Hanan Tork, a popular actress in the Middle East of Egyptian origins, who recently took to the hijab and retired from acting, has returned to the silver screen—to much criticism and threats from the same Muslims who formerly praised her for donning the veil. According to Al Sawt, the actress is under “vicious attack” for accepting to play the role of Mother Teresa, the Catholic nun who, for 45 years, dedicated her life to the poor, sick, orphaned, and dying.

The problem, however, is that Mother Teresa was a Christian; and playing her role required the Muslim actress to wear the crucifix around her neck and read some Biblical verses, thereby incensing Islamists, to the point that they proclaimed her an apostate infidel, through takfir—just as they did with many other artists, most recently, Adel Emam.

Earlier Tork had said that she does not “consider playing such a role as risky, due to the fact that she will be playing the role of a woman who is very religious and lives her life based on religious principals and ethics.” She is now discovering that such “ecumenism” is primarily a Western construct, and that, for many in the Islamic world, a Muslim merely acting the life of a Christian, wearing the cross or quoting the Bible, is a great crime—regardless of the saintly life led by the Christian. (Copyright © 2012 FrontPageMagazine.com 05/11/12)