The Pope's Remarks & the Islamic Response

"Always be prepared to give an answer". (1 Peter 3:15)





Dedicated with love and gratitude to the memory of Sister Leonella Sgorbati.

During a recent pilgrimage to his native Germany, Pope Benedict made remarks during a speech that sent the Islamic world into another insane tirade. The report stated:

"The Pope's speech quoted from a book recounting a conversation between 14th century Byzantine Christian Emperor Manuel Paleologos II and an educated Persian on the truths of Christianity and Islam.

"The emperor comes to speak about the issue of jihad, holy war," the Pope said.

"He said, I quote, 'Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached'."

The Pope’s remark (quoting a statement made seven hundred years ago) enflamed the tender sensibilities of peaceful Muslims worldwide. Let’s go over that again: referencing a comment made seven hundred years ago causes rampage in the streets and the self-righteous indignation of religious tyrants who enslave their people. With all due respect, it is reasonable to consider whether such a response reflects an ideology that has difficulty providing its adherents a way to conduct their affairs civilly in a global society.

There is no way anyone can adequately address what needs to be said in a just and adequate manner. Some folks simply look at a photograph and say, "What a bunch of assholes", before turning to the sports page. If that works for them, fine. All I know is that a picture speaks louder than words, and I need to study and analyze it as if my children’s future hung in the balance. If you feel the same way, hit the mute button on your tv and turn on your recorder. The game can wait. Follow along with me for a few minutes if you would be so kind.

I do not offer a blanket indictment of the Islamic ideologies or Muslims in general, for there are men and women of good faith and dealing in every corner of the world. I’m looking for solutions. Headaches I already have. As the old American axiom goes, "there’s nice guys and assholes on every block." Accordingly, I offer these thoughts in a spirit of goodwill.

As a Christian and as an American (while such perspectives are not mutually exclusive) synthesizing a methodology which reconciles considerations of the spiritual, secular and emotional is not easy. The Talmud so rightly states, "We don’t see things as they are, we see things as we are." Christians, Muslims and Jews all purportedly cry out to the same Heavenly Father. We purportedly seem to want the same things for our children and ourselves. So why can’t people simply understand and respect their neighbors? It seems pretty simple to me. If these ideologies purportedly preach salaam, shalom and peace, don’t they mean the same thing? How does it then follow then that more of God’s children have been murdered in the name of religion than in any other human endeavor?


Sometimes you need reflection before commenting on anything as volatile as this photograph, because the first thing that most people of goodwill feel is outrage toward anyone who would react in such a violently STUPID way. Disagree with the man and the message all you want, but burn him in effigy, maybe that’s taking things a wee bit too far.

So, how should Catholics respond? Just say, "Oh, there go those wacky Islamo-fascists again. What a bunch of cutups those kids are."

No, our response needs to reflect our belief of "being in the world, not of it." We simply can’t turn our backs on this outrage (or act like ostriches) and pretend it will go away. We know from history that appeasement to tyranny does not produce a peaceful solution, but merely emboldens the tyrant. Just ask Neville Chamberlain how that worked out. Similarly, look at what has occurred since 1983, after we "cut and ran" in Lebanon after 241 American military service personnel were killed in an explosion. Years later, we attempted to negotiate with the countries that harbored Bin Laden, and what happened? There is nothing to negotiate with murderers or an ideology that appears to be philosophically incapable of tolerance.

We cannot respond out of fear, either. We are reminded by scripture, "[F]or God did not give us a spirit of cowardice but rather of power and love and self-control". (2 Timothy 1:7). Jesus also tells us, "I tell you, my friends, do not be afraid of those who kill the body but after that can do no more". (Luke 12:4)

Nor can we reasonably go off half-cocked on a hate-filled diatribe. As followers of Jesus, we are called to a higher duty of care and love of neighbor. Besides, what would that prove anyway? That’d be just what the world needs, another self-important chump adding his two cents of hot air and provoking more hostility. If that’s what you’re looking to find, go somewhere else. Besides, all that anger does is to produce a destructive internal force which can cause high blood pressure, heart attacks and strokes. Sorry, Abdul, but you ain’t worth getting a heart attack over.

Because I am a Christian, I am called to see things in that light, not as a military commander would. However, it is very hard to love thy neighbor when thy neighbor is burning down thy house of worship, as occurred on Friday and Saturday when Catholic, Anglican and Orthodox churches got torched in the Middle East. It is very hard to love thy neighbor when thy neighbor does not consider thee thy neighbor but thine enemy. It is very hard to love when thy neighbor denies my brother the right to exist. It is very hard to love and to forgive when you kill my sister. But we must remain calm and have faith if we ask to take that closer walk with Him each and every step of the way.

Love is neither easy nor comfortable. When many of His original followers could not accept that price and walked away, a disconsolate Jesus turned to the Twelve, wondering whether they would abandon Him as well. Peter told Him, "Master, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life." (see John 6:22-69).

If you choose to follow the Way of The Cross, then you necessarily accept that we are simply no more than travelers on this mortal plane with a duty to walk the walk one day at a time. If you want an easy and comfortable love, by all means don’t look at the Cross, because His suffering and death was not easy on the eyes. But it is Divine Love Manifest. To walk by faith, not by sight is our calling.

The world laughed at his followers then, and does so today, because His message of love and forgiveness seems to have no rational basis. For hundreds of years after His passing from this world, He and His followers were considered the laughingstock by the Powers That Be. There is a famous mural in a Roman bathhouse in which Jesus is depicted with the head of an ass.

How then did a non-violent ideology that came into being under one of the world’s most ruthless and powerful empires in history not only survive, but flourish? Did he not say to Peter, "But who do you say that I am?"

Simon Peter said in reply, "You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God."

Jesus said to him in reply, "Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah. For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my heavenly Father. And so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it." (Matthew 16:15-18) That’s pretty wild stuff. It’s little wonder that a stand-up guy like that would get whacked out for pissing off the wrong people.

Bishop Sheen said it best when he said (paraphrasing), "Either Jesus is who he said He was, or it’s the biggest fraud ever perpetrated on mankind". I choose to accept the former proposition. Look at it this way: The likelihood that Christian ideology would have survived more than a generation or two does completely flies in the face of reason. The rational mind would inevitably conclude that the way of love and forgiveness is no match for the sword. Maybe Jesus was onto something when He said, "Blessed are the meek, they shall inherit the Earth." (Matthew 5:5) We (whose hope rest in The Risen Jesus) have no recourse but to hope and to trust in Him. "For nothing is impossible with God." (Luke 1:37)

Accordingly, my Christian duty is to follow the example of Jesus when I am confronted by my enemy and trust that He will make things right if I surrender to His Will. That does not necessarily imply that I am a doormat to be stepped on or steamrolled. It is my duty to remain steadfast in my belief. Maybe that’s why the Lord picked a guy like Paul to evangelize in the years following his Ascension. Paul’s letters are filled with examples of walking by and holding steadfast to faith under some rather terrifying adventures.

However, from a American/human perspective, there’s still a good deal of piss and vinegar that I’m processing (so don’t get too close). Americans really don’t care if you choose to kneel down before a bowl of dog food, just so long as you don’t bother anyone else. While I’m no cultural relativist, I respect the idea that other peoples’ spiritual paths may be different than mine or yours. There are ultimate truths in this world, mainly birth, death and taxes. There are immutable laws of physics, science and mathematics as well. Everything else is hypothesis, conjecture, theory and belief. I have mine, you have yours, neither of us seek to wield our respective belief systems like a nine-iron over each others’ heads. Hopefully, we’ll meet up at the same point at the end. Sure, there are particular sects or cults whose practices we may find socially abhorrent and spiritually and intellectually dishonest, but the Constitution guarantees freedom of worship. So, having been conditioned to view life from a broader lens, it is little wonder that Americans have a difficult time trying to relate to an ideology as pervasive as Islam.

The fact is, America’s primary consideration in the Middle East is oil, and how that resource can be best manipulated to serve the American economy. For better or worse, we’ve hitched ourselves to being an oil dependent economy. Our energy policy in turn caused diplomatic problems. Other than our steadfast support for Israel, our foreign policy with respect to the Middle East has been a series of intelligence blunders. We have backed some brutal regimes over the years, in the name of Almighty Oil. Any honest American perspective needs to remember that as well.

To help us understand, we have the benefit recorded history, tales of human interaction that predate Mohammed and even Jesus. In the case of the latter, we do know that there was a man named Jesus, Son of Joseph, ("the carpenter’s kid") who made outrageous claims that pissed off the authorities who caused him to get whacked in Jerusalem by the Romans. Jewish commentators of the era, such as Josephus, independently documented what happened. What transpired after that is simply a matter of faith. His followers believed that Jesus rose from the dead, gave counsel to His followers on how to carry out His wishes, and then ascended into Heaven, with the promise that He would return. His movement did not employ violence in order to spread His ideology, and in fact, suffered greatly under the Romans for several centuries thereafter.

Mohammed’s life and times were recorded more fully than Jesus’. We do know that the rise of his movement was brought about and spread largely by violent means. We do know that wherever Islam has been established as the dominant cultural influence, "unbelievers" have not been afforded equal treatment. It is not an opinion, but historical fact and codified as Islamic law ("Shari'a"). And the violent legacy of Mohammed’s movement is a shame, because the early Islamic scholars and mathematicians brought great ideas into being.

We also know that The Crusades were brought about as a response to the plundering of Jerusalem by Mohammed’s progeny. After a few hundred years of beating each other up, the warring factions called it a day (and you thought our involvement in Iraq has been interminable). Is there any relevance at all to "who-did-what-to-whom" over a thousand years ago? Yet, Islamists now use the term "Crusader" as a vile connotation, right up there with "Zionist." It's as if dredging up the memory of an ancient wound could actually offer anything relevant to a 21st-Century dialogue. There is nothing in Western thought that envisions a return of Papal State warriors. I have no such qualms about using the term, and would lay down my life to defend and preserve Jerusalem with my Jewish brothers and sisters. I sincerely pray it never gets to that point.

We need to be cognizant of the fact that the development of Christianity down through the ages has not always been a tolerant ideology either, most especially regarding relations with the Jews. John Paul The Great fully outlines the Church’s position in his work "Reflections on the Shoah". We are also mindful of the Church’s failure to prevent the most abominable forms of sexual misconduct perpetrated on innocent children by a few members of clergy. Tragically, in the religion business, one rotten apple can truly negatively affect the credibility of the whole barrel. Nevertheless, we have a duty to respond to hatred.

We know that many Islamic nation-states do not allow differing or competing religious ideologies to exist within their borders, at least not without paying "protection fees"(i.e., "jizya tax"). In the civilized world, we would refer to such demands as "extortion". Pubic displays of a cross and any form of proselytizing are forbidden. Wasn’t it just a few months ago that the Afghanis (who we delivered from the clutches of medieval brutality) wanted to execute a man who converted to Christianity? A couple of phone calls were made and the guy was zipped out of the country having been dismissed as "insane." I’ll tell you what’s insane: Killing people and outlawing spiritual practices and beliefs that differ from the official government position.

Do you realize how blessed we are in America? In a coastal community not far from where I compose these words there exists various Christian denomination English and Spanish churches, synagogues, a mosque and a Buddhist shrine all within a two-mile radius. Nobody bothers anyone else. When we look around the so-called "hot spots" in the world, what appears to be the common denominator? Just last week, Palestinian extremists destroyed a YMCA building on the West Bank. The Islamists have virtually driven out the entire Christian Arab population over the last 40 years. And those turds in the media say nothing about it! What about the genocide of African Muslims, Christians and animists in Darfur? And how could we ever forget the Taliban? What a swell bunch of opium traders they were. How would you have enjoyed being a female living with such an enlightened crew? Do you remember when they blew up statues that Buddhists held as sacred? Do you know why? Because they were "anti-Islamic". Oh, I see.

Then there are the madrassahs, the one-stop indoctrination terror centers where boys don’t learn a great deal other than to hate and kill while dovening. Where does the money come to support this? From our "friends", the Saudis, that’s who.

Let’s look at Lebanon: At one time, and not so long ago, it was hailed as "The Switzerland of The Middle East". Beirut was a thriving metropolis, a financial and cultural hub. Christians and Muslims co-existed peacefully. Then what happened? Guys like that ten-ton pantload Arafat were given a voice and legitimized. This scumbag siphoned off tens of millions in humanitarian aid and allowed his wife and kid to live in the lap of luxury in Paris while Palestinians suffered under his despotic thumb. His movement proved to be the antithesis of "liberation". Beirut was blown to bits in sectarian warfare in the ‘80’s, rebuilt again only to be torn asunder this year after the weak "government" got co-opted by a crazed bunch waving green flags who want to destroy Israel. (They fire their arrows in vain, Israel shall never be defeated). Now there’s a pause in the action so the greenies can reload while "UN Peacekeepers" look for buried land mines and unused missiles (there are plenty of those still waiting to be shipped from Damascus). Let’s move east, to Syria (run by that murderous butcher Assad), the import/export armaments department of the Islam-o-Fascists' Superstore where it’s not necessary to put homegrown boots on the ground, not when you have a bunch of greenies willing to take a hit for the home team. But Assad is no more than a middleman, a fence, a cheap thug.

If you want to find the source, you have to go deeper into the desert. Just keep going east, you can’t miss it: (in bright lights) Iran. The psychotic Mouthpiece of the Mullahs is one dangerous little prick. He wants nukes and is making apocalyptic noises. That is about as volatile a mix in mankind’s history. It’s very much like 1936 Germany, only this time with nuclear weapons added to the mix. What’s being done to address the problem? Our "friends" on the UN Security Council want to "negotiate a resolution". How many crises have the UN put their intervening paws on that haven’t turned into a world class clusterfuck?

Then one of the left’s more prominent media toadies floated an untrue story that the Marines "desecrated" their "official spiritual text" and people ended up getting killed in the riots that ensued. Does the toady get fired? Of course not! He routinely makes the rounds on those talking head shows featuring Nantucket Democrat crowd.

Then there was the "cartoon scandal". Apparently Islam forbids any form of images representing their "Great Fearless Leader". When a Dutch periodical published a likeness of Fearless Leader as a political cartoon, the Islamists went wild. The cartoon that featured Fearless Leader with a stick of dynamite in his turban was deemed to be too "offensive" by those fearlessly noble publishers in the West, the very same guardians of good taste who didn’t bat an eye while publishing Maplethorpe’s "Piss Christ" (a Crucifix in a vat of urine), or political cartoons that were derogatory to Catholics. Do we spill out into the streets with venomous rage and burn the editor of the Times in effigy?

And what is the reason for all this hatred of the West? Because we have different ideas, democracy, equality for women, freedom of worship, tolerance, and (how could we forget) we absolutely support the Jewish people in their right to exist in their ancient homeland.

A Westerner’s rather simplistic analogy of the conflict since 1948:

You and I are neighbors. I recently returned to the neighborhood because this has always been home for my family. You don’t like the fact that I moved in and said that $1 that I have is yours, and you only have 10¢. I came by my dollar honestly and am under no legal obligation to share what I have, but you are constantly belligerent and threatening to steal my $1 and kill me. All I want to do is live in peace, but I’m prepared to defend myself. I am compassionate and understand that you are suffering, and because it’s more sensible to have peaceful neighbors than bickering ones, I offer you 10¢ if you promise to simply take it and leave me alone. I can also see that your extended family isn’t really willing to help you out all that much. You then say that you need more time, and put on a show in front of your extended family and other neighbors on the block before saying, no, you need more than 10¢.

We get into an argument. I feel insulted that my offer was rejected. You respond by saying that $1 in my pocket is yours; that I stole it from you and it’s only fair that I give it back. I reply that the $1 in my pocket came by legal means.

You respond by throwing bricks through my window and tossing bombs on my front porch. Whereupon, I go over to your house and smack the living shit out of you, then things quiet down for awhile. I don’t want to do this, but you leave me no alternative. Then the policeman stops by and says that the whole neighborhood wants us to quit bickering. Then we go through this whole finger pointing exercise over who’s the rightful owner of the $1.

Policeman says he’ll do a sit down with us to fix the problem. All I know is that it will cost more than 10¢. But I’m willing to do something good for the neighborhood. So you, me and the Policeman sit down over coffee to work things out. You seem to be on your best behavior whenever he’s around. So we get talking, and the policeman nudges me, and I reluctantly offer you 20¢ to leave me alone. You say all the right words, handshakes and toasts all around, but come time to fish or cut bait, you walk away from the deal.

Then the cycle of violence and intervention repeats itself, each time (with the policeman’s encouragement) I offer you more and more and you keep demanding more and more.

Finally, my family and neighbors encourage me to make you "an offer you can’t refuse": 40¢. This is an offer that would put you in great stead with "the Joneses" and would be detrimental to my survival. But, it’s true, there’s no place like home.

But you just say "no", you want more. But what you want is more than I can give. So at what point do I simply say that you never had any intentions of accepting anything less than the full dollar, and that all of your grand pronouncements of wanting peace in the neighborhood were empty words to garner sympathy from the neighbors. At least you were true to your word from the start: all you wanted was to steal my $1 and kill me.

Last week, I mentioned that, in the abstract, societies organize and develop based on ideas. In their purist form, theocracy, monarchy, democracy, socialism, communism, etc. are ideas cooked up by somebody as a way of tribal organization for purposes of interacting with other tribes. The catalyst of the idea is an act of free will.

Ideas, in an abstract state, are neutral. It is the application of the idea that gives it either positive or negative value. Ideas that are harmful to the individual or restrictive to the application of free will have generally determined to possess negative value while ideas that serve to promote the exercise of free will have generally been considered to connote positive value.

Some tribes have short lives while others have longer lives, in many instances based upon the application of the idea. Some tribal interactions are benign while others are rife with conflict. Sometimes one tribe attempts to conquer the others due to a clash of ideas.
Most ideas make claims of moral superiority as compared with other ideas, but most tribes allow each other the right to go about their business unimpeded. Sometimes one tribe becomes so large that various factions are established within the tribe, each interpreting the central organizing idea independently. When this occurs, the primary organizing idea splinters and either (a) the tribe splinters into smaller independent units; or (b) the factions agree that the central organizing idea is viable enough to encompass the factions under a consensus tribal umbrella.

Certain ideas claim ultimate superiority with no justification other than the idea itself and attempt to force the other tribes to accept their idea under threat of force. Some tribes acquiesce while others resist encroachment. This dynamic is the story of mankind in a nutshell.
During centuries of tribal development and interaction, certain tribes have gained the means not only to destroy those tribes with which it may conflict, but the ability to destroy all of the tribes.

Within each tribe there are adherents of good will who wish no harm to either their tribe or anyone else’s. Within each tribe there are voices of reason that cry out for peaceful coexistence. Sometimes the stewards of the ideas respond, sometimes they don’t.

Where are we in the picture and what do you and I intend to do about it?
Do we surrender, or do we dare to walk the walk by the courage of our convictions?