Christian Extremists: "Hate Thy Neighbor"

Christian Extremists: "Hate Thy Neighbor"

It appears that some Christian leaders missed some important lessons from
the teachings of Jesus Christ (peace be on him). Recent hate mongering
remarks by Frank Graham, Ann Coulter, Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell against
Islam and Prophet Muhammad (peace be on him) reflect ignorance, arrogance,
self-conceit and bigotry. They need to hang the Ten Commandments around
their necks and recite "Love Thy Neighbor" hundred times a day. They also
need to read the following daily:

Matthew 5:9:"Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of
God."
James 3:18:"Peacemakers who sow in peace raise a harvest of righteousness."
Falwell defames Islam: Why is there a lack of reaction?
Southern Baptist Leadership Chose to Spew Hate
Will the Muslims of the world be able to control and marginalize extremists
and hate mongers among them?
Will the Christians, Jews, Hindus,... of the world be able to control and
marginalize extremists and hate mongers among them?

Some editorials follow:

CHRISTIAN LEADERS' REMARKS AGAINST ISLAM SPARK BACKLASH
Alan Cooperman, Washington Post, 10/15/02
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A25654-2002Oct14.html

A recent series of disparaging remarks about Islam by the Rev. Jerry Falwell
and other evangelical Christian leaders have sparked riots in India, helped
religious parties win elections in Pakistan and undermined public sympathy
in Islamic countries for the U.S. war on terrorism, experts said yesterday?

"Jerry Falwell makes a statement, he pleases his constituents, then he says
he's sorry and apparently thinks that's the end of it," said Akbar Ahmed,
chairman of Islamic studies at American University. "What Americans don't
realize is that remarks like this are flashed all over the Muslim world, and
they are doing very serious damage to U.S. interests..."

Shortly after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, President Bush visited a mosque
and said the U.S. war on terrorism was not a war against Islam, which he
called a "religion of peace." Bush's approach quieted the evangelical
community for a few months, but "it wasn't very long before I began to pick
up rumblings in the grass roots -- sermons saying not all religions are
equally correct, evangelicals saying the president may have gone a little
too far," said John Green, a professor at the University of Akron who
closely follows the Christian right.

"Once some prominent people stepped forward, like Franklin Graham, that made
it easier for others," Green added. "I suspect that it's just become more
and more acceptable for evangelical leaders to speak out against Islam?"

---

EDITORIAL: HERE'S ANOTHER FINE MESS YOU'VE GOTTEN INTO JERRY FALWELL
Elizabeth Schuett, Cox News, 10/14/02

GIBSONBURG, Ohio - There will be a moment's silence from the Rev. Jerry
Falwell, preacher, leading member of the Southern Baptist Convention, and
spokesperson for America's Moral Majority, while he recovers from his most
recent bout of foot-in-mouth disease _ "I think Muhammad was a terrorist. .
.. a violent man, a man of war."

Such a pronouncement could have gone relatively unnoticed had the Rev.
chosen another venue from which to out Islam's prophet as a killer.
Possibly, he could have gotten away with it from the pulpit, or even in a
classroom at his Liberty University. Maybe. But to call the holy man of
millions a "terrorist" on national television was not, by any stretch of the
imagination, a swift move. Did Mr. Falwell think no one would be listening?
That no one might take exception to his sweeping condemnation? Or did he
expect to be the instrument of enlightenment for millions??

Ibrahim Hooper of the Council on American-Islamic Relations commented:
"Anybody is free to be a bigot if they want to. What concerns us is the lack
of reaction by mainstream religious and political leaders who say nothing
when these bigots voice these attacks."

Malaysia's Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad said only an ignorant person
would make such a remark and urged Muslims not to take the matter too
seriously. "I'm not going to accuse all Christians," he said, "only one
person made such a statement?"

America loves its comics. Always has. But religion doesn't belong in the
funnies. Between Mr. Falwell's thoughtless repartee, and televangelist Pat
Robertson's appearance on Fox News' "Hannity and Colmes," where he called
the Prophet Muhammad an "absolute fanatic," as well as a robber and a
brigand, we've got a regular Laurel and Hardy sketch going here?

Thanks a lot, gentlemen, you've been a big help _ to God and country.

---

EDITORIAL: IN DEFENCE OF ISLAM
Ottawa Citizen, 10/15/02
http://www.canada.com/ottawa/ottawacitizen/editorials/story.asp?id={EDC8EB8F-69B0-4102-9AEB-9AEEAEB6CFA5}

In the Hebrew Bible or Old Testament, God orders the death of everyone who
stands in the way of his chosen people, the Israelites. Accordingly, Joshua
sends his army rampaging across the Promised Land, "utterly destroying all
the souls that were therein?"

Sacred texts can be inspiring, dramatic and even revelatory, but they are
not always models of religious tolerance. Like all great literature, these
documents are rich with contradiction and complexity. We can be exhorted to
slaughter infidels on one page and to love our neighbour on the next. Those
with a true spiritual calling are sensitive to the ambiguities and tensions
inherent in Scripture and will spend a lifetime studying them.

There is, then, a certain dishonesty about the current campaign to discredit
the Koran, Islam's holy book. Robert Spencer, a Catholic intellectual, has
just published Islam Unveiled, a nasty work filled with damning quotations
from the Koran such as "When you meet the unbelievers in the battlefield,
strike off their heads and, when you have laid them low, bind your captives
firmly." The American baptist leader Jerry Falwell recently said on CBS-TV's
60 Minutes that the Koran's author, Mohammed, "was a terrorist" and the
religion he founded "teaches hate."

In the immediate aftermath of Sept. 11, 2001, there were decent folk who,
ignorant of religion, wanted to know if Islam was inherently a primitive,
violent creed. Books on Islam were in great demand, and as people read them
they learned, perhaps to their surprise, that Islamic societies were once
more enlightened than Europe. Muslim women owned property and enjoyed more
dignity than their counterparts in the West. Minorities who faced
persecution in Christian lands often fled to the Islamic world because they
knew that among Muslims they'd be unmolested?


(Editorials texts taken from C.A.I.R.'s http://cair-net.org )

http://www.islam101.com/terror/christianExtremists.htm


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