LONDON (CNS/Zenit): A Chaldean Catholic leader said Christianity may begin to disappear from Iraq if the country’s new constitution is based on Shariah, or Islamic law.
“If there is nothing that assures Christians of their rights, they will leave for other countries,” said Archbishop Louis Sako of Kirkuk, Iraq.
“We are asking people to stay in this country, but the problem is that we cannot give them a vision for the future. No one knows what the future will hold,” he told international charity Aid to the Church in Need on August 23.
The role of Islam in the constitution is one of several areas of disagreement that prevented the constitution from being ratified on August 15.
Pope Benedict XVI received Iraq’s Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari in an audience on August 25 and requested that the constitution respect religious freedom.
Iraqi Christian leaders are united in their opposition to the adoption of Shariah because they fear it will mean that Christians may become second class citizens.
More than 90 per cent of the Iraqi population is Muslim. Catholics form 1 per cent of the 25.3 million population, most of them belonging to the Chaldean or Assyrian rites.
