A Devout Christian Has His Anti Muslim Prejudice Challenged

I have always prided myself on being open-minded and fair, so it was with both surprise and shock that I read Mona Shadia’s weekly column, “Unveiled: A Muslim Girl in O.C.”

I almost couldn’t believe what I was reading: A Muslim telling me, a Christian, that she and people of her religion give some credence to Jesus.

Shadia refers to passages within the Koran regarding Jesus that reflect the very same beliefs that I hold.

 Because, like most Americans, I hold deep-seeded preconceptions and prejudices, I first read the column with more than a little skepticism. I couldn’t help but think, “Is she putting me on? What’s her game?” I couldn’t help but remember Muslims scoffing at my Bible, and now one of them says they include Jesus Christ in theirs?

As I read, I remembered an imam I saw on TV who told his flock, not only before him, but to the whole Muslim world, not to tell the truth to the infidels, we Christians, because we are not worthy, that in fact it is the Muslims’ duty to mislead and lie to the infidel.

When I read the column again, I thought, “This couldn’t be what that imam meant. Shadia couldn’t/wouldn’t be putting this in print for all the world to see it she didn’t believe it, if it didn’t have some level of truth to it, knowing she could and perhaps would, by those Islamic radical terrorists, be killed for saying such things that go against Muslims and their/her religion and their sacred bible, the Koran.”

You might want to know that I have been one of those individuals who since 9/11 felt justified in believing that Muslims are a people never to be trusted, especially after hearing that imam. I have seen and heard things that has reinforced and ingrained this belief very deeply.

FULL ARTICLE FROM THE DAILY PILOT

American Muslims: Fact vs. Fiction

New Poll Dispels Myths About Muslim Americans

News flash: Muslims are the most optimistic religious group in America right now. They are more likely than other religious groups to be satisfied with their lives and to see their standard of living improving. In terms of attitudes toward violent extremism, Muslim Americans are the least likely of all major religious groups to say that attacks on civilians are justifiable. And more than 9 out of 10 Muslim Americans say they are loyal to this country.

If you have colleagues and friends who are Muslim American, these findings from a newGallup poll are probably not surprising. But if you know Muslim Americans only through the skewed lens of the media, you might be shocked. That’s because there is a huge gap between the way Muslim Americans—and their religion, Islam—are seen in the media and who they really are.

In the media—and in resulting public perceptions—Muslims tend to be default, all-purpose villains. They are innately suspect, hostile to democracy, and the likely perpetrators of terrorist attacks anywhere in the world. From the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995 to the Norway bombing this July, many pundits and reporters were quick to say that Muslims did it, even before the facts were in.

FULL ARTICLE FROM CENTER FOR AMERICAN PROGRESS

 

Faith in the Arab Spring

New beginning A villager in Sol looks over a Coptic

church that Muslims helped rebuild after it was

destroyed in May by extremists

 

When President Obama stepped into the State Department on May 19 to deliver his long-awaited speech on the Middle East, he did so amid fears that the Arab Spring was devolving into a Summer of Discontent. Egypt was sagging under a weakening economy and escalating crime; NATO’s efforts in Libya were stuck in neutral; the Syrian government was boasting that its rebellion was over. Sectarian tensions were roiling Bahrain and Syria, and a wave of church burnings in Cairo had spawned a week of deadly violence between Muslims and Christians.

In his speech, Obama confronted these religious struggles head-on. “In a region that was the birthplace of three world religions, intolerance can lead only to suffering and stagnation,” he said. “For this season of change to succeed, Coptic Christians must have the right to worship freely in Cairo, just as Shia must never have their mosques destroyed in Bahrain.”(See “Obama Struggles to Keep Pace with the Middle East Mess.”)

Beyond their political implications, the religious dimensions of the Middle East uprisings have always been central, particularly to the West. Ever since 9/11, the West and Islam have been locked in a chilly standoff. The relationship was captured by Harvard professor Samuel Huntington’s lightning-rod phrase “the Clash of Civilizations.” Huntington’s thesis, which was roundly trashed when it was published as an article in 1993 but became a best seller in book form following Sept. 11, was that Islam taught Muslims to be hostile to freedom, pluralism and individualism.

FULL ARTICLE FROM TIME MAGAZINE BLOG 

Good News Amidst the Bad: A Christian-Muslim Potluck in Alaska

The world knows about Terry Jones and his burning of the Quran in Florida. The one burning begat more, far across the oceans, and innocent people died.

Closer to home, it was comforting to see a more constructive exploration of the differences among us. On Saturday, members of the Muslim community in Fairbanks joined the congregation at Christ Lutheran Church on Farmers Loop for a potluck and a round of stories about their lives and ways of life.

Such moments don’t make more than local news, so few people hear about them outside the communities involved. We can only hope that what such events lack in publicity, they make up in numbers. If every town in America held such gatherings, people would know through their neighbors that they are not threatened by a particular religion so much as a particular way of behaving.

Violence, banishment and discrimination are behaviors that divide and threaten. Wherever they are found, people must turn away to seek peaceful, respectful interaction.

That’s what the people gathered at the Christ Lutheran Church were doing. They started by choosing to focus on their shared humanity rather than their differences in doctrine.

That’s not a bad choice. We can and should disagree with one another about our differences at times, because they are real and they can have real consequences. Our actions and our prescriptions for others are influenced by the specific religious doctrines to which we hitch our souls and to which our cultures owe their roots. Many doctrines drive the world, so we can’t expect perfect moral harmony.

But all of us, of all faiths, should expect that these disagreements and differences are shared peacefully and respectfully. It’s the only way any of us will listen anyway. And what better place to start the conversation than over a dinner table?

FROM THE FAIRBANKS DAILY NEWS MINER

Egypt’s Christians and Muslims Face Unity and Tensions

As Egyptians shape their political destiny, there are questions about whether the Christian-Muslim unity seen during the popular uprising will hold.

On this Sunday morning, Christians attend mass in Egypt’s Coptic Cairo neighborhood, where they have worshipped since pre-Islamic times.  Egypt’s Coptic community is the largest Christian population in the Arab world, as Christians make up about 10 percent of Egypt’s 82 million people.

St. Mark the apostle introduced Christianity to Egypt 2,000 years ago.  And, in this modern time of political uncertainty, Egypt’s Christians say they trust in their ancient faith.

FULL ARTICLE FROM VOICE OF AMERICA

Countering Irrational Attacks on Islam: A religion Pop Quiz

OK, put your books away. We’re having a pop quiz.

Below are four quotes. Each is from one of two sources: the Bible or the Quran, although, just to make things interesting, there’s also a chance all four are from one book. Two were edited for length and one of those was also edited to remove a religion-specific reference. Your job: identify the holy book of origin. Ready? Go:

— “… Wherever you encounter (nonbelievers), kill them, seize them, besiege them, wait for them at every lookout post. …”

— “Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.”

— “If your very own brother, or your son or daughter, or the wife you love, or your closest friend secretly entices you, saying, ‘Let us go and worship other gods’ … do not yield to him or listen to him. Show him no pity. Do not spare him or shield him. You must certainly put him to death.”

— “Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man.”

All right, pens down. How did you do?

FULL ARTICLE FROM DNJ.COM (AND THE ANSWERS!)

 

Muslims, Christians in Memphis Share Differences, Similarities in Sunday Conversations

A small group of Memphis Christians engaged a small group of Memphis Muslims last month in what many of their grandmothers used to call polite conversation.

During one of the conversations, the Christians asked Sehrish Siddiqui, a young Muslim attorney who grew up in Memphis, why she covers her head.

Siddiqui showed the group five pictures of women with their heads covered — a Jewish woman, a Catholic nun, several Eastern Orthodox Christian women, and two Muslim women.

“It was fun to watch people light up with a big smile and surprise when they realized three faiths, rather than one, were presented,” she said.

FULL ARTICLE FROM THE COMMERCIAL APPEAL (MEMPHIS)

 

Do Christians and Muslims Worship the Same God?

by Miroslav Volf

Muslims and Christians can work together to depose dictators and assert the power of the people. We’ve seen it happen on the Tahrir Square in Cairo during the 2011 revolution in Egypt, with devout Muslims and Coptic Christians protesting side by side. But can Muslims and Christians work together to build a democratic society in which rights of all are respected, the rights of minority Coptic Christians no less than the rights of majority Muslims? They can, if they have a common set of fundamental values. But do they? They do, if they, both monotheists, have a common God.

FULL ARTICLE FROM THE HUFFINGTON POST

Muslim American Organization Asks Presidential Hopeful to Apologize for Comments on Islam

Mike Huckabee falsely claims Muslims believe Jesus and his followers are ‘infidels’

WASHINGTON, Feb. 21, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — A prominent national Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization today called on presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee to apologize for “inaccurate and offensive” comments about Islam and to meet with Muslim leaders to discuss growing Islamophobia in American society.

The Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) made those requests after the Fox News host and possible 2012 presidential candidate falsely claimed that Muslims believe “Jesus Christ and all the people who follow him are a bunch of infidels who should be essentially obliterated.”

In his recent “Fox and Friends” interview, Huckabee referred to Islam as the “antithesis of the gospel of Christ.” He also seemed to compare Muslim prayer being allowed in a church to the showing of pornographic films.

Video: Huckabee Infuriated by Church Allowing Muslims to Pray There

http://tinyurl.com/4bsagg3

FULL ARTICLE FROM PR NEWSWIRE

 

Kuwaiti Christian Pastor Speaks out for Law and Order

By Abayomi Adesida

Rev. Amanuel Ghareeb is the pastor of the National Evangelical Church of Kuwait, the umbrella Christian congregation that coordinates the activities of the 150 Kuwaiti Christians among their fellow compatriots of the Islamic faith in the about one million population of Kuwaiti citizens.

Rev. Amanuel Ghareeb 

He spoke as much as the Kuwaiti laws could permit him during an interaction he had with a team of Nigerian journalists who were in Kuwait for two weeks as part of activities that formed a build-up to the Kuwaiti 20th Liberation and 50th National Day. Ghareeb also gave an insight into how religious riots that continue to take innocent lives could be avoided if everybody played his part.

FULL ARTICLE FROM VANGUARD