A man from Turkey, raised Muslim, calls in to Catholic Answers Live to ask how he can become Catholic and practice the Catholic faith without putting himself in danger. Karlo Broussard and Jimmy Akin explain how he can be a faithful, practicing Catholic in a dangerously anti-Catholic environment.
Transcript:
Host: [Name withheld] in Turkey. In Turkey! How wonderful. Well, let me make sure I’m pushing the right button, are you there with us?
Caller: Yes, I’m here.
Host: And you’re calling from Turkey.
Caller: Yes, I’m calling from Turkey. I want to ask you a question.
Host: Okay, sure, go ahead.
Caller: Yeah. I’m raised as a strict Sunni Muslim, however now I want to become a Catholic, and I want to ask you: are there any Catholic doctrines which are related to the crypto-Christianity? I mean, is it possible for me to practice my faith secretly? For example, I don’t want to share my faith publicly, and attending the mass secretly–by the way, I am living with my family…
Host: And are they practicing the Muslim faith as well?
Caller: Yes.
Host: Your family’s Muslim?
Caller: I’m living with my family, and as it is with the majority of people, five-times Salat is important for Muslims. So even if I pretend Salat, can I pray to the Christ secretly? It’s because they believe in the same God according to the Catechism, right?
Host: I’ll tell you what, I’m gonna just clarify that, make sure Karlo and I both have the same question, that we both heard the same thing and that the listeners are able to hear it, but: he is calling from Turkey, he comes from a Muslim area, his family is Muslim, he is called to the Catholic faith, feels that he’s ready to be a Catholic, but can he practice his faith secretly? And can he also still participate in the five-times- a-day prayer of the of Muslims in order, is that correct, in order to keep the appearance? Is that correct?
Caller: Yes, that’s right.
Karlo: Okay. Yeah, this is a very difficult situation. And I can speak to the idea of practicing your faith secretly, in that sometimes we are physically impeded from entering into the visible boundaries of the Church and becoming a member of the Catholic Church. And that can have a variety of different shapes and forms that can take on different shapes and forms of what the reason might be for an individual not being able to be a member of the Catholic Church.
You know, initially when I think about it, it would seem as if, in your case, this would be one of those cases to where visible membership in the Church just might not be practical, it might not be possible for you to do so in your situation. And so given that case, this is an extraordinary case where visible membership with the Catholic Church is not possible for you, so the only way that you can do so is to practice the faith secretly. Even though you might not be able to get to the sacraments of, say, Baptism and the Mass and Eucharist, you can still unite your heart to the risen Christ spiritually, and praying to him, and asking him to guide and to lead you.
With regard to the latter question of continuing to participate in the Muslim prayers, I’m gonna have to say right now that I would have to think about that one a little bit more. I think that one might be a little bit more nuanced than what I can address here on the air, but I would highly encourage you to continue uniting your heart to our Blessed Lord in the secret way that you’re working on doing. It’s a very, very difficult situation which goes a little bit beyond what I can articulate here.
Host: Could I ask you a quick question: is there any way for you to be baptized? Not to go to Mass, but to be baptized; is that available to you?
Caller: Yes, I can be baptized if I go to the church secretly.
Host: Okay, fair enough. Listen, your question is very very important to us, so we have called the entire staff, and Jimmy Akin is here.
Karlo: Praise God!
Host: Jimmy, you have anything that you can add?
Jimmy: Yeah. First thing is, I just want to praise God for how He’s been working in your heart. It’s really wonderful to hear this, and it’s understandable, given the fact you’re in Turkey, the difficult situation you face, and it’s to your credit that you’re willing to follow God in spite of that difficult circumstance and He’ll certainly reward you for your willingness to follow Him.
In terms of the practical situations, obviously you want to be baptized, and you want to live the Christian life to the extent that you can, and so if you can, for example, go to Mass, that’s a good thing; but you don’t have to in put yourself in danger to go to Mass. Similarly, if you can tell people about your Christian faith, you want to do that; but you don’t have to put yourself in danger to do that. This is something that Christians worked out in the very early centuries, when they were persecuted all over the Roman Empire, was: “We don’t have to go looking for trouble. We can, if the situation forces us to, simply live quiet Christian lives and not announce the fact, although when we can safely announce the fact that we’re Christians, then we want to do that.”
In terms of the ability to say the five daily prayers: it’s true, the Church recognizes that Muslims worship the same God that Christians do; they don’t understand Him completely, but they are directing their prayers to the creator of the universe. And so if you’re praying to the true God, and you happen to be doing it at the same time as other people, that is in principle okay. If there are elements of the prayer that contradict the Christian faith, like saying Muhammad is His prophet, you wouldn’t want to say that part of the prayer; but if you’re just testifying that there’s one God and things like that, that’s perfectly fine, especially in a difficult situation like this. You can authentically express worship, and it can be in in common with other people who are worshiping God truly, even if their understanding of God is incomplete.
This is something that Pope Benedict talked about a few years ago, about how in special circumstances it is possible to have inter-religious prayer to the true God, even if we don’t understand the true God in quite the same way, and that would certainly apply in your case given the special circumstances.
Host: Has this been helpful to you? Do you feel your questions have been addressed?
Caller: Yeah, thank you so much. I’m so happy right now. You are the only person that I can ask these kind of questions around this place.
Karlo: Blessed be God!
Host: You are a gift to us today, really.
Karlo: Amen.
Host: I want to give you another phone number, because if we’re off the air and you ever have a question that you want to ask, we have an apologist line you can dial: it’s (619) 387-7200. Any of the apologists here would be happy to help you, or our chaplain would be happy to help you. (619) 387-7200.
Jimmy: And you’re also welcome to call in any time here on the show.
Host: Sure. We’re gonna keep you in our prayers, will you pray for us as well?
Caller: Yeah.
Host: God bless you, brother. God bless you. I don’t even know what to say to that, Karlo. What a privilege to take a call like that, what an extraordinary privilege.
Karlo: Amen. And that’s just a classic example of what we do here at Catholic Answers. Thank God for Jimmy coming in to help me out, to give a wonderful answer to him there.
Host: You both did, really.
Karlo: Which expresses, you know, the way Jimmy articulated that is something that the Church is commonly teaching: that we want to rejoice in that which is true, and wherever there is truth found, we can rejoice in that, and that’s a source of unity. So wherever that truth is present, we can be united and rejoice in that, and as Jimmy, said we don’t want to deny the truth and participate in things that would deny it, but where there is truth we can rejoice.
And so for our listeners out there, I mean, this is what we’re doing here at Catholic Answers, and in particular Catholic Answers Live. As our caller said: there was no one that he could go to to ask these questions and get an answer, but he was able to call here at Catholic Answers and get an answer that, as you’ve heard, Cy, brought joy to him.
Host: Yeah.
Karlo: So that he can truly live his Christian life in the best way that he can. So if our listeners want more of this, because I’m sure there’s more of him out there, right?
Host: Oh man, we get messages from people in Saudi Arabia listening: “Nobody knows that I listen, but I just want you to know I appreciate what you do,” that kind of thing.
Karlo: And we need listeners out there, listen, we need your donations so that we can keep doing this great work of our Lord. So call (888) 291-8000.