Priest cancels planned reading of Quran during mass

It made headlines and sparked a firestorm of controversy when the news broke last week.  Now, the event has been scrapped:

A plan to allow for the reading of the Quran from the pulpit during a Mass at St. Peter Church in Charlotte June 26 has been canceled, with an interfaith dialogue planned for October instead. St. Peter Parish had agreed to take part in an event called Faith Shared, in which priests, rabbis and Muslim scholars are scheduled to read sacred texts in each other’s houses of worship. The event is a project of two groups, the Interfaith Alliance and Human Rights First.

In announcing the cancellation June 7, Jesuit Father Patrick Earl, pastor of St. Peter, noted that a 2004 Vatican document, “Redemptionis Sacramentum” (“The Sacrament of Redemption”) expressly forbids the reading of texts from other religions during the celebration of Mass. Father Earl was not aware of the Vatican prohibition when he agreed to host the event.

In a May 27 telephone interview, he told Catholic News Service he was prompted to sign on to the Faith Shared initiative after recalling things he had heard during meetings of Mecklenburg Ministries, an interfaith clergy group in the Charlotte area. “I’ve heard from Muslim imams about what they and their congregations have suffered just from the fear, the fear of what they call Islamophobia,” Father Earl said. One recent instance was related to an Islamophobia conference held in Charlotte earlier in May. “Some of the clergy coming here had trouble flying here because of the fear of some of the pilots, and so they were late getting here,” said the priest.