(LifeSiteNews) — Cardinal Gerhard Müller has said that there was an “infiltration” of Germany by foreigners and warns that Germany could become a Muslim-majority country where Christians are “second-class citizens.”

In a recent interview with Catholic journalist Diane Montagna, the former prefect of the Congregation (now Dicastery) for the Doctrine of the Faith said that leftist politicians and activists “are instrumentalizing Islam to undermine Christian identity and Western tradition and culture.”

“In England, for example, wokeism in its initial phase uses Islamism as a tool to weaken Christian culture and tradition,” the German cardinal said. “Currently, in tragic cases – such as when a girl is violated by several Muslim men – the girl is more likely to go to jail than the perpetrators.”

“I hope that we will see meaningful change in England with the next elections,” he added.

Müller said that Muslims by and large will not accept woke ideology, and that leftist ideologues will “be the next victims of radical Islamists.”

“Islam rejects the dignity of women, and its moral framework has nothing in common with the aims of wokeism, one of which is to homosexualize society and thought,” he stated.

Asked about his native Germany, Müller said that it is “similar” to England.

“On average, there are eighteen knife attacks each day, and two or three girls or young women are victims of gang rape,” he lamented.

“There are also growing challenges in schools, where Muslim children often outnumber Christian children, but few are willing to confront this reality.”

“Even many bishops seem not to fully grasp the seriousness of the situation,” he added.

The German prelate warned that his home country “could become like North Africa”:

Until the seventh century, it was a completely Catholic region, albeit with challenges such as the Donatists. But then Islam arrived, and five hundred years later, the population had become entirely Muslim.

Were this to occur, Christians would become second-class citizens.

Müller used the example of his hometown to show the radical transformation German cities have undergone in the past decades:

My hometown of Mainz, for example, was seventy percent Catholic fifty years ago; today, due to secularization, migration, and other factors, that figure has fallen to twenty-seven percent. Currently, thirty percent of the country’s population are not ethnically German, and they are predominantly young. In twenty to thirty years, Islam could become the dominant religion.

When asked by Montagna if he really believed Germany could become a Muslim nation, Müller replied, “It already is, in many ways. Muslims dominate public life, in part because politicians live in fear of them.”

Reiterating the paradoxical alliance between Islam and the radical left, he said, “The former communist party in eastern Germany is absolutely pro-Islam. Even though their ideology is entirely Marxist and atheistic, they have formed an alliance with Muslims, who profess belief in one God to whom all must submit. It is an absolute contradiction, yet it serves the purpose of de-Christianizing the West.”

“I believe young Germans are no longer able to defend themselves; in effect, they have already lost the battle,” Müller said, lamenting, “In truth, there was no battle – it was an infiltration.”

“One million people arrived from Syria, many without speaking German,” the cardinal continued. “Germany offered them financial support and a developed infrastructure without requiring work. For them, it seems like an earthly paradise – until they exhaust the resources.”

Müller warned that a civil war would become increasingly realistic with a growing foreign population living in Germany.

“Once that occurs, conflict could arise, potentially ending in civil war, but amongst themselves, similar to what we have seen in Syria.”