First Muslim Professor at the Gregoriana

The German-language service of Radio Vatican reports that the Gregorian University in Rome has appointed its first Muslim professor, the Tunisan Koran scholar Adnanee Mokrani. Interviewed is Fr. Felix Koerner, whose book on Islamic reform  I reviewed last year in Asia Times under the title, “Tin-opener theology from Turkey.” Fr. Koerner explains that professors at the Gregorian are supposed to profess the Catholic faith. Nonetheless, the Gregorian wanted a Muslim to teach at the Gregorian on a permanent basis. “We have done that now through a construction of Church law which we call ‘Professore Aggregato’,” Koerner told the Vatican site.

The interviewer responded, “So it took some legal trickery, eh? Isn’t the fact that a Professor of the Gregorian University should profess the Christian faith?”

“You’re exactly right!,” said Fr. Koerner. “Nonetheless we can say that there’s someone in the Collegium who confesses another faith, but who nonetheless has a long-term contract here, and who has the confidence that he can offer proper instruction, who of course doesn’t sit on the governing bodies that determine the future of the Gregorian, but who nonetheless belongs in his own way.”

I’m translating, of course, but Koerner did use the word trotzdem three times in the same sentence.

What about reciprocity?, the interviewer asked. “Is there actually something comparable in majority-Musim countries at Islamically-oriented institutions of learning or universities? You yourself taught in Ankara...”

Koerner (who played something of a key role in gestating the “Ankara School” of Islamic theology) said, “Hm. I have in fact taught for a semester at a state university, but that was doubly indicative of a problem. The first question is, why not theology? And the answer is actually: as long as I lived in Ankara, I was a bit scary (unheimlich) to the theological faculty, who was happy to talk to me: “The priest through whom one can convert [to Catholicism] might be an interpreter or mediator, but neer a teacher. But now the same priest — myself — is happilky invited to come from Rome as a partner in dialogue at the theology faculty at Ankara. As long as I lived in Ankara, I couldn’t do this.”

The Jesuit Church in Ankara actually employed a guard at the door to make sure that prospective Turkish converts were turned away from Mass.