Pope Benedict baptises Muslim convert in historic ceremony

Pope Benedict baptises Magdi Allam, Muslim-born journalist

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Sunday, 23, Mar 2008 08:15

Pope Benedict has baptised Magdi Allam, a Muslim-born journalist who has converted to Catholicism during an historic Easter mass.

Mr Allam, one of Italiy's most prominent commentators on Muslim and Arab affairs, received death threats from Islamic extremists after criticising Palestinian suicide bombers.

And in an Easter vigil at St Peter's basilica, Mr Allam, the 55-year-old deputy director of the Corriere della Serra newspaper, was baptised by the German-born pontiff.

A statement released by the Vatican less than an hour before the start of the Saturday ceremony confirmed Mr Allam's conversion, adding: "For the Catholic Church, each person who asks to receive baptism after a deep personal search, a fully free choice and adequate preparation, has a right to receive it."

After baptising Mr Allam - who was born in Egypt - Pope Benedict said a homily reflecting on the meaning of the procedure.

"We no longer stand alongside or in opposition to one another," he explained. "Thus faith is a force for peace and reconciliation in the world: distances between people are overcome, in the Lord we have become close."

Muslim commentators have said Mr Allam's baptism was his own decision but have criticised the high profile his conversion was given by the Vatican.

In a December interview with the Il Giornale newspaper, Mr Allam said he decided to call a controversial recent book Viva Israele (Long live Israel) after receiving death threats from Hamas.

"Having been condemned to death, I have reflected a long time on the value of life. And I discovered that behind the origin of the ideology of hatred, violence and death is the discrimination against Israel. Everyone has the right to exist except for the Jewish state and its inhabitants," he said.

"Today, Israel is the paradigm of the right to life."