" . . . . At the outbreak of the Great War, de Foucauld immediately wished to return home and re-join the army as a military chaplain. The bishop, under whose authority he lived, told him to stay where he was. He obeyed. In any event, France was under attack in North Africa. The Ottoman Empire, fighting alongside Prussia, called for an expulsion of the infidel from the lands of Islam and a full restoration of the Caliphate. Some Saharan tribes responded to this call for jihad. Tamanrasset was far from French military aid, and so, with little by way of hindrance, in the early hours of December 1, 1916, an armed gang of fanatical Senussi set out to deal with the Christian hermit.
There was an eyewitness to what happened next. The dragging of the priest from his refuge, his silence and lack of resistance combined with what appeared to be a profound sense of peace; his being forced to kneel as his captors offered him the chance to renounce his Savior—to confess the Shahada. He declined to …More