VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Francis on Sunday gave the Catholic Church new saints, including hundreds of 15th-century martyrs who were beheaded for refusing to convert to Islam, as he led his first canonization ceremony Sunday in a packed St. Peter´s Square. (note: we now have 830 new saints)

QUESTIONS

How did the new saints qualify for their exalted positions ? 

Did Turks have anything to do with this affair ?

Gedik Ahmed Pasha killed them for resisting and delaying the Ottoman advance wich permitted the ruler of Naples to strenghten his forces.

Correct !

Gedik Ahmet Paşa was out to remind the Pope a promise he had made to Mehmet II, but  never kept.

Mehmet II was poisoned at the early stages of the campaign and and Paşa had to be recalled, operation cancelled.

Those who died in the skirmish were actually paying for Pope´s (Vatican´s) lies. Forced conversion to İslam is not allowed in İslam.

They were not forced to convert, they were probably asked, "do you renounce your catholic faith?" they said non and then their heads were removed... no force there at all just the loss of one head.

Muslims have their matyrs and they do not need to justify them, why do catholics have to justify canonysing their martyrs?

You are right, stumpy. The Pope does not need Muslims´ permission for that.

Catholic saints and Muslim martyrs are not the same thing. In the Islamic faith there can be no intercessor between Allah and his servant. If someone dies as a martyr it is a personal victory for him but it does not mean you can address your prayers to him. Many Sunni Muslims do not want to pray in a mosque where graves of righteous people are placed in order to avoid the mistake of raising a human being onto a level where he does not belong to.

The Islamic teachings of martyrdom are sweet and touching. Martyrs´ souls fly in Paradise free like birds and go to any place they wish. When martyrs are asked about the harsnesses they went through in this world they say: "We never experienced anything difficult." And when the Creator says they can wish for anything they want they first hesitate because they are so content. In the end they express their only wish: "Let us go back to the Earth and die for your sake once more."

It is the wish of every believer to die as a martyr. It does not only mean dying on battle field: a woman dying while giving birth, someone dying in a fire or getting drowned, people dying of certain diseases are also martyrs. The marks of their suffering are not washed from their corpses before they are buried.

You have too many saints. You declare everyone fought against Muslims and died saints. There is no end to it.

The only reason there are so many saints is to provide us with more names to use to swear, after a while useing the same saints names becomes redundant.

Mother Theresa was canonised and is now a Saint and she did not fight the Muslims

It was not the Pope Francis who said that the reason they were being canonised was because they oposed the Muslims, this was said by a "stupid" reporter who wanted to cause exactly what is happening, an uproar.

Those people took a stand against an invading force, I don´t care what they were, they could have been Martians for all I care.  So Ottoman forces were at war against the forces of Naples and thus there were casualties.

Now lets turn it around, if it were Ottomans who had been beheaded for upholding their faith and not converting to catholisism how would it have been remebered??

All religions are guilty of atrouceties in the name of their religion. 

So if we want to canonise a few martyrs it´s our perogative... I figure after being staked, burned, drawn and quartered, fed to the lions or what other stupid unimaginable torture because we upheld our religion, we can have as many saints as we want.

Why is it ok for a muslim to be proud and uphold their religion but it is not ok for christians?

Copy & paste is OK.....saves time !

There must be a difference between a saint and a martyr. As far as I know a saint performs some kind of a miracle like stigmata. If you think it is a miracle standing against Ottomans, then I have no objection

Catholic Pope sold the Orthodox Christians of Byzantium to the mercy Ottoman Turks.

He did not move a finger to save the Orthodox population; in fact he provided technical assistance to Ottomans in construction of Rumelihisar - to bar free passage through the Bosphorus - and a devout Catholic Mr. Urban was assigned to produce the largest cannons of its time, for use by Mehmed II armies.

Mehmed II did eventually conquer Istanbul (he had to, to be able to set up the Empire he dreamed), but did not massacre the ortjhodox population of the city as the Pope expected. Mehmet spared the city and its population, because he now considered himself to be not only the Ottoman Sultan, but also the rightful owner of East Roman Empire throne.

Pope was disappointed. Despite previous promises that Mehmet II would be recognized, by Vatican as the East Roman Emperor, the Pope forgot his promises.

Ottoman Armies were ordered to teach the Pope a lesson. Unaware Italians, now made saints, faced Ottomans to protect their Pope and lost their lives.

Mehmet was poisoned in his own palace by unknown (!) advesaries.  Military operation into Italy was cancelled.

Vatican is now paying a historical debt !

Why is it that we people like the role of a victim so much?

in the 15th century, what we called the Papacy today was a Monarchy back then.  The Vatican was run by the Pope aka "king" he was married and had children.  It was only later on that Popes were sworn to celebacy and that the popes were ellected because prior to that the papalesea was inherited.

Thus, the "vatican" was invlved in wars just like any other rulling country i.e.: spain, France, England and yes Ottoan empire.

We are looking at this event through our modern eyes and do not really understand what happened back then,  They say, hindsight is 20/20.

Now this event occured only 27 years after the fall of Constantinople, this was still very fresh in the minds of everyone, I presume since I was not there.

Another thing, all martyres are saints but not all saints are martyres.

Joanne of Arc, martyre and saint

St. Francis Xavier, marture and saint

St,Theresa of Avila, not a martyre but is a saint

Mother Theresa, not a martyre but a saint

Now people are going to say pope Francis is canonysing all those martyres to stir up contraversy, wrong, he only finished what Pope Benedict started before he decided to give up the holysea, Benedic could not finish what he was appointed to do, because when a bishop is elected pope he dies on the holysea.

Now those martyres were canonysed because of their devout faith, it is a stupid journalist, who thought it would be funny to throw in the Islamic twist to the story.

What about the martyres that were canonysed and there executor were the roman rulers, who by the way were pageans?  Did we insult the pageans?

Let the Christians have their saints but take it with a grain of salt because there will always be people who will want to turn everything into a stupid religious conflict.

Stumpy,

This is an inexcusable delay on Pope´s part.

Many a poor Christian must have spent all that time in hell, just because their holy father took his time to finish the necessary paperwork.

Neglience by Popes is so great that I doubt if any Pope between the time those Christians were slain, to the day of cannonization can ever see the haven, even if the resulting sin was equally divided between all of them.

PS: Gedik Ahmet Paşe should take his rightful place in "Guinness Book of Records". Anyone else you know caused the death of over 800 official Saints ?

Welcome to Religions Conflict

Even within a single religon there is conflict about what parts or characteristic of their god(s) or prophets/angels/saints etc. one should believe in.

Believe if you want to believe but don´t waste time fighting about who is better or what another religion decides to do. Dont let religon make you a fence sitter. If you believe in a god it is your choice if you believe in a religon embrace it by yourself, you don´t need to throw sticks at others who think you are wrong or different.

IMO a total waste of time

Nero would hold the title a around 100 000

oh abd FYI we don´t go to hell right away, we have purgatory, it´s like the waiting room

I like your sense of humor stumpy....rather weird, like mine !

Quote: AlphaF

I like your sense of humor stumpy....rather weird, like mine !

P.S. I even scare myself sometimes

I don´t think discussing religion is stupid.

I think everything is stupid. Oh my God I am in depression again.

Here is your medicine...   http://www.blackdoginstitute.org.au/docs/CBT_JillianBall.pdf

Read it.....you will either heal yourself or fly totally off your rocker..... 

Good luck !

Thank you alpha. You are so thoughtful

Quote: gokuyum

Thank you alpha. You are so thoughtful

I think you should strap yourself good in your rocker gok, I don´t know why but I have this mental picture of alpha behind the rocker ready to shake it like crazy