On the first Sunday of Advent of all days, the beginning of the period of preparation for Christmas, one of the two central Christian festivals, the readers of the newspaper WELT AM SONNTAG (WAMS) are confronted with an “Advent riddle” with the question: “How often does a Muslim have to pray every day?”
Would it not have been appropriate in an “Advent riddle” to answer, for example, the question: “What do Christians actually understand by the Latin term ‘Advent’?” – or to draw attention to Christian customs and traditions during Advent and explain them if necessary?
In any case, when announcing an “Advent puzzle”, a subject with a Christian background is the order of the day. Anything else is a journalistic hoax. The accusation is that the editor of German weekly WAMS is using its apparent “Advent puzzle” to occupy the Christian-themed Advent season for Islamic instruction.
And if it has to be: Aren’t there enough innocuous, “neutral” times throughout the year for Muslim guesswork, including times that at least make a corresponding journalistic reference to Islam appear comprehensible?
With twelve individual questions on various areas of the topic of Islam, WAMS readers are to be put on the Islamic course in this current “Advent puzzle”. Those who answer correctly will first be rewarded with the self-generated solution word “wish list”.
They are also offered the prospect of four handsome prizes: An Advent puzzle with an Islamic theme worth a total of 40,000 euros. I am happy not to take part. Perhaps I should also give up my decades-long subscription to the newspaper.
The editorial team should be questioned critically: would you consider it sensible to publish a “Ramadan puzzle” before Ramadan next year, which is decidedly about Christian topics? In all probability: No!
You would probably be indignant at the editorial meeting: Impossible! You can’t talk about Ramadan and then bring up the Christian faith. The accusation levelled at WAMS would be fully justified: Missing the point.
What kind of protests would that trigger among Muslims, even among Islamophile non-Muslims? Christians, on the other hand, can obviously be expected to do the same in the WAMS editorial office!
By the way: On Easter 2022, the central festival of Christians, there was a report in WamS about Muhammad and Islam. This questionable “theological” mixture in favour of Islam, in which the Christian celebration culture is exploited for Muslim “enlightenment”, obviously seems to be a deliberate editorial method. Or is this merely a case of journalistic insensitivity?
A suggestion to compensate: The editorial team at WELT AM SONNTAG could continue to publish an entire puzzle page in each issue in the coming year 2024 in the appealing style of this “Advent puzzle”. However, with twelve critical questions each time, in which the wealth of problems caused worldwide by the Islamic religion are addressed with almost daily consequences.
These questions should have a theological, historical, cultural, ethical, legal and social context, questions that are of concern to many “adventurous people” who are worried about future developments in our country and in Europe.
The questions for this weekly puzzle page would certainly not run out this year due to their complexity. At times of year that are particularly characterised by Christianity, Islamic riddles should definitely be avoided, which would mean that the Islamic riddle would be omitted in some Saturday editions.
The editorial team would certainly not have to announce a lucrative prize for the puzzle participants either. The WamS project “Critical Islam puzzle every week” would probably be a media product with a unique selling point, certainly also informative, stimulating discussion, exciting and attractive – and thus also effective advertising at the same time.
https://christlichesforum.info/befremdliches-adventsraetsel-auf-muslimisch/