In which he reportedly said,
The corpus of texts and ideas that we have made sacred over the years, to the point that departing from them has become almost impossible, is antagonizing the entire world. You cannot feel it if you remain trapped within this mindset. You must step outside yourselves and reflect on it from a more enlightened perspective
and, according to the article, he “called on the religious establishment to lead the fight for moderation in the Muslim world.”
And, according to my twitter feed, and as reported here, he then made the news again by attending Christmas mass at the Coptic cathedral in Cairo — not to stay for the entire service, but specifically to give a brief speech of support.
What do you make of this? Is this something new? Or just another speech?
UPDATE: just speculating, is al-Sisi regarded as too right-wing, too anti-democratic and anti-human rights for his treatment of the Muslim Brotherhood, and insufficiently Muslim for this to “count”? Does this go against the narrative that there’s nothing wrong with Islam in the first place? Or do mainstream journalists just not pay attention to what goes on in that part of the world unless it fits with their narrative?
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