB's head for the Middle East and North Africa, this month
appealed to the 16 million members of his church, the largest Protestant
denomination in America.
"Southern Baptists have prayed for years that Iraq would somehow be opened
to the gospel," his appeal began. That "open door" for Christians may soon
close.
"Southern Baptists must understand that there is a war for souls under way
in Iraq," his bulletin added, listing Islamic leaders and "pseudo-Christian"
groups also flooding Iraq as his chief rivals.
The missionaries are mainly evangelicals who reject talk of Muslims and
Christians worshipping the same God.
Jerry Vines, former head of the Southern Baptist Convention, has described
the Prophet Mohammed as a "demon-obsessed paedophile". Franklin Graham, son
of Billy Graham and the head of Samaritan's Purse, a big donor to Iraq, has
described Islam as a "very evil and wicked religion".
The missionaries pose a dilemma for President George W Bush. He has reached
out to Muslims since September 11, shrugging off criticism from evangelicals
to describe Islam as "peaceful". But Christian conservatives are also a key
Bush constituency: Franklin Graham delivered the invocation prayer at his
presidential inauguration.
The US Agency for International Development has said that the government
cannot rein in private charities. "Imagine what the US Congress would say to
us," said a spokesman in April.
Jon Hanna, an evangelical from Ohio who has recently returned from Iraq,
applied for a new passport to travel there, describing himself as a
humanitarian worker. "I was worried the US authorities might try to stop us,
might be worried we were going to start a riot with our Bibles."
In Baghdad last month Mr Hanna met two other American missionary teams. One,
from Indiana, had shipped in 1.3 million Christian tracts. "A US passport is
all you need to get in, until the new Iraqi government takes over. What we
thought was a two-year window, originally, has narrowed down to a six month
window," said Mr Hanna, an evangelical minister and editor of Connection
Magazine, a Christian newspaper in Ohio.
He describes Islam as "false". He cited St John's Gospel, saying: "Who is
the liar? It is the man who denies that Jesus is the Christ. Such a man is
the antichrist."
Mr Hanna concluded: "The Muslim religion is an antichrist religion." Later
Mr Hanna asked to retract that choice of words. "Without the reader hearing
my voice and looking into my eyes as I made that statement, it would be easy
for certain readers to feel personally attacked and be offended," Mr Hanna
wrote by email. "That would be unfruitful."
He rejected the suggestion that aid work was a "cover" for missionary work,
preferring to call it a "conduit for sharing the gospel of Jesus. Christians
are commanded to minister to the hungry, but also to the hunger of the
spirit. It can't be separated," he said.
In public, the largest groups put the emphasis on their delivery of food
parcels and their medical work. However, their internal fund-raising
materials emphasise mission work. One IMB bulletin reported aid workers
handing out copies of the New Testament and praying with Muslim recipients.
Another bulletin said Iraqis understood "who was bringing the food . . . it
was the Christians from America."
Southern Baptists from North Carolina visited Iraq in October to help hand
out 45,000 boxes of donated food. One of the team, Jim Walker, told IMB's
Urgent News bulletin that he met village children "starved of attention and
I could tell some of them have not eaten well. But their biggest need is to
know the love of Christ."
Mr Hanna said he encountered friendly curiosity, with noisy crowds gathering
to take his group's tracts. "Maybe 10 per cent were hostile." He was one of
21 on his mission including Jackie Cone, 72, a Pentecostalist grandmother
from Ohio who said God had told her to join a second mission planned for
next year. "I sensed Him telling me to come back in January," she said.
Mrs Cone is confident she made converts in Baghdad. In her hotel she met a
Muslim woman on crutches with a leg operation due that day. Mrs Cone knelt
on the lobby floor and prayed that surgery would not be required.
"I saw her that evening and she said God had healed her, and she hadn't
needed the surgery. She didn't say Allah, she pointed to Heaven and gave God
the glory," she said.
Mrs Cone led the Kurdish woman and her brother in prayer, asking Jesus into
their hearts. "I'd given them a Bible and a Jesus video in Arabic. I think
they think of themselves as Christians now," she said. "They have the Bible
and I hope they will grow in grace."
Muslims are hard converts, American missionaries admit. The large
organisations have experts trained in refuting Muslim teachings that Jesus
is just another prophet.
Before going to Iraq, Mr Hanna studied Christian training manuals and
attended a seminar for missionaries to the Arab world.
Mr Hanna concedes his new Iraqi friends were possibly drawn by the novelty
of meeting Americans. "But you don't discount that, you use it as an
opportunity to tell them about Jesus. Last time we only took 8,000 Arabic
Bibles to Iraq. In future missions the goal is one million."


Spero che prendano esempio dai Maori di Aotearoa; la prima persona messa nel
pentolone fu un frate , l'ultimo che nella loro lotta hanno scannato fu un
prete.
Giano
--
Le nostre vite cominciano a finire il giorno in cui iniziamo a tacere sulle
cose che contano
Martin Luther King Jr.