El Cid, Call Your Office

Spain's bishops are alarmed by ambitious plans to recreate the city of Cordoba - once the heart of the ancient Islamic kingdom of al-Andalus - as a pilgrimage site for Muslims throughout Europe.

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Last month, Spanish Muslims reasserted their right to pray in Cordoba's great mosque. The mosque houses within its arches a cathedral built to consolidate Catholic rule after Muslims were expelled from Spain in 1492. Muslims are forbidden to pray in the building.

Mansur Escudero, president of Spain's Islamic Council, has challenged the current head of Spain's Episcopal Conference, Bishop Ricardo Blazquez of Bilbao, to explain why Muslims could not pray in Cordoba's mosque. Mr Escudero said he had been encouraged by the Pope's act of prayer in Istanbul's Blue Mosque on his recent visit to Turkey. "It showed that mosques are open to Christian worshippers," he said. "Could not Muslims pray in Cordoba's mosque?"

Bishop Blazquez replied that public collective praying was prohibited, but he supposed private or individual prayer was acceptable. Mr Escudero then announced that Muslims would henceforth return to Cordoba's mosque to pray "in a respectful, private and individual capacity". The bishops hit back, insisting that "Muslims cannot in any way pray in Cordoba cathedral".

Spain's Muslims have been long respectful towards civil and ecclesiastical authorities, but as numbers have grown they have turned to more radical leaders.

Along with prohibiting Mohammedan prayer in Catholic cathedrals (copy: H.E. Roger Cardinal Mahony) their excellencies might consider preaching the Catholic faith and restoring the Catholic liturgy that invigorated the reconquista.

The rest of the article can be found here. (And thanks, Eloise, for the reference.)