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Mark Shea:
It’s easy as pie to generalize to millions of people the crimes of a few. We Catholics have had it done to us. And we can have it done to us again. So we should be bloody cautious about insane schemes to do it to 18 million fellow citizens.
The grotesque excuse “But the the first amendment is dead, and Islam killed it. There is no ‘freedom of speech’ or ‘freedom of religion’ with the threat of Muslim violence hanging over your head” is rubbish. Cancelling the rights of 307 million people because you are, by your own admission,afraid is neither patriotism, nor courage, nor Christian fortitude. It is cowardice. And it is extra-special cowardice when you are ready to cancel your most precious national heritage because you are afraid of a speck.
[From Chart Of The Day via Islamicate]
Note: Even though the population of American Muslims is probably quite high and there are other Islamist terrorist groups, the point of the diagram remains.
Actually, what is the point of the diagram?
Am I supposed to take the comparison of one potential book-burner to thousands of people-burners and bomb throwers as serious and thoughtful analysis? Are we to believe that it is only Al-Qaeda as a subset of Islam that poses a threat to the freedoms of millions of people?
This is sloppy at best.
I am with you Dustin on your commitment to reach Muslims with the Gospel. I am. But I am also increasingly trying to figure out how (for myself, and in the shepherding of our people) to engage the issue of the spread of Islam as a Christian, who is also a citizen, looking out for the good of people and cultures.
Is it not naivete to treat Islam as a religion in the sense that we have considered religions in this country? It does not seem to me, from what I can see of its spread and effects in nations around the world, to be merely a religion. Where it plants, it means to take over the legal system. It means to take over the government. It means to take over the culture. It means to take over the economic system. And none of the ways it does so results in an overall good for the people of those nations.
How is it that we want people (certainly including national leaders) to respond to that reality?
I am not suggesting that the answer is “canceling” anybody’s “rights.” But I am suggesting that these two paragraphs from Mr. Shea are not thoughtful, and get us nowhere in the discussion.
Branding someone a coward because they contemplate such realities is in poor form.
Knowing I have much to learn,
Matthew Molesky
Matthew,
Thanks for your honest reply. The point of the diagram, I believe, is to show that just as it is wrong for people in the Muslim world to take the Qur’an burners as the norm among Americans, it is also wrong for us to take Al-Qaeda as the norm for Muslims. No one should take a small subset of a particular group and then treat the whole group as though they are all within that subset.
Certainly you are right that Islam seeks to control the legal system. There is no separation of mosque and state. Islam is a whole way of life. However, if your argument above is correct, than Judaism would not be a religion either. A religion that has clear laws regarding economics, culture and government is still a religion. It is only natural for Muslims to want Islam to have this control over society since they believe that Islam is the truth and that this truth is the best (and only) way to submit to God. I don’t think we can fault the average Muslim for this. I know that you long to see Christ-centeredness permeate every aspect of our culture and every culture. I am with you in believing that such pervasive Christ-centeredness is good for people and indeed it is better than a pervasive Islam.
I posted the diagram with the hopes of people seeing more clearly that we must be careful before we generalize. I know a lot of Muslims and none of them fits the mold of a terrorist. Yet, so many who do not know any Muslims seem to talk and act as if all Muslims want to destroy us. The same is true of many Muslims who don’t know any Christians. I want to encourage us (Christians and Muslims) to stop with the generalizations and actually get to know one another.
So, I would encourage you to shepherd your people towards love by inviting them to get to know their Muslim neighbors. If we simply speak of Islam in the abstract and determine its goal is to take over America, it is unlikely that your people will be encouraged to go out and actually invite their Muslim neighbor over for dinner. And when they do they may actually find that this neighbor has no plan to work towards the establishment of Sharia law in America. Of course, even if our neighbors do want to establish Sharia law and take over America it doesn’t change the fact that we are to lay down our lives in love for them.
Blessings,
Dustin
Does your website have a contact page? I’m having trouble locating it but, I’d like to send you an e-mail.
I’ve got some creative ideas for your blog you might be interested in hearing. Either way, great blog and I look forward to seeing it grow over time.