The Basra marathon, sponsored by the provincial governor and several corporate donors, is scheduled to take place on Friday.

The organizers say the aim is to "shine a spotlight on the city and its tourism".

However, "following the instructions of interim governor, Mohamed Taher al-Tamimi, participation in the Basra marathon will be open to men only," the organisers announced on social media on Wednesday.

In Iraq, where men and patriarchal structures continue to dominate, a lot of voices are calling for the race to be cancelled.

Read More

Never before has a Pope been in the land of Abraham.

Providence willed that this should happen now, as a sign of hope, after years of war and terrorism, and during a severe pandemic.

After this Visit, my soul is filled with gratitude—gratitude to God and to all those who made it possible: to the President of the Republic and the Government of Iraq; to the country's Patriarchs and Bishops, together to all the ministers and members of the faithful of the respective Churches; to the religious Authorities, beginning with the Grand Ayatollah Al-Sistani, with whom I had an unforgettable meeting in his residence in Najaf.

I strongly felt a penitential sense regarding this pilgrimage: I could not draw near to that tortured people, to that martyr-Church, without taking upon myself, in the name of the Catholic Church, the cross they have been carrying for years; a huge cross, like the one placed at the entrance of Qaraqosh.

I felt it particularly seeing the wounds still open from the destruction, and even more so when meeting and hearing the testimony of those who survived the violence, persecution, exile…

And at the same time, I saw around me the joy of welcoming Christ's messenger; I saw the hope of being open to a horizon of peace and fraternity, summed up in Jesus's words that were the motto of the Visit: "You are all brothers" (Mt23:8).

I found this hope in the discourse of the President of the Republic.

I discovered it again in the many greetings and testimonies, in the hymns and gestures of the people.

I read it on the luminous faces of the young people and in the vivacious eyes of the elderly.

People stood waiting for the Pope for 5 hours, even women with children in their arms.

They waited and there was hope in their eyes.

The Iraqi people have the right to live in peace; they have the right to rediscover the dignity that belongs to them.

Their religious and cultural roots go back thousands of years: Mesopotamia is the cradle of civilization.

Historically, Baghdad is a city of primary importance.

For centuries, it housed the richest library in the world. And what destroyed it?

War.

War is always that monster that transforms itself with the change of epochs and continues to devour humanity.

But the response to war is not another war; the response to weapons is not other weapons.

And I asked myself: who was selling the weapons to the terrorists? Who sells weapons today to the terrorists—which are causing massacres in other areas, let's think of Africa, for example? It is a question that I would like someone to answer.

The response is not war, but the response is fraternity.

This is the challenge not only for Iraq.

It is the challenge for many regions in conflict and, ultimately, the challenge for the entire world is fraternity.

Will we be capable of creating fraternity among us?

Of building a culture of brothers and sisters?

Or will we continue the logic Cain began: war.

Brothers and sisters. Fraternity.

For this reason, we met and we prayed with Christians and Muslims, with representatives of other religions, in Ur, where Abraham received God's call about four thousand years ago.

Abraham is our father in the faith because he listened to God's voice that promised him a descendant.

He left everything and departed.

God is faithful to His promises and guides our steps toward peace still today.

He guides the steps of those who journey on Earth with their gaze turned toward Heaven.

And in Ur—standing together under those luminous heavens, the same heavens that our father Abraham saw, we, his descendants—the phrase you are all brothers and sisters seemed to resound once again.

A message of fraternity came from the ecclesial encounter in the Syriac-Catholic Cathedral of Baghdad, where 48 people, among them two priests, were killed during Mass in 2010.

The Church in Iraq is a martyr-Church.

And in that church that bears an inscription in stone the memory of those martyrs, joy resounded in that encounter.

My amazement at being in their midst mingled with their joy at having the Pope among them.

We launched a message of fraternity from Mosul and from Qaraqosh, along the Tigris River, near the ruins of ancient Nineveh.

The ISIS occupation caused thousands and thousands of inhabitants to flee, among them many Christians of a variety of confessions and other persecuted minorities, especially the Yazidi.

The ancient identity of these cities has been ruined. Now they are trying hard to rebuild.

The Muslims are inviting the Christians to return and together they are restoring churches and mosques.

Fraternity is there.

And, please, let us continue to pray for them, our sorely tried brothers and sisters, so they might have the strength to start over.

And thinking of the many Iraqis who have emigrated, I want to say to them: you have left everything, like Abraham; like him, keep the faith and hope.

Be weavers of friendship and of fraternity wherever you are.

And if you can, return.

A message of fraternity came from the two Eucharistic Celebrations: the one in Baghdad, in the Chaldean Rite, and the one in Erbil, the city in which I was received by the President of the region and its Prime Minister, the Authorities—whom I thank a lot for having come to welcome me—and I was also welcomed by the people.

Abraham's hope, and that of his descendants, is fulfilled in the mystery we celebrated, in Jesus, the Son that God the Father did not spare, but gave for everyone's salvation: through His death and resurrection, He opened the way to the promised land, to that new life where tears are dried, wounds are healed, brothers and sisters are reconciled.

Dear brothers and sisters, let us praise God for this historic Visit and let us continue to pray for that land and for the Middle East.

In Iraq, despite the roar of destruction and weapons, the palm, a symbol of the country and of its hope, has continued to grow and bear fruit.

So it is for fraternity: like the fruit of the palm, it does not make noise, but the palm is fruitful and grows.

May God, who is peace, grant a future of fraternity to Iraq, the Middle East and the entire world!

• Pope Francis delivered this message the Wednesday, 10 March. (Thursday NZ time)

I suppose the church really committed to dialogue and positive engagement at the Second Vatican Council, with the famous declaration on the relationship of the church to non-Christian religions, "Nostra Aetate."

There's a paragraph in there dedicated to Islam and opening up possibilities for good, positive relationships.

Of course, that was prefigured by some important historical figures in the church, who found positive ways to engage with Islam. St. Francis of Assisi is one of the key figures here.

While churches and mosques have been built for centuries in close proximity to each other, the relationship between those who worship God inside these sacred houses of prayer has not always been as close.

Pope Francis taking the name of Francis of Assisi when he became pope was in many ways a statement of intent with regard to openness to the Muslim world.

I think that's now being seen very clearly. But you could point to several other people in the Catholic tradition who have been very open to the Muslim world; who have overcome some of the prejudices of their age and who reached out.

If you were to do a kind of whistle-stop tour between Pope Paul VI and Pope Francis, how would you characterize the popes' interactions with Muslims?

Pope St. John Paul II was a towering figure in Christian-Muslim relations.

He is known in the Muslim world as somebody who was unprecedented in his outreach to the Muslim world.

He visited many Muslim countries; said very positive things about the Muslim tradition; famously kissed the Quran.

It was an important moment, and he attracted a huge amount of criticism from the Catholic world for having done this. But he was a real pioneer of interreligious relations and especially in the worlds of Islam and Judaism. So his efforts represent a high point.

The papacy of Benedict XVI is a time of more strained relationships with the Muslim world, of course.

Coinciding with 9/11 geopolitically, it included the Regensburg lecture, which was perceived at the time as something of an attack on Islam.

It was actually much more an attack on Western secularism. But people interpreted it in an opportunistic way.

It led to a certain amount of damage.

I think there were hurt feelings in the Muslim world, Muslims wanting to understand why the pope was joining in the sort of Islamophobia so apparent in much of the Western world at that time.

That was something of a low point.

But then, of course, Pope Benedict visited the Blue Mosque in Turkey and had that extraordinary moment when he stood in a moment of prayer there.

That was thought to have saved the situation, something of a diplomatic triumph.

Francis has right from the beginning struck a very different tone.

The agenda before Pope Francis was above all focused on religious freedom; what the Vatican calls reciprocity. In other words, "We Christians allow you Muslims to come to our countries and worship freely. Why don't you do the same for us?"

Pope Francis is convinced that suasion and warmth and encounter and mutual understanding can in the long term actually change relationships.

With Francis, there is a desire to understand religious extremism in all its forms, so you get this acknowledgement, right from the beginning of his pontificate, in "Evangelii Gaudium," where he refers not just to religious fundamentalism as a phenomenon you find in other religions but also in Christianity.

And I think that's been quite a helpful thing to have pointed out because it means that the enemy if you like, is not Islam.

It's a certain kind of extreme Islam, but you don't find that Christianity is free of extremism either.

Certainly, I think the last few years— if you have been watching what's going on in the United States—would bear that out.

You see an extraordinary politicization of Christianity in the name of a certain political agenda, which is not exactly the same but it is reminiscent of the way that Islam was hijacked by radical Islamism.

And while Pope Benedict was keen to detect that as evidence of a fundamental problem in Islam, I think Francis would be saying, "Well, actually, this is a weakness present in all religions, including our own, and this is something we have to combat together." Continue reading

"Pope Francis's visit was a historic and welcome first for the country," Biden said.

"It sent an important message, as Pope Francis said himself, that 'fraternity is more durable than fratricide, that hope is more powerful than death, that peace more powerful than war.'

"To see Pope Francis visit ancient religious sites, including the biblical birthplace of Abraham, spend time with Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani in Najaf, and offer prayers in Mosul — a city that only a few years ago endured the depravity and intolerance of a group like ISIS — is a symbol of hope for the entire world."

Security was tight during the pope's March 5-8 trip. It had to cater for major security concerns inside Iraq, as well as the additional security needed during ongoing global pandemic: in Iraq, COVID-19 cases were on the rise.

Biden also spoke of Iraq's rich religious heritage, noting it is "steeped in religious and ethnic diversity."

"It's also home to one of the oldest and most diverse Christian communities in the world."

"I congratulate the Government and people of Iraq for the care and planning that went into organizing this monumental visit, and continue to admire Pope Francis for his commitment to promoting religious tolerance, the common bonds of our humanity, and interfaith understanding."

As a long-serving senator and former vice-president, Biden once estimated that he had visited the country a least 24 times.

His views on Iraq have changed over time.

In 2002, he voted to approve the U.S. war in Iraq, a decision he later said was a mistake. His son served in Iraq from 2008 to 2009 as a member of the Delaware Army National Guard.

In 2017, the U.S. State Department declared a genoicide by the so-called Islamic State against the country's Yazidis and other minority groups.

United States' top diplomat, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, was also full of praise for Francis.

He took to social media, saying:

"We believe his visit will inspire hope and help promote religious harmony and understanding among members of the different religions in Iraq and around the world."

Source

• NCR Online
• Image: Wall Street Journal
  

The first Catholic pope to visit Iraq, Francis's history-making four-day trip began in Baghdad last Friday.

His key message stressed peace in Iraq where wars, terrorism and sectarian conflicts have plagued it over several decades.

"May there be an end to acts of violence and extremism, factions and intolerance!" Francis said in his first official speech.

Addressing Iraqi President Barham Salih, government leaders and diplomats at the Presidential Palace, he called for room to be made for all citizens wanting to help build up Iraq.

This could happen "through dialogue and through frank, sincere and constructive discussion," he said.

"I come as a penitent, asking forgiveness of heaven and my brothers and sisters for so much destruction and cruelty.

"I come as a pilgrim of peace in the name of Christ, the Prince of Peace. How much we have prayed in these years for peace in Iraq."

Francis also visited one of Shia Islam's most respected religious figures.

Receiving the pope at his home in the holy city of Najaf, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani (pictured) said Christians should be able to live in peace and security like all other Iraqis.

The meeting was seen as a highly symbolic moment in the Pope's visit, which is his first international trip since the start of the coronavirus pandemic more than a year ago.

During another scheduled visit - this time speaking at an inter-faith prayer service, Francis told those present: Hostility, extremism and violence are "betrayals of religion."

Religion "must be at the service of peace and fraternity," he said on another occasion.

"Religion, by its very nature, must be at the service of peace and fraternity."

Hence, the name of God cannot be used "to justify acts of murder, exile, terrorism and oppression," he explained.

Society needs to be based on fraternal union, solidarity and concrete acts of care and service to the vulnerable and those most in need.

"Fraternal coexistence calls for patient and honest dialogue, protected by justice and by respect for law," he said.

"Only if we learn to look beyond our differences and see each other as members of the same human family will we be able to begin an effective process of rebuilding and leave to future generations a better, more just and more humane world," he said.

Francis had a special message about Iraq's large youth population during his "pilgrimage of peace".

They are an "inestimable treasure for the future.

"Young people are your treasure," he told Christian spiritual leaders.

"They need you to care for them, to nurture their dreams, to accompany their growth and to foster their hope." Noting that their patience has already been sorely tried by the conflicts of recent years.

"It is up to us to cultivate their growth in goodness and to nurture them with hope."

Source

• Catholic Herald
• La Croix
• BBC
• Image: CNN

Iraq's Chaldean Catholic Church is one of the largest in Iraq and the diaspora.

Cardinal Patriarch Louis Raphael Sako, head of the church, said the decision was made "out of respect" for victims; those killed and wounded in recent anti-government protests and in solidarity with the pain of their families.

"There will be no decorated Christmas trees in the churches or streets, no celebrations and no reception at the patriarchate," the Patriarch said in a statement on Tuesday.

"We will take refuge in prayer for the victims," said Sako.

His announcement coincided with a gathering in Baghdad of Iraqi politicians threatened by the revolt and their Shia regional allies whose involvement in Iraq's affairs is strongly rejected by the protesters.

Since early October authorities have failed to suppress mass demonstrations against corruption, a lack of services and jobs.

Around 430 people have died and 20,000 wounded in the mass rallies reports the Irish Times.

While the protests are in the main taking place in Shia Muslim-majority areas, the Church had taken part as an act of solidarity.

Iraq, a major global oil exporter has 20 per cent of the population living in poverty.

A young populaion, youth make up 60 per cent of Iraq's 40 million people and they see no future for themselves as long as the current regime remains in power.

Twenty-five per cent of youth are unemployed.

Sources

• Irish Times

The legislation aims particularly to help groups targeted for genocide by Islamic State militants.

It enables financial and technical assistance for the humanitarian, stabilisation and recovery needs of former and current religious minority residents of Iraq and Syria.

In addition, the act enables the US State Department - in collaboration with other federal agencies and other entities, including faith-based groups - to conduct criminal investigations.

It also enables them to apprehend individuals identified as alleged IS members and to identify warning signs of genocide and threats of persecution.

"In recent years, IS has committed horrifying atrocities against religious and ethnic minorities in Syria and Iraq, including Christians, Yazidis, Shia and other groups," Trump says.

Trump says the legislation directs US assistance to persecuted communities.

In addition, it will enable government agencies to help groups that are investigating and prosecuting what he calls Islamic State's "despicable acts."

Officials of the Knights of Columbus took part in a signing ceremony at the White House.

"The legislation signed today again reminds us of America's earlier efforts to aid victims of genocide - Christian communities targeted by Ottomans a century ago and Jewish survivors of Shoah," Supreme Knight Carl Anderson says.

With the bill now law, he says "America speaks with bold moral clarity and political unanimity."

The Chairman of the US bishops' Committee on International Justice and Peace, Archbishop Timothy Broglio says the new law is a "critical" measure and "a signal of hope for the critically vulnerable of this region."

Source

• NZ Herald
• Crux Now
• Image: Crux Now

Making a plea for peace and saying "extremism and division" are not inevitable, Charles said he had been privileged to have met many people "with such inspiring faith and courage" who were battling oppression and persecution, or who have fled to escape it.

Speaking to 1000 people at an ecumenical service at Westminster Abbey on Tuesday "to celebrate the contribution of Christians in the Middle East," Charles recalled his "great joy" of meeting Sister Luma Khudher OP in October.

Saying Khudher and other Iraqi refugees are a testament to the "extraordinary power of faith," Charles explained that in 2014, as extremists advanced on the Christian town of Qaraqosh, Khudher "got behind the wheel of a minibus crammed full of her fellow Christians and drove the long and dangerous road to safety.

"Like the 100,000 other Christians who were forced from the Ninevah Plains by Daesh [Islamic State] that year, they left behind the ruins of their homes and churches, and the shattered remnants of their communities.

"The sister told me, movingly, of her return to Ninevah with her fellow sisters three years later, and of their despair at the utter destruction they found there," he said.

"But like so many others, they put their faith in God, and today the tide has turned - nearly half of those displaced having gone back to rebuild their homes and their communities."

Charles said the return of Christians to Iraq represented "the most wonderful testament to the resilience of humanity, and to the extraordinary power of faith to resist even the most brutal efforts to extinguish it."

He said that in meeting people like Khudher, he was repeatedly "deeply humbled and profoundly moved by the extraordinary grace and capacity for forgiveness that I have seen in those who have suffered so much."

"It is an act of supreme courage, of a refusal to be defined by the sin against you," he said, "of determination that love will triumph over hate."

Christians who face persecution, endure and overcome "are an inspiration to the whole church, and to all people of goodwill."

Source

• CruxNow
• VOA News
• Premier
• Image: Crux Now

About half of them have have left so far, says a report released by Christian advocacy groups Open Doors, Served, and Middle East Concern. Read more

The US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) who carried out the arrests, said in negotiations with the U.S. Iraq had "agreed to accept" the individuals.

ICE said those arrested had criminal convictions, including for murder, rape, assault, burglary, weapons violations and drug trafficking.

The unexpected arrests caused significant distress.

It was "a very strange and painful day for our community in America," said Bishop Francis Y. Kalabat, who is the head of the Chaldean Catholic Eparchy of St. Thomas the Apostle.

"With the many Chaldeans that were awakened by Immigration Customs Enforcement agents and consequently picked up for deportation, there is a lot of confusion and anger," he added.

About 40 people were arrested near or at their homes on Sunday. News reports say they were put on buses and taken to a federal detention center. They will be sent to Iraq.

Kalabat said the Eparchy was working with many agencies to try to stop the arrests and deportation.

They are seeking support from the U.S. State Department, members of Congress, the Iraqi Embassy, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and "any agency that could file an injunction to keep anyone from being deported".

While agreeing that those arrested have criminal records, the bishop said "many who were picked up are not hardened criminals but for the last decades have been great citizens."

"As a community, we're all suffering, seeing the loss of our loved ones," local priest Father Anthony Kathawa said.

Source

• National Catholic Register
• Catholic News Service
• Image: National Catholic Reporter

Martin Baani was 24 when these events unfolded.

Rather than leave Iraq with his family, Baani chose to stay and complete his training in Erbil, the capital of Iraqi Kurdistan.

He was one of seven seminarians ordained last September.

Baani told international charity Aid to the Church in Need (ACN) that he will stay in Iraq because he loves Jesus.

"I am happy to celebrate holy Mass in Iraq, he told .

"Every day I go to the refugee camps to accompany the families," he told ACN.

"We are Christian refugees. ISIS wants to eliminate Christianity from Iraq, but I have decided to stay. I love Jesus, and I don't want our history to disappear."

ACN has planned to reconstruct about 13,000 Christian homes ISIS destroyed.

It says there are over 10,000 Christian internally displaced individuals and families in the greater Erbil region.

While many still hold a hope to return to their homes in Nineveh, they say this is uncertain for most.

They say is because of "the continuing conflict in the region and lack of any stable security plan from the central government in Baghdad or the Kurdistan Regional Government".

Source

• Aid to the Church in Need
• Catholic News Agency
• Catholic Online
• Image: ACI Prensa

Chaldean Catholic Archbishop Bashar Warda of Erbil, Iraq, was due to visit the US at the invitation of New Jersey politician, Chris Smith.

He intended visiting Washington DC and New York.

He was also planning to visit Mgr John Kozar, who is the president of the Catholic Near East Welfare Association.

Kozar said they had planned to discuss the persecution of Iraqi Christians.

He would like to visit Warda instead, but is not certain if he will be eligible to enter Iraq.

"I'm planning a visit to Iraq in March to continue to demonstrate the solidarity we have and to show them we haven't abandoned them and assure them that they are not forgotten.

"But I don't know — will I be permitted to enter that country? As we have stopped the flow from these listed nations, some of them are doing the same in kind."

Source

• Catholic Herald
• Angelus News

The mass was announced with pealing church bells and celebrated in the Church of the Immaculate Conception's bombed-out shell.

The handful of worshipers gathered between the burned walls in front of a damaged altar is a remnant of Qaraqosh's Christians.

Christianity in northern Iraq dates back to the first century AD. Qaraqosh is nearby the ruins of the Biblical cities of Nimrud (then called Calah) and Nineveh.

The Archbishop of Mosul, Butrus Moshe, who said mass on Sunday, commented that the next task is to free the city of everything related to ISIS and its victimising works.

Moshe says he is particularly keen to change the political and sectarian bitterness that keeps individuals and leaders at odds with each other.

Hundreds of thousands of displaced Iraqis are now hopeful they can return home. At the same time, however, they fear what they might find when they get there.

Many homes have been destroyed, defaced or otherwise damaged.

The United Nations says violence is still rampant across the country, with killings worsening in October.

In a monthly report released by the U.N. Assistance Mission for Iraq, it said 1,792 people were killed in violence in Iraq in October, up from 1,003 the previous month.

1,120 of the dead were civilians.

Source

• The Christian Post
• FoxNews
• United Nations Iraq
• Image: Christian Today

Like many young boys, he is happy to be interviewed.

This is war-torn Iraq, however, so he tells of the day ISIS came to his village. He starts to recount, horror after horror, what took place. It is hard to accept that one so young has already seen so much evil. Gradually, his retelling of what happened slows and he breaks down.

It is hard to watch as the tears flow down his cheeks. He tries to stem them, brushing them away…but to no avail. His grief is too great. He is now talking to himself as much as to the camera. He talks of when he used to go to school, ride his bicycle and play soccer with his friends—he stops. Again, he looks at the camera, finishing with the words: "Now all that is gone…"

This is just one of the harrowing testimonies in the new documentary Our Last Stand. The award-winning film tells the story of what is left of the ancient Christian communities in Iraq and Syria. ISIS, along with other Islamic extremists, is destroying the lives and the lands of Christians who have for centuries lived in peace with their more numerous Muslim neighbors. In this latest genocide, no one came to the aid of the Christians. They looked to the West, but no avail.

I recently spoke with the filmmakers, Jordan Allott and Helma Adde, after a screening of Our Last Stand.

CWR: What was the genesis of Our Last Stand?

Jordan Allott: For a number of years, I had been traveling in the Middle East doing work (shooting video, writing, taking photos) for an organization called In Defense of Christians. As I was learning more and more about the region, I was constantly thinking how best to present the plight of Christians in places like Iraq and Syria to a Western audience through film. Once I met Helma, who is a schoolteacher from New York (I was on a Fox News program with her father, who is a Syriac Orthodox priest) I knew she could act as a bridge between her family and community in Syria and an American or Western audience. After convincing Helma to travel with me, we set out to plan our journey to Iraq and Syria. Continue reading

Sources

• The Catholic World Report, article and interview by K.V. Turley, a London-based freelance writer and filmmaker with a degree in theology from the Maryvale Institute.
• Image: Breitbart

He was a tyrant, they said, who, after 14 years of marriage, wouldn't let their sister, Rana, 31, have her own mobile phone. He isolated her from friends and family, guarding her jealously.

Although Diyaa and Rana were both from Qaraqosh, the largest Christian city in Iraq, they didn't know each other before their families arranged their marriage. It hadn't gone especially well.

Rana was childless, and according to the brothers, Diyaa was cheap. The house he rented was dilapidated, not fit for their sister to live in.

Qaraqosh is on the Nineveh Plain, a 1,500-square-mile plot of contested land that lies between Iraq's Kurdish north and its Arab south.

Until last summer, this was a flourishing city of 50,000, in Iraq's breadbasket. Wheat fields and chicken and cattle farms surrounded a town filled with coffee shops, bars, barbers, gyms and other trappings of modern life.

Then, last June, ISIS took Mosul, less than 20 miles west. The militants painted a red Arabic ‘‘n,'' for Nasrane, a slur, on Christian homes.

They took over the municipal water supply, which feeds much of the Nineveh Plain.

Many residents who managed to escape fled to Qaraqosh, bringing with them tales of summary executions and mass beheadings.

The people of Qaraqosh feared that ISIS would continue to extend the group's self-styled caliphate, which now stretches from Turkey's border with Syria to south of Fallujah in Iraq, an area roughly the size of Indiana.

In the weeks before advancing on Qaraqosh, ISIS cut the city's water. As the wells dried up, some left and others talked about where they might go.

In July, reports that ISIS was about to take Qaraqosh sent thousands fleeing, but ISIS didn't arrive, and within a couple of days, most people returned. Diyaa refused to leave. He was sure ISIS wouldn't take the town. Continue reading

Sources

• Eliza Griswold is the author of ‘‘The Tenth Parallel: Dispatches From the Fault Line Between Christianity and Islam.'' The article above is from The New York Times.
• Image: Middle East Eye

Unless it comes leaping off the screen at us. Unless it breaks through the headlines for some reason, appears again after its few seconds on Twitter and comes alive outside itself. In us.

I have just had that experience.

Out of nowhere, a story that had become dimmed appeared in front of me: I got a letter from a Yazidi woman.

I had met Ummaya in a women's interfaith peace program in New York City in 2003. The Global Peace Initiative of Women brought Iraqi women to the United States to meet with American women from across the country.

The hope was, of course, that we would make personal connections between us that would advance interfaith understanding and build bridges between two countries locked in a senseless war.

More than that: Women, we thought, might be able to reach across the ethnic boundaries there, too, soften the anger, and forge new bonds in a country seriously divided and dangerously entrenched.

Now, 12 totally silent years later, I was holding a letter to us from one of the women in that first meeting whose face I could barely remember but whose voice came through loud and clear.

It made real that day so many years ago in New York. It read in basic and sometimes inverted English and took careful interpretation. She wrote:

Cases of rape and marry the wrong person ... has been our girl's destiny when Daash [ISIS] has taken them prisoners. Today 300 of them returned after the girls fled from air strikes ... Tragic stories of these women that are suffering psychological and neurological damage. Is it possible to address this situation in America or send medical aid to them? ...

We want your help and we want solidarity on International Women's Day. Continue reading

• Sr Joan Chittister in National Catholic Reporter

Benedictine Sr. Joan Chittister is a frequent NCR contributor.

Italian Archbishop Silvano Tomasi said there is a type of genocide happening to Christians and other minorities in these countries, which must be stopped.

Archbishop Tomasi told Crux's John Allen that any anti-ISIS coalition has to include the Muslim states of the Middle East, and can't simply be a "Western approach".

It will be up to the UN and its member states, especially the Security Council, to determine the exact form of intervention necessary, he added.

"But some responsibility [to act] is clear," he said.

Archbishop Tomasi presented a statement entitled "Supporting the Human Rights of Christians and Other Communities, particularly in the Middle East", co-authored with the Russian Federation and Lebanon, to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva on March 13.

The statement, which had almost 70 nations as signatories, highlighted the perilous situation faced by Christians in the Middle East.

It also recognised abuses suffered by persons from any religious, ethnic and cultural background in the region.

Archbishop Tomasi told Vatican Radio the statement had prompted France to call for a special session of the UN Security Council to deal with the problems of Christians in the Middle East.

This will happen on March 27.

Archbishop Tomasi told Crux that he hopes the statement will galvanise nations around the world to provide humanitarian aid to Christians and other groups suffering at the hands of ISIS.

Beyond that, he said, the crisis requires "more coordinated protection, including the use of force to stop the hands of an aggressor".

"What's needed is a coordinated and well-thought-out coalition to do everything possible to achieve a political settlement without violence," Archbishop Tomasi said.

"But if that's not possible, then the use of force will be necessary."

The archbishop called such international military action to defend beleaguered minorities "a doctrine that's been developed both in the United Nations and in the social teaching of the Catholic Church".

Sources

• Crux
• Vatican Radio
• Image: USA Today

The bishops released a statement on February 24, the same day Prime Minister John Key officially announced the deployment of up to 143 personnel.

The deployment, likely in partnership with Australia, will probably start in May.

The bishops' statement opens by saying New Zealand can no longer "watch from the sidelines as the Islamic State continues to inflict immense suffering and brutality on the people of Iraq".

The bishops go on to cite Pope Francis who said it is "licit to stop an unjust aggressor".

On behalf of the bishops, Cardinal John Dew said: "If by providing training to the Iraqi Army we can assist them to stop the aggressor in their land, then as a matter of promoting the common good we should provide that assistance."

"Substantial humanitarian support should also be part of New Zealand's involvement in Iraq," Cardinal Dew said.

He noted that New Zealand's place on the United Nations' Security Council gives this country a unique place of influence in global affairs.

This could be "used to advocate strongly in the UN forum for further sanctions and other actions which will stop the flow of arms to ISIS, and prevent it making money from Iraqi assets it has captured", Cardinal Dew said.

"We urge Christians to pray unceasingly for the people of the Middle East and we pray for global leaders in their efforts to stop those who inflict this brutality on others," he added.

Two weeks before Mr Key's announcement, Peace Movement Aotearoa released an open letter opposing deployment of New Zealand military personnel in Iraq and Syria.

Among the 30 representatives of peace, justice and faith organisations and academics who signed the letter were Pax Christi's Kevin McBride and Fr Peter Murnane, OP, of Waihopai Ploughshares.

The letter stated that "further involvement of western armed forces in the Middle East, whether in a training or combat capacity, will do nothing but bring more violence, killing and hardship to the peoples there".

"Military trainers will add nothing of value to peace processes in the region."

In a statement to Parliament, Mr Key noted that New Zealand would step up humanitarian and diplomatic efforts.

Sources

• New Zealand Catholic Bishops Conference
• Scoop
• New Zealand Herald
• Image: TVNZ

But here's what's less visible — the online backlash against the Islamic State, also known as ISIS and ISIL, by young Muslims declaring their opposition to rule by Islamic law, or Shariah, and even proudly avowing their atheism.

Nadia Oweidat, a senior fellow at the New America Foundation, who tracks how Arab youths use the Internet, says the phenomenon "is mushrooming — the brutality of the Islamic State is exacerbating the issue and even pushing some young Muslims away from Islam."

On Nov. 24, BBC.com published a piece on what was trending on Twitter.

It began: "A growing social media conversation in Arabic is calling for the implementation of Shariah, or Islamic law, to be abandoned.

"Discussing religious law is a sensitive topic in many Muslim countries.

"But on Twitter, a hashtag which translates as ‘why we reject implementing Shariah' has been used 5,000 times in 24 hours.

"The conversation is mainly taking place in Saudi Arabia and Egypt.

"The debate is about whether religious law is suitable for the needs of Arab countries and modern legal systems. Dr. Alyaa Gad, an Egyptian doctor living in Switzerland, started the hashtag.

" ‘I have nothing against religion,' she tells BBC Trending, but says she is against ‘using it as a political system.' "

The BBC added that "many others joined in the conversation, using the hashtag, listing reasons why Arabs and Muslims should abandon Shariah. ‘Because there's not a single positive example of it bringing justice and equality,' one man tweeted. ... A Saudi woman commented: ‘By adhering to Shariah we are adhering to inhumane laws. Saudi Arabia is saturated with the blood of those executed by Sharia.' " Continue reading

• Thomas L. Friedman in The New York Times

Thomas L. Friedman became the The New York Times' foreign affairs Op-Ed columnist in 1995.

Blair made this observation in November 2002, four months before the invasion of Iraq, when he invited six experts to Downing Street to brief him on the likely consequences of the war.

The experts warned that Iraq was a complicated place, riven by deep communal enmities, which Saddam had dominated for over thirty-five years.

Destroying the regime would leave a vacuum; the country could be shaken by Sunni rebellion and might well descend into civil war.

These dangers left the Prime Minister unmoved.

What mattered was Saddam's moral iniquity.

The divided society over which he ruled was irrelevant. Get rid of the tyrant and his regime, and the forces of good would prevail.

If Saddam was uniquely evil twelve years ago, we have it on the authority of our leaders that ISIS is uniquely evil today.

Until it swept into Iraq a few months ago, the jihadist group was just one of several that had benefited from the campaign being waged by Western governments and their authoritarian allies in the Gulf in support of the Syrian opposition's struggle to overthrow Bashar al-Assad.

Since then ISIS has been denounced continuously and with increasing intensity; but there has been no change in the ruthless ferocity of the group, which has always practised what a radical Islamist theorist writing under the nameAbu Bakr Naji described in an internet handbook in 2006 as "the management of savagery." Continue reading

• John Gray in ABC Religion & Ethics

John Gray is formerly Emeritus Professor of European Thought at the London School of Economics and the author of many books.