Maronite bishop speaks about violence against Christians in Middle East
Maronite Catholic Bishop Gregory J. Mansour speaks with a soft voice and calm demeanor but delivers a powerful message as he talks about violence against Christians in the Middle East.
“I don’t care if it’s politically correct or not, but this is not a Muslim against Christian phenomenon. This is ISIS against everyone else, specifically in Syria and Iraq,” he said, adding, “The American government is not calling it what it is. This is genocide.”
Mansour, 60, spoke last week at the Bishop Connare Center in Greensburg, just days after returning from a visit to Jordan, Lebanon and Egypt. A member of the board of directors for Catholic Relief Services, he makes trips to the Middle East two to three times a year and is both troubled by the violence he sees and encouraged by the people he finds responding to victims with compassion and support.
Mansour is bishop of the Eparchy of St. Maron of Brooklyn, N.Y., which consists of 16 states, including Pennsylvania and the District of Columbia. The Maronite Catholic Church is in full communion with the pope but is headed by Patriarch Bechara Peter Rai in Lebanon, whom Mansour spoke of with admiration during an interview before his lecture, calling Rai “a good bridge between the Catholic community and the Orthodox community in the Middle East.”
Ordained to the priesthood in 1982, Mansour took on his first role as pastor at St. George Maronite Church in Uniontown from 1983 to 1994 with many members of the congregation traveling to Greensburg Tuesday to hear him speak at the invitation of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Greensburg, which includes Fayette County.
The Maronite bishop appeared in Greensburg as part of the diocese’s observance of the Catholic Church’s Jubilee Year of Mercy for a talk about the plight of Christians in the Middle East.
Greensburg Bishop Edward Malesic, who introduced Mansour, said, “It’s a privilege to be able to reflect on and pray for our brothers and sisters in the Holy Land and the Middle East.”
Although he receives many invitations to talk about what he has seen in the Middle East, Mansour told his audience he’s neither an expert or scholar but said, “I’m speaking to you as a Christian.”
The bishop began by talking about the good works being done by Catholic Relief Services workers – both Catholic and Muslim – who are serving thousands of refugees in schools, homes, churches and villages.
“They do a work of mercy,” Mansour said, noting he met one group that must work undercover because of danger.
In his trips to the Middle East, Mansour has witnessed the flood of refugees and heard stories of suffering of both Christians and Muslims at the hands of terrorists.
“I’m really concerned about my brother bishops,” Mansour said in the interview, explaining, “Their people are kidnapped and they have to bargain for their release.”
Not only are people kidnapped but killed. In his lecture, Mansour told stories of people who stood up to terrorists, such as a man who refused to leave a Syrian village where he was caring for mentally and emotionally handicapped adults because there would be no one left to help them. He stayed and was shot twice in the head.
“The good people of Syria and the good people of Iraq are tortured by such human beings who feel justified in what they do,” Mansour said.
He mentioned Malala Yousafzai, a Pakistani girl who was shot in 2012 after standing up to the Taliban to defend the right of girls to attend school. She survived and continued her advocacy, receiving the Nobel Peace Prize in 2014. Mansour noted the work of both Yousafzai and her father, saying there are many Muslims standing up to terrorists.
Mansour remarked, “I am a lover of the Muslim people and can say to them you’re laboring under such evil and I stand with you.”
He called groups such as ISIS, the Taliban and Boko Haram “criminal gangs who hide behind Islam.”
Mansour called for the West to develop a defiance that says “This is wrong and I will help Muslims and Christians alike to stand before this evil.”
In the interview, the bishop said people can help by donating to groups such as Catholic Relief Services and the Knights of Columbus who are working in the Middle East as well as urging Congress and the Obama Administration to call what ISIS is doing genocide.
While a witness to the pain in the Middle East, Mansour has hope for the future.
He concluded his lecture by referring to a time before Christianity was legal, noting, “Back then, we conquered the world with love. I have a feeling — even with ISIS — that Christians with our Muslim brothers and sisters, and with love, can conquer the world again.”