[CAIR: The Council on American Islamic Relations. ELC]

Maybe our peaceful Islamic friends will even threaten my life, who knows? It’s certainly not unusual for devotees of that great Religion of Peace to act that way. Just ask Jonah Goldberg. Anyway, for all you moral equivalists out there, consider this: in order to get a hearing in some allegedly “Christian” forum anywhere in the Western world, white supremacist, anti-semitic creatures like David Duke have to locate websites run by neanderthal “Christian Identity” loonies living in tarpaper shacks in Montana. But to get a hearing in the Islamic world, they just have to submit something to Arab News, a press organ reflective of so much that makes Islam the backward, corrupt, soul-destroying bastion of ignorance, repression, violence and thuggery that it is today.

[The article that had been published in Arab News is no longer available at that website. It is, however, available at David Duke’s website. Here is a bit of it: “So, the unvarnished truth is that we suffered the terror of September 11 because of our support of the criminal policies of Israel. We have let our country be controlled by a foreign lobby that has worked against the best interests of the American people.” ELC]

Does Islam have to be the thin-skinned, imperialist, know-nothing realm of ignorant, brutal wahoobis and enemies of humanity that so many of its representatives want it to be? No. Islam, recall, is not a magisterial faith. Indeed, no faith is except for the Catholic faith. There is no “The” Islamic view. It can develop along other lines if the present lines are abandoned and the good things it emphasizes can be emphasized more. But that’s a big if. Salman Rushdie rightly pointed out after 9/11 that it’s kind of Pres. Bush to say that the problem is not Islam but a few fringe nuts. But he also pointed out that the problem is, in fact, Islam. It’s a religion that began with century after century of conquest (don’t believe the PR about “defensive war” being the only legitimate form of war for Islam. Spain and Vienna are an awful long way from Mecca. Just what threat did they pose to Arabs?). In fact, the definition of what constitutes “defense” for a huge number of Muslims is so elastic that all wars against the dar el harb (world of war) are “defensive”, including 9/11, which is why so many representatives of that great religion of peace were dancing in the streets at the death of 3000 “aggressors” who were sitting at their desks on the 90th floor of the WTC reading Dilbert cartoons on the web and thinking about how to get their daughters to music practice that evening when the valiant heros of the dar el Islam incinerated them.

Imagine — imagine — if some Christians had done this to Mecca. Not only would there be mass outrage in the Islamic world, there would be mass outrage in the Christian world. Stadiums all over the West would be full of breast-beating Christians rightly grieving for this betrayal of their faith. In the Islamic world, what did we see? Cheering in the streets. Morons with “Osama and Bert” posters. “Osama” as the most popular name for Muslim baby boys last year. Why? Because they did not see it as a betrayal, but as an expression of their faith.

Islam doesn’t have to go this route, but the fact is, right now it is. It is a religion which possesses no theology of the fall, no experience of persecution for centuries after its start, a festering sense of entitlement to rule the world, coupled with a corrupt, ignorant, medieval conception of despotic theocratic rule that assures it of never achieving that goal. Like a spoiled child who was pampered in youth and then found itself destitute in adulthood, it blames everybody but itself for its troubles; remembering everything and learning nothing. And so, it embraces the most grotesque losers (like Duke) as its champions while failing to ask a single hard question of itself. It is a textbook example of how false ideas about God can lead to human misery on a massive scale. And it is, at present, a planetary scourge that threatens the lives of millions of people while whining about persecution every time somebody points that out.

Islam can change because people can change. It is, after all, a manmade religion (a fact that its adherents will sooner or later have to face if they hope to escape the prison of their present circumstances). Like all manmade religions, it borrows certain elements of true revelation from the Logos who is Jesus Christ, the Son of God. These elements can and should be encouraged to grow. But that growth will have to mean a huge amount of repentance and re-thinking in a religious culture that is not used to thinking its champions can seriously sin and which is far more inclined to ask David Duke for his valuable ideas or to claim Jewish vampires drink the blood of Muslim children. Such a spoiled-brat-fallen-on-hard-times culture is probably going to get the snot beat out of it several times before it finally loses its fundamental haughtiness and bends the knee to God in a way that is more than mere ritual.

Death threats from wahoobi morons and David Duke fans welcomed. Operators are standing by.

Catholic and Enjoying It!
May 15, 2002

© Mark Shea 2002. Used with permission.