Anti-Muslim Violence a Race Issue?
By Reese Currie, Compass Distributors
In my city, there is an organization called the "Race Relations Education Association" that is holding an event to focus on Islam. Here's a verbatim copy of the letter I received:
The recent tragic events in the United States have shown, if nothing else, that we truly have an interconnected world and we ignore this fact at our peril. As human beings, we need to think about what religions have in common, rather than on their differences. Learning about each other's faiths is a crucial first step.
The evening will host two speakers. One is Dr. Gamal Badawi, professor at St. Mary's University in Halifax and the other is Dr. Todd Lawson, research associate at McGill University. Both are internationally known scholars and speakers on the Islamic faith. The Association is confident that these two people can begin the process of understanding and acceptance.
This evening is hosted by the Race Relations Education Association and the Muslim Society of PEI. The Association and the Muslim Society of PEI also want to acknowledge the financial assistance from Canadian Heritage, the PEI Department of Cultural and Community Affairs, The PEI Multicultural Council, the Baha'i Community of PEI and the Confederation Centre of the Arts.
There is a terrible propensity among people today to create strawmen that can be more easily attacked than the intelligent, tenable positions that people really hold. Here, we see that people's distrust of the oppressive Muslim religion is being re-cast as racism. Since none of us want to be thought of as racists, we are supposed to swallow the lie that Islam is a peace-loving religion. It is not. Islam is the most inherently fascist religion in existence. It contains direct commands to murder all people who are not Muslims.
An example of this is Surah 9:5, "But when the forbidden months are past, then fight and slay the Pagans wherever ye find them, and seize them, beleaguer them, and lie in wait for them in every stratagem (of war); but if they repent, and establish regular prayers and practise regular charity, then open the way for them: for Allah is Oft-forgiving, Most Merciful."
This simply states that you should kill people unless they will convert to Islam. This is the truth of what the Muslim religion is. There are countries whose interpretation of Islam is relatively liberal and not terribly violent, but fundamentalist Muslims closely adhere to the violent principles of the Qur'an.
I cannot understand how intolerance toward Islam in the western world can possibly be understood as a racism issue. While the vast majority of Arabs are Muslims, the majority of Muslims are not actually Arabs. Certainly not all Arabs are Muslims! Ideological issues are being repainted as race-related issues, which is a dishonest approach to the problem.
And why wouldn't the approach be dishonest? Let's look at the sponsorship of the event. The religious representation in the sponsor list are either Muslims or Baha'is. Baha'is are so intellectually dishonest that they believe there is no problem reconciling a faith that says that Jesus is God and another faith that says it is heresy to think so. On this principle alone, the two faiths are mutually exclusive.
Even the most naive child can understand the concept of mutual exclusivity--the electric light bulb is either on or it is off; it can't be both on and off at the same time. Similarly, there can be no possible reconciliation between faiths that differ on the identity of Jesus Christ. Jesus is either God or He's not. If Jesus is not God, He is not a "prophet" as Muslims claim, but a raving lunatic who claimed He was God. I stand by the fact that Jesus is God and His claims are true, and that any religion denying this is false in its most crucial aspect. Both the Muslim faith and the Baha'i faith are false religions by this definition.
The fact of the matter is, we Christians should not be at peace with our Muslim neighbors because of what they are, but because of what we are. We should be kind to them not on the basis of common ground we can find with them, but because of common ground we should have with Jesus Christ.
Jesus says, "But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust" (Matthew 5:44-45).
The solution to domestic violence against Muslims is not to release the values of the Christian faith but to embrace them. The Christian faith is not the problem with violence against Muslims. The lack of adherence to the real tenets of the Christian faith is the problem. There is only one answer to this problem, which is repentance--turning to God's way and more closely adhering to the true principles of Christianity.
If having "common ground" with the Muslims were really the answer to the problem, then North America would be unsafe for all Muslims. You see, Christian countries are safe for Muslims, but Muslim countries are not safe for Christians. Since the September 11, 2001 attacks, Muslim violence against Christians has escalated in all Muslim countries.
On October 23, Indonesian Muslim college students stopped traffic to search for Christians, beating four men so severely that they needed treatment in intensive care. The next day, two more Christians were viciously beaten by the same students. On October 28, Muslim gunmen opened fire on a Protestant service of the Church of Pakistan which was being held in a Roman Catholic church building in Behawalpur. They mowed down men, women and children in addition to two Muslim guards. In Malaysia, two churches and a Christian community centre were the targets of arson attacks by Muslims.
If we were to be like the Muslims, we would turn a blind eye to these attacks and allow the perpetrators to go unpunished.
Paul Marshall, a leading authority on religious persecutions and author of the book, "Their Blood Cries Out," revealed that Osama bin Laden's Al-Qaida terrorist network is connected with Christian persecution in the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Algeria, Nigeria, and the Sudan. He also revealed that the imposition of Islamic Law causes a high death toll wherever it takes place. Since the imposition of Islamic Law, Nigeria has murdered 5,000 of its own citizens. Ambon, Indonesia murdered between 5,000 and 6,000 of its own citizens. The Sudan has murdered an estimated 2,000,000 people since its own imposition of Islamic Law, many of them Christians killed in persecution.
Those who paint Islam as a peace loving religion are liars. Even a cursory look at the facts betrays the truth that the Islamic world is a very violent one. Fundamentalist Islam is an evil force in our world on a par with Nazism, but in typical double-speak, proponents of Islam here and abroad paint Christians as racists for failing to embrace the religion that produces megalomaniacs like Osama bin Laden, Muammar Qadafi, and Saddam Hussien.
The answer is not to find common ground with Muslims and become like them. The answer is to follow the Bible's advice: "Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? for ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you" (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
True Christianity is not a "world religion." As Jesus said, "My kingdom is not of this world: if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now is my kingdom not from hence" (John 18:36). True Christianity is a relationship, a true communion of heart, mind and spirit with Almighty God. We must separate from the violent ways of this world and cleave to the ways of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, which are inherently peaceful and damaging to no one.
Anyone claiming to be a Christian who has performed an act of violence against peaceful Muslims must repent, but not as a matter of compromise toward an inherently evil, even Satanic, religion like Islam. They must repent as a matter of non-compromise toward the commandments of Jesus Christ toward all who purport to follow Him.
Anti-Muslim Violence a Race Issue? is Copyright (c) 2001 Compass Distributors.
Scripture taken from the King James Version.