Until There Are Churches in Saudi Arabia --Sightings

The debate over the presence of mosques in the United States seems to go on without end, and much of the debate is based on misinformation (both intentional and non-intentional).  Martin Marty takes up some of this in an especially pertinently entitled piece.  I invite you to read and enter a civil and informed conversation, so the tantrums of the day can start to die down.

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Sightings  9/20/2010

Until There Are Churches in Saudi Arabia

-- Martin E. Marty

The tantrum—let’s call it what it is—against government, taxes, Muslims, and moderates continues to rage, and will through November and perhaps long after. A child in a tantrum eventually stops stomping and rejoins the family, where speaking and hearing, agreeing and disagreeing, can resume. Sightings would like to move on to other topics about religion and public life, and may do so soon, out of boredom, fear, weariness, or, dare we hope, with hope for better, tantrumless times.

In the meantime in these mean times, out of thousands of choices from columns, blogs, and books, let me select two, one of the best, and one of the worst. In The New Republic Leon Wieseltier challenges readers with a question: Is Islam, as some defenders say, “a religion of peace?” He answers, “It is not. Like Christianity and like Judaism, Islam is a religion of peace and a religion of war,” depending on which era and which circumstances bring forth “the tendencies” within the religion. To relate terrorism to movements within Islam “is not Islamophobic. . . Quite the contrary: it is to side with Muslims who are struggling against the same poison as we are.”

As for the World Trade Center attacks, he pleads, don’t erect a cross as a memorial. “Christianity was not attacked on September 11. America was attacked. They are not the same thing.” American Christians who use the cross in their ads against Islam “do not deplore a religious war, they welcome one.”

Now read William McGurn in The Wall Street Journal. Ask yourself what does he and the tantrum-throwers to his far right, the Newt Gingriches and company want? Peace? Moderation? Can you find the beginning of the beginning of a way to peace in the McGurn column? Note that, for good measure, he links American liberalism to radical Islam. Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, “perhaps” a “moderate Muslim,” Richard Haass of the Council on Foreign Relations, and others support “‘interfaith dialogue,’ and called for American Muslims and non-Muslims to ‘break bread’ together.” Not on your life, says columnist McGurn. Stooping lowest he asks, “What are the fruits” of the efforts at moderation and dialogue?

These efforts, he writes, produced as fruit the “obscure Florida Pastor” and other would-be Qur’an burners, those who tear out pages of the Qur’an in front of the White House, and—this one is half right—“angry marches between pro- and anti-Islamic Center crowds,” all to be blamed on one “typical experiment in liberal bridge building.” He implies that there should be no efforts at “interfaith dialogue,” “breaking bread together,” or differentiating moderates from extremists in all faith traditions. Whom to blame for the current rages? Muslims, of course; one Imam, of course; and “folks who cling to their liberalism and their antipathy to people who aren’t like them.”

McGurn does have the grace to scold “Republican politicos” who, thanks to “liberal hectoring,” exploit tensions, “saying no mosque near Ground Zero until we see a church in Saudi Arabia.” Which sets us up for Wieseltier’s best line: “I also hear that there should be no mosque in Park Place until there are churches and synagogues in Saudi Arabia. I get it. Until they are like us, we will be like them.”

References

William McGurn, “'Bridge Building' and the WTC Mosque,” The Wall Street Journal, September 14, 2010.

Leon Wieseltier, “Mosque Notes,” The New Republic, September 2, 2010.


Martin E. Marty's biography, current projects, publications, and contact information can be found at http://www.illuminos.com/.


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Sightings comes from the Martin Marty Center at the University of Chicago Divinity School.

Ground Zero: Exaggerating the Jihadist Threat

It does seem as if this is a story that won't quit. It doesn't matter that much of the rhetoric is either misplaced or politically expedient. As Romesh Ratnesar writes in a Time Magazine online piece entitled Ground Zero: Exaggerating the Jihadist Threat, the "jihadist threat" that everyone is so worried about is actually fading away. Yes, the militants are still doing their thing -- largely in Muslim countries and rarely in the West --but their support in Muslim countries is dissipating fast.

What I find unfathomable is the idea that a mosque sponsored by a moderate group of Sufi Muslims would constitute a victory for radical Islam. I simply don't get it. What would constitute a victory in my mind would be the ongoing fear mongering that grips our nation. The goal of terrorism is to terrorize people -- make them afraid. I think, from all the rhetoric, that these militants have done just that. The American people have been cowed, which makes the susceptible to demagogues such as Newt Gingrich. As New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg suggests:

"We would betray our values and play into our enemies' hands if we were to treat Muslims differently than anyone else," Bloomberg said on Governors Island, the Statue of Liberty behind him in the distance.

In the long run this is an "debate" that will go nowhere.  The group seeking to build the center have the right, according to the Constitution, to build at the site.  No court in the land would disallow this and its not the government's business to decide between religions.  The Constitution's guarantees don't simply apply to Congregationalists in New England and Anglicans in Virginia, or Presbyterians in the middle states.  We've outgrown the question of which Protestant church will dominate. 

But perhaps even more importantly this "debate" maybe focusing on an threat that no longer really exists.  Remember it's 9 years since 9-11.  We've been in Afghanistan for much of this period, with no end in sight, largely because we put Afghanistan on the back burner to engage another phantom threat in Iraq (where we've been at war now for seven years). 

But, whether the threat is receding or not, I can't stop reiterating the fact that principles of American identity are at stake in this debate -- the principles of religious freedom.  And if Muslims and other minority religions are denied their Constitutional rights, then our nation will have betrayed its founding principles.  I know the President has taken a lot of heat for his position -- David Gergen, whom I normally regard highly, made a statement last night that stunned me -- that in this President Obama demonstrated a lack of understanding of the feelings on the part of the American people.  I'm sorry, but standing up for what is right when religious freedom is under threat for political reasons (even among Democrats) is astounding.

Let the Negative Campaigning Begin! Constitutional Roll-backs?

There are two rather interesting issues that have emerged lately in the political debate, issues that to my mind strike at the very core of the American ethos.  Both seem to me to be rather blatant challenges to American freedoms and opportunities -- and no that issue here isn't the right to bear arms.  The issues though are related.  One has to do with immigration and the other with religious freedom.

It saddens me to watch as two Republican Senators, both of whom have stood at the head of the line in support of comprehensive immigration reform, back pedal and embrace the repeal of the 14th Amendment, which interestingly enough was engineered in the 1860s by leaders of the Republican party.  The 14th Amendment has several parts to it, but the section relating to the current conversation reads:

Section. 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

Sen. Lindsey Graham has suggested that this provision be rolled back, because it provides opportunity for "anchor babies," a rather ugly term that suggests that women come to the US to "drop babies," another popular term -- so that they can have residency in the US.  It has been rare in American history to roll back constitutional protections.  The only amendment that has been passed and then repealed was Prohibition.  Supporting Graham is John McCain -- also in trouble politically in his home state -- which has led him to take up causes he once opposed.   Do we really want to undermine constitutional protections that make it possible for the children of immigrants to become citizens?  Oh, it might be politically popular, but do we really want to go there?   And let me remind readers that this Amendment was Republican sponsored and largely opposed by the Democrats of the day.  

The other issue is the proposed mosque in Manhattan (and other mosques around the country).  The First Amendment reads:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

The Constitution reads pretty clearly here -- Americans have a freedom to exercise their faiths.  This includes popular and unpopular ones.  Unless they are clearly breaking laws or impinging on zoning restrictions, people have the freedom to gather wherever they like.  Thus, the sponsors of the Manhattan mosque and community center have the right to build two blocks from "Ground Zero."   It may not be politically popular -- and apparently the Republican Party is ready to make this a "campaign issue" for the fall -- but its a Constitutional protection.  I continually hear Tea Party folks and others talking about the Constitution -- usually their right to bear arms -- but when the Constitution doesn't go their way, well then -- "the Constitution be damned!"   My hope is that the American people have a broader and more open vision of the world than to decide who should govern them on the basis of the President's remarks about the mosque in New York. 

So, here's my question -- not so much as a Christian (my faith calls for justice for all people and therefore my view is colored by that theology, but I think this time the question emerges from my being a citizen of this nation) as an America citizen:  Do we really want to undermine constitutional protections of religion and citizenship?

Cordoba House and Mosque at Ground Zero (Michael Kinnamon)

I saw this statement from Michael Kinnamon, General Secretary of the National Council of churches and a Disciples of Christ minister, and decided to share it with my readers. Kinnamon offers a cogent response to those protesting its being built, suggesting that Ground Zero should be a place for people of all faiths to gather and remember, reminding readers that a good number of those killed that day were themselves Muslims -- the number that I remember is about 200 to 250 (about 10%).   I invite you to consider Kinnamon's prophetic call to respect the right of Muslims to build at their chosen site. 

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Cordoba House and Mosque at Ground Zero

is a gesture of neighborliness and healing

NCC Editor's Note. Dr. Kinnamon's statement on Cordova House and Mosque at New York's Ground Zero is available to you for use and distribution as you see fit.

For thousands of families, Ground Zero in southern Manhattan is holy ground. Thousands lost someone they love in the terror attacks of September 11, 2001, and hundreds of thousands know someone who was directly or indirectly scarred by the collapse of the World Trade Center. The emotional investment in Ground Zero cannot be overestimated.

That is precisely why Ground Zero must be open to the religious expression of all people whose lives were scarred by the tragedy: Christians, Jews, Sikhs, Buddhists, Hindus, and more. And Muslims.

No one knows how many Muslims died on 9/11, but they number in the hundreds. One was Salman Hamdani, a 23-year-old New York City police cadet, emergency medical technician and medical student. When Salman disappeared on September 11, law enforcement officials who knew of his Islamic faith sought him out among his family to question him about the attacks. His family lived with the onus of suspicion for six months until Salman’s body was identified. He was found near the North Tower with his EMT bag beside him, situated where he could help people in need.

The point of this now famous story is simple. Not every Muslim at Ground Zero was a terrorist, and not every Muslim was a hero. The vast majority were like thousands of others on September 11: victims of one of the most heinous events of our times.

But for the family of Salman Hamdani and millions of innocent Muslims, the tragedy has been exacerbated by the fact that so many of the rest of us have formed our opinions about them out of prejudice and ignorance of the Muslim faith.

It is that narrow-minded intolerance that has led to the outcry against the building of Cordoba House and Mosque near Ground Zero. It is the same ignorance that has led many to the outrageous conclusion that all Muslims advocate hatred and violence against non-Muslims. It is the same ignorance that has led to hate crimes and systematic discrimination against Muslims, and to calls to burn the Qur’an.

On the eve of Ramadan on August 11, the National Council of Churches, its Interfaith Relations Commission and Christian participants in the National Muslim-Christian Initiative, issued a strong call for respect for our Muslim neighbors.

“Christ calls us to ‘love your neighbor as yourself’ (Matthew 22:39,” the statement said. “It is this commandment, more than the simple bonds of our common humanity, which is the basis for our relationship with Muslims around the world.”

The statement supported building Cordoba House “as a living monument to mark the tragedy of 9/11 through a community center dedicated to learning, compassion, and respect for all people.”

Now the National Council of Churches reaffirms that support and calls upon Christians and people of faith to join us in that affirmation.

The alternative to that support is to engage in a bigotry that will scar our generation in the same way as bigotry scarred our forebears.

Three-hundred years ago, European settlers came to these shores with a determination to conquer and settle at the expense of millions of indigenous peoples who were regarded as sub-human savages. Today, we can’t look back on that history without painful contrition.

One-hundred and fifty years ago, white Americans subjugated black Africans in a cruel slavery that was justified with Bible proof-texts and a belief that blacks were inferior to whites. Today, we look back on that history with agonized disbelief.

Sixty years ago, in a time of war and great fear, tens of thousands of Japanese-Americans were deprived of their property and forced into detention camps because our grandparents feared everyone of Japanese ancestry. Today that decision is universally regarded as an unconscionable mistake and a blot on American history.

Today, millions of Muslims are subjected to thoughtless generalizations, open discrimination and outright hostility because of the actions of a tiny minority whose violent acts defy the teachings of Mohammed.

How will we explain our ignorance and our compliance to our grandchildren?

It’s time to turn away from ignorance and embrace again the words of Christ: Love your neighbor as yourself.

In that spirit, we welcome the building of Cordoba House and Mosque near Ground Zero.

Michael Kinnamon

General Secretary
National Council of Churches

Welcoming the Manhattan Mosque

Word has come down that a City Commission has cleared the way for a Muslim Group to build a mosque in a Manhattan neighborhood close to the former World Trade Center site.  The commission voted 9-0 to deny landmark status to a 152 year old building that has little artistic, architectural, or historical value -- other than it is 152 years old.  Had any other use been proposed it would likely not have been a big deal to tear it down, but since it's near (a couple of blocks away) the WTC site it became a symbolic point of contention for those who seem intent upon defaming Muslims.  The argument stated in support of landmark status was that it had been touched by debris from the 9-11 attacks, but as a member of the commission noted that applies to hundreds of buildings on Manhattan.  The rationale for landmark status was simply a cover for an ongoing anti-Islamic campaign.

In conversations with Muslim friends, they continually express dismay that they have been linked with Osama Bin Laden and with extremists.  They reject categorically the rhetoric and the actions of these extremists, and yet their statements continually get drowned out by those who wish to put all of Islam into one basket. 

As I noted the other day, while I find the statements of Sarah Palin and Newt Gingrich unfortunate, it's not surprising since it fits their "Christian America" focus.  What I found most disheartening were the statements of ADL head Abe Foxman.  Foxman is quoted as saying in an interview with the New York Times:

“Survivors of the Holocaust are entitled to feelings that are irrational,” he said. Referring to the loved ones of Sept. 11 victims, he said, “Their anguish entitles them to positions that others would categorize as irrational or bigoted.”

Here is the head of a group, the Anti-Defamation League, which was founded for the purpose of opposing this very kind of thing, saying that the anguish of loved ones entitles them to positions that are irrational and bigoted.  But its not the families whose bigotry is at issue, but the bigotry that is present in the broader public.  This isn't about the anguish of victims loved ones, this is about politics, and right now being anti-Muslim will, at least in some quarters by you votes.  This is why I am so dismayed that the ADL has chosen to align itself with such a tide.  As Mark Silk points out, in his statements Foxman has allied himself with the very people who connect all Muslims with 9-11, by suggesting that building a mosque, one to be opened by a moderate Islamic group, would cause anguish to families of survivors. 

We will not get beyond hatred and misunderstanding as long as we remain committed to stereotypes (something that I taught as a project coordinator for the ADL's "No Place for Hate" program I was charged with exposing).  If there is no place for stereotypes that lead to hate in our communities -- as I consistently maintained in that role -- this includes stereotyping Muslims and espousing hate against them.   So, as for me, I welcome this mosque, especially since those who are opening it seek to bring dialogue to the community.

Time to Stop Villifying Muslims and Islam

The other day the head of the Anti-Defamation League, Abe Foxman, joined Sarah Palin and Newt Gingrich in condemning the Islamic center and mosque planned for New York City -- even though the city's mayor, Michael Bloomberg welcomes it.  What saddens me about the ADL response, which includes casting aspersions on the project because of its unknown funders, is that I once worked for the ADL office in Santa Barbara, coordinating its "No Place for Hate" campaign -- an effort that was designed to overcome misrepresentations and bring people together.  But the New York situation isn't the only one at hand.  There is an attempt to block the building of a mosque in Murfreesboro, TN, an effort that has been aided and abetted by politicians who are running for office on an anti-Islam platform.  Remember that the current Lt. Governor, who is running for governor, has suggested that maybe Islam isn't covered by constitutional protections, because its a cult and not a religion.

Then, beyond politics, there is a whole host of Christian groups and churches that have chosen to attack Islam.  Yes, Islam has its share of terrorists and it was an extremist Islamic group that perpetrated 9-11.  But, one shouldn't tar and feather an entire religion, one that is adhered to by more than 1 billion people, for the acts of a minority of its adherents.

So, consider the preacher who has proclaimed that he is going to hold a special service where he'll burn the Koran.  Now, how is that an example of Christian love?  Then there are the so called Christian "specialists" on Islam, who have been shown not to understand this religion, and to have even falsified the nature of their understanding.

Robert Parham has written a very helpful essay for Ethic's Daily that speaks to this problem, sharing two Baptist voices that are trying to counter this problem.  It is time, these leaders say, for Christians to refrain from slander, and engage the issues with honesty. With this, I'm in total agreement. 

It is time for those Christians (and others), whether they are politicians, preachers, or whatnot, who have cast inappropriate aspersions on Islam and Muslims, to put aside vilification, take a humble stance toward the other, and begin conversations that will lead to understanding and hopefully bring peace.