Abducted priest tells-all after escaping ISIS with help from a MUSLIM

'The presence of the Blessed Virgin, our Mother, and the prayer of the Rosary were my spiritual weapons.'

Fr. Jacques Mourad is a Syrian monk who was taken hostage by ISIS and was held captive for five months.

LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - Speaking of his experience at the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, he explained how he survived the terrifying ordeal.

His words were shared with Church in Need, which explained Fr. Mourad's ministry in Karyatayn (Al-Qaryatayn).

He began ministering in the region in 2000 and was responsible for the Syriac Catholic parish, which belonged to the Diocese of Homs.

On May 21, 2015, Fr. Mourad and then-postulant Boutros Hanna were abducted by a group of masked and armed men...

They were imprisoned within a vehicle in the desert for four days before being transported to Raqqa, where they were locked in a restroom.

Eight days later, a masked man dressed in black entered the duo's makeshift cell.

"At the sight of him I was terrified and I thought my last hour had come," Fr. Mourad shared. "But instead, to my great surprise, he asked my name and addressed me with the customary [Arab Muslim] greeting: Assalam aleïkum, which means 'Peace be with you.'

"It is an expression reserved for Muslims and forbidden to non-Muslims {because there can be no possible peace with those who oppose them). And above all because Christians are considered by them to be unbelievers and heretics (kouffar)."

The masked man spoke to Fr. Mourad and Hanna for a while, until Fr. Mourad finally asked why they were being held captive.

The man surprised them by responding, "Look on it as a spiritual retreat."

The men were left in the restroom for a total of 84 days. They were interrogated daily about their faith and Fr. Mourad shared: "I lived each day as thought it was my last. But I did not waver. God granted me two things: silence and amiability.

"I was harangued, threatened several times with beheading, and was subjected to a mock execution for refusing to renounce my faith. In those moments, our Lord's words resonated within me: 'My grace is sufficient for you, for my strength is made perfect in weakness...'

"In the midst of this situation I was also happy to be able to concretely live these words of Christ from Saint Matthew's Gospel: 'Love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you and pray for those who ill-treat and persecute you.'"

Just over two months after his abduction, on August 4, 2015, ISIS took control of Karyatayn. The next morning, roughly 250 Christians were taken hostage.

Neither Fr. Mourad nor Hanna knew of this but seven days later, on August. 11, a Saudi sheik went to speak to the men.

"You are Baba Jacques? Come with me! They've been battering our ears talking about you!" he said.

Fr. Mourad recalled driving four hours through the desert before reaching the prison containing the Christians.

"When we arrived in a compound enclosed by a huge iron gate, the Christians of Karyatyn were around me, astonished to see me. It was a moment of unspeakable suffering for me, and for them an extraordinary moment of joy and pain. Of joy because they never expected to see me survive, and of pain because of the conditions in which we had met."

The Christians spent the next 20 days together before they were returned to Karyatayn. They were not allowed to leave the town but were more free than they were in the prison.

"...it was a return to life, but not yet liberty," Fr. Mourad called it, adding, "But already a return to life - what a miracle! I could not help but marvel at it!"

The Christians were allowed to practice their faith provided they not advertise their services.

On September 9, Fr. Mourad went to bury a parishioner who passed from cancer, and he learned the cemetery was destroyed.

The desecrated cemetery near the Mar Elian monastery (St. Julian of Edessa) was a sign. Fr. Mourad explained: "I realized that Mar Elian had sacrificed his monastery and his tomb in order to save us. On the evening of October 9, I sensed that the time had come to leave.

"[T]he next morning, with the help of a young Muslim man, I was able to flee from Karyatayn, despite the dangers it involved. And here again the merciful hand of God and the Virgin Mary protected and accompanied me. Helped by this local Muslim man, I was able to pass through a checkpoint controlled by the jihadists, without them recognizing or seizing me.

"It was on that day, Oct. 10, 2015, on that desert road, that the word 'freedom' really came home to me once more."

Fr. Mourad departed from his personal experience to explain "the thirst for freedom is not mine alone. It is that of all the Syrian people."

He described the countries that opened their borders to refugees but admitted, "Nevertheless, I cannot close my eyes to the contradictions we see in these countries at war. On the way towards freedom we must absolutely ask ourselves this crucial question that Pntius Pilate addressed to Christ: 'What is truth?' Having said that, he went out again to speak to the Jews and declared to them, 'I find no cause for condemnation in him.'"

Fr. Mourad said Pilate was a representation of the Roman Empire and since then, nothing has changed. Many refuse to understand the message of God and is still governed by small groups seeking "only their own self-interest."

"It is time to react against the fears of a third world war. The time has come for a revolution of peace-against violence, against the manufacture of armaments, against governments who constantly find reasons for war throughout the world, but above all in the Middle East.

"As for Europe, it is time that the Muslim community took a clear and unambiguous position in regard to the violence which is growing and being propagated. For them, too, fear is a paralysing factor that is shackling them. Their silence is becoming the sign of a manifest and apparent agreement in the face of the violence that is unfolding.

"Despite everything the humanitarian organizations are doing for the Syrian people, there are still families living in terrible conditions, outside the refugee camps, for lack of space. They are not accepted there. They are homeless, they have nothing.

"God is not only asking us to be sensitive to the material needs of the poor. We are presented with a people who are suffering, a wounded people who are bearing a very, very heavy burden, who cry out with Jesus on the Cross: 'My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?' People who cry out with David in Psalm 51: misericordias domini. This war must stop. We want to return to our ruined homes. We have the right to live, like everyone else in the world. We want to live!"

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