A priest in Leuven, Belgium, began Mass by reciting an Arabic verse from the Qur’an 26:69-83.
In the prayer, Abraham confronts his people about their idol worship. They ask whether those idols can hear them, benefit them, or harm them. They then reject what they and their ancestors worshipped and declare their allegiance to the Lord of the worlds.
The passage explicitly centers on condemning idolatry and was recited inside a Catholic church filled with sacred images; in Islam, statues and veneration of saints are themselves routinely condemned as idolatrous by Muslim polemicists, which obviously shows that the Muslim reader’s intentions were far from being clear or innocent.
As with the Archbishop of Canterbury and Leeds Canon Mayberry, it’s not clear whether the organizers and prelate knew what the Islamic reader was doing, but there should be far more scrutiny.
As the Islamist recites, there are six statues over his head, which he would consider idols. Some say it’s apostasy.
What is wrong with these people? This is so insulting and degrading, but these prelates are letting the camel into the tent.