Peaceful Islam?

---by Micheal

Awhile back Pope Benedict touched off a fire storm of protest from the Muslim world when he quoted an ancient Byzantine emperor who said that Islam was a violent and intolerant religion. How dare the Pope say such things, the Muslim world shouted. Riots and death threats ensued. (see previous blog entry) Anyone who says Islam is intolerant is to blame for violence by Muslims. An odd logic at best.

Now enter the Islamic court in a Somalian town. "Anyone who does not pray five times a day to Mecca will be beheaded." (I kid you not. See Fox News story for Dec. 6, 2006). The court will impose what they call "Islamic Law" on all residents. Infractions will bring death.

Okay, NOW what do we do with Muslim outrage at being called violent and intolerant? Beheading isn't violent and intolerant?

I realize that any organization, religious or secular, has its occasional wackos. There are millions of quiet postal workers, and only a tiny few who go nuts with guns. One wacko postal worker is not respresentative. There are millions of respectable Christians, and yet the occasional Jim Jones or David Koresh surface from time to time. They're not representative of real Christianity.

The huge difference here, is that we do not hear a larger Muslim community saying, "There are some wacko Muslims out there, but we're not like that. They preach hate and intolerance and death, but that's not the true basis of Islam." Instead, we hear only of riots and protests, as if the statements were true enough, but how dare anyone actually say them. "For calling me violent and intolerant, You Die!"

If the greater Muslim community does not want to be "profiled" as all wackos, they need to speak out -- and loudly -- against the wackos in their backyards. If Islam really is NOT violent and intolerant, they need to take to the airwaves and teach everyone who'll listen, what the Quran really says, if it is, in fact, peaceful and tolerant.

Christians have to do this constantly. Some idiot somewhere decides to kill people he doesn't like and says God told him to do so. Christians everywhere are tarnished by such idiots. The sane Christians then have to spend lots of time explaining to people that God says (in the Bible) that murder is wrong and that vengance his His (not ours) to extract. Or that Jesus commands us to love our enemies (not kills them), etc. etc. Christians set the record straight. No one can prevent wackos from cropping up, but sane Christians defend their faith against the wackos.

Where are the Muslim defenders? Where are the Quran lessons that prove that Mohammed did not preach beheading to those who do not pray five times a day? Where have the wackos gotten Islam all wrong? Muslim defenders have a right, an obligation to speak up. If they don't distance themselves from Muslim wackos, we've no real choice but assume the wackos are actually representative of true Islam.