Clerics demand Islamic State slaughter be named genocide

Washington’s Cardinal Donald Wuerl in an interview with the archdiocesan bi-weekly, the Catholic Standard, called for the ongoing atrocities against Christians in Iraq and Syria to be categorised as genocide, thereby requiring the United Nations to come to their defence. “This newly proclaimed Islamic State, seems intent on nothing less than genocide. And yet, where are the voices denouncing this?” he asked. He went on: “Where are the voices of congresses and parliaments around the world? Where are the voices on campuses? Where are the voices of community leaders? Where are the voices of talk show hosts? Where are the voices of the late-night news? Why a hesitancy to call the situation by its proper name – genocide? Why so muted a response?”

Canon Andrew White, the Church of England clergyman known as the “Vicar of Baghdad”, speaking after an address in St Mark’s Church in Dublin this week, also insisted that the targeted slaughter and expulsion of Iraqi and Syrian Christians from their homelands constitutes genocide. He appealed to the Catholic bishops of Ireland and Britain: “Come and talk to me”. He recently visited Iraq secretly and described Baghdad as “relatively all right” but added that “the rest of Iraq is horrendous. Up to two years ago the region of Nineveh [around the Iraqi city of Mosul] was all Christian; now there isn’t one Christian left. They were massacred and their businesses were destroyed.” He appealed to Dublin to include persecuted Christians among the refugees they take in.