Father Orthoduck is running late today and will try to post more later, as he promised to a poster from yesterday. However, he would like to make the following statement.
Essentially all religions (with some pacifist exceptions) have gone through periods during which they turned violent. And, when they turned violent, they did so against both those within the religion and those outside the religion. Every religion with violence in its past has some within it that continue to advocate that violence even today, including Christianity. But, to argue against a religion because it had violence in its past and has some who advocate violence today is to shoot oneself in the foot. This is because it is very easy to turn that argument around and use it against anyone who uses it.
This is what the Religious Right is not seeing. The arguments that somehow Muslims should be denied their Constitutional rights here in the United States because of violence in history or current violence by jihadists is a bad argument. First, it is a throwback to the very reasons why the first Congress insisted on passing the first ten amendments to the Constitution of the United States of America before they would approve it. Those representatives, coming from a fresh and recent experience of European repression, wanted to ensure that no future USA populace could deny the rights for which they had just finished fighting the American Revolution. Fortunately, the Bill of Rights is there today to protect us from the Religious Right. Notice that I said us and not just the Muslims. Unfortunately, what history does clearly show is that once a “cleansing” crusade begins within any religion it quickly turns inward and begins attacking its own. That has already happened among those of the Religious Right, who have turned upon any Christian who disagrees with them, whether those Christians are morally conservative or not. Charges of theological liberalism or anti-Scripture views have been leveled at those who have dared to disagree. (All one needs to do to verify this is to look back at comments made on this blog, regardless of Father Orthoduck’s continuing statements on the efficacy and authority of Scripture. Father Orthoduck also has spoken of Holy Tradition, but that is another subject.)
Second, it is a bad argument because it would deny citizens of the USA their rights though they themselves have committed no crime. There has been no jihadist wave among American citizens who are Muslim. In fact, there have been less than five incidents and all of them individual with no connection to an organized conspiracy. 9/11 was an attack from outside the United States by citizens of another country, not by citizens of the USA. Yet, the drumbeat across many parts of America is to deny Muslims the right to build a mosque anywhere despite the lack of jihadist activity by USA citizens who are Muslims. The Religious Right seeks to turn the USA into another Kosovo or another Rwanda, in which people are punished simply on the basis of their ethnic identity or their religion. We fought a Civil War in order to stop people who did that sort of thing, and it does not belong here today either.
Third, it is a bad argument because the argument can be turned around and used against Christianity itself. We, too, in every denomination have a history of violence in the past. And, even today, there is a history of violence among some in Christianity. One only need to go to the website of various churches in the USA who advocate taking the country back from blacks and purifying it. Are these groups extreme and small? Yes, they are extreme and small, but just like some of the jihadist groups, they own arms, they practice military tactics, and they claim they are ready to do violence in order to protect us from ourselves. The ATF and the FBI try to keep these groups under surveillance, just in case they do cross the line into violence. But, to use those groups to argue that no church should be allowed to be built is as much sheer nonsense as using jihadists against American citizens who are Muslim.
Fourth, it is a bad argument because it appears to make Christianity the purveyor of xenophobia and racism. This should not be!
In a fallen world, humanity is violent. some try to find other ways to solve conflict and some use religion or other philosophy to rationalize it. Even the most dedicated pacifist has moments…..sigh….
nfortunately, what history does clearly show is that once a “cleansing” crusade begins within any religion it quickly turns inward and begins attacking its own.
What do predators eat after they’ve killed off all the prey?
HUG quoted the very lines that I had highlighted and was about to paste. It scares me when he and I think alike.
This is pretty relevant with me right now; I received an email from a good friend this morning that was not only anti-Muslim but anti-Obama (there appears to be a movement to link the two). The friend meant it to be pro-American, pro-Christian, and pro-prayer, but I don’t think that was all there was to it in the mind of the original author. And it was about a year old already, recycling something from last September. I hit “reply-all” and asked people not to keep forwarding hate-mail, that the email in question didn’t tell the whole story, and that the Muslims too have a right to freedom of religion and assembly under the First Amendment, if we are going to keep acting like Americans.
Before I sent, I received a reply-all from my friend’s sister who upped the ante with an even more vicious message, mostly against Obama and Democrats in general. Then, shortly after I sent, there was a email to me personally from my friend’s daughter thanking me for sending what I did. She said that she has “been urging my Dad for years to quit forwarding this crap that threatens me as a christian if not followed to the letter.”
So the discussion continues. Was Mohammed the Antichrist and are all of his followers demons? Stay tuned…
“I received an email from a good friend this morning that was not only anti-Muslim but anti-Obama (there appears to be a movement to link the two).”
Yup. There sure is. All of this is pretty much designed to get people likely to vote Republican (or Tea Party Republican) to the polls in November. The morning after election day, all of this will steeply subside.
I received a reply e-mail telling me that it had been obvious to a couple of people that I have been increasingly upset lately. In other words, saying that I was going through some emotional stuff. That, of course, quickly removes my opinions from serious consideration since it is emotional.
Funny, I begin to understand more and more what women used to go through when men would accuse them of being emotional if they objected to something.
Padre, I just clicked onto your Sept 11 post, “Bad Logic on Ground Zero Islamic Cultural Center”. I could tell something was going on because the comments are now up to 30.
As for your emotionalism: Some of the comments over there may have you severely provoked, but I think you are staying remarkably tranquilo. In one of the comments you were called a heretic in the first line, and in the last line he said, “Repent of your lies, Mr. Obregon, and our Lord might yet have mercy on you.” Another person said, “You disgust me.”
You emotional? I think you’ve been pretty balanced and biblical.
I think so too, Ted. If this were my blog, several of the comments to which you refer would never have seen the light of day.
Fr. Ernesto, I thank God for you. You are in our prayers that you will be strengthened as you continue to speak the truth which, apparently, many with “itching ears” are not keen to hear today.