The Christian Priest Who Wants to Redeem Lebanon’s Sins

Foreign Policy ^ | 4/19/21 | Amir Hussein-Radjy

[marshmallow]

The country wants an end to sectarian strife. Can the leader of the Maronite church deliver?

In an address from the balcony of his limestone residence in the town of Bkerke, Lebanon, at the end of February, Lebanon’s senior Catholic prelate, Cardinal Bechara al-Rai, made it clear he believes his country is on the brink of collapse—and the key to rescuing it involves disarming Hezbollah. “There does not exist two or several states within one land,” Rai said before a crowd of hundreds of people, who had gathered despite the pandemic. “There does not exist two or more armies within one united state.”

It was the latest of a series of sermons and speeches in recent months that continue to grip the Lebanese media and made the 81-year-old Rai—patriarch of Lebanon’s Maronite church, the Levant’s most influential Christian community—the unlikely head of a new political movement that leans on the support of establishment figures while taking up the language of anti-government protesters. It’s fair to wonder where this balancing act is leading.

Rai’s rhetoric may seem like vague patriotic talk and moral exhortations. He has been careful not to directly criticize Hezbollah or Iran, instead couching his demands within a broader political initiative to “save Lebanon.” But Rai has also portrayed his campaign as a direct challenge to Lebanon’s present sectarian rulers—one grounded in what he sees as his historical mission.

Rai’s call to make Lebanon a constitutionally “neutral” country—akin to the role that Switzerland or Belgium sought during the years of great-power rivalries in Europe—are an unmistakable reference to Hezbollah’s alliance with Iran and Syria’s Bashar al-Assad family. At Rai’s February speech, members of the crowd acknowledged his allusion by chanting, “Out Iran!” Rai concluded with a call to protesters to “not be silent on illegitimate and non-Lebanese weapons,” warning......

[cdcdawg]

“Cardinal Bechara al-Rai, made it clear he believes his country is on the brink of collapse”

It just might be! Again.

[packagingguy]

Thus sayeth also his Islamic president who recently resigned. This is an internal problem for Christians, Shiites and Sunnis to solve. They are smart as anyone else, they have to find answers to their own problems. My experience is the further one travels east in Eurasia the worse becomes corruption.