Just outside Westminster Cathedral today

Sunday, September 17, 2006

A very rushed post

I thought I’d refrain from posting anything substantial about this uproar about the Pope’s speech, since I’m sure other bloggers can put things more eloquently than me. ( here and here and here : “If the Pope does not appear on TV and apologise … we will blow up all of Gaza’s Churches” and here: a priest’s calm take on things.).

Unfortunately after Mass today at Westminster Cathedral it was shoved in my face. Holy Mass on a Sunday is the very source and summit of the Catholic week, so my family decided this Sunday to make the trip to Westminster Cathedral together. As we came out about 100 Islamists were chanting slogans such as “Pope Benedict go to Hell” “Pope Benedict you will pay, the Muja Hadeen are coming your way” “Pope Benedict watch your back” and other pretty hateful things. I’ll post more pictures of it when I get more free time. It was a pretty nasty demonstration. From 11 – 3pm they chanted absurd things, literally just outside the Cathedral. And from 11- 3pm (and indeed all day, every day) like every day of the week, faithful Catholics and non-Catholics (mainly tourists) wondered in and out of the magnificent Church, largely ignoring the furore of hatred this crowd of muslims was trying to stir up.

As I say I’ll post more pics when I’ve a bit more spare time.

I had an interesting conversation with a policeman about it, who reckonned that some of them might be prosecuted.

I feel a bit uneasy posting the above, so any supportive comments would be very much appreciated!

Post Scriptum: Away from home… a nun was indeed killed by muslim protesters, aswell as Churches fire bombed and shot at.

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Having recieved over a hundred hits in the last 30 mins I thought I’d stop thinking about putting some more pics of the protest on and actually just do it. I’ll put more comments on tomorrow.

Above:There were about 100 police around and about keeping an eye on things and video recording the protestors. I asked if they’d be prosecuted, and the policeman sounded edgey. He said they’d been warned about their behaviour already but arresting any of them might just fuel them up ever more.They had their eye on this guy (above) though.


I kept trying to take a photo of this little girl (above) – about 7 years old I reckon, but every time I pointed the camera she put the sign she was holding in front of her face. So eventually when she looked away I took the photo. Since her face was covered I didn’t think it was unfair to do so. If her face had not been covered I wouldn’t have taken her pic.
These 2 above are taken from the tower at Westminster Cathedral where I prayed the rosary for them before taking some photos from that height. Unfortunately this tree was in the way of the actual protesters but you can see the women behind covered up preparing banners and food and the likes. You can also see they weren’t getting much attention for all their shouting. Just out of sight are the police vans.

“ISLAM WILL CONQUER ROME”. erm… I think not actually.
All photos are copyright. To use them you must have permission.

Addendum: I’ve had to turn comment moderation on again since some of the comments show as much hatred as these extremists in the pictures. Please do leave your comments – they’re very welcome and there are some very interesting ones I’d invite you to read… but remember…
1) These were 100 Muslims out of the 2 million (ish?) living in Britain. Thus this is hardly representative of all muslims.
2) The Pope’s speech reiterated Christ’s words to love your enemies, and not to commit violence in the name of religion. Further, Christ gives us a difficult commandment (Mt 5:28) that even to think of evil is as bad as committing it. Hateful comments won’t be published.

3) I prayed the rosary for their intentions. The rosary is a very powerful prayer.