Of Bishops and Bombers

Catholic World Report ^ | 4/29/13 | William Kilpatrick

[marshmallow]

It is time for Catholic leaders to update their thinking on Islam.

In his Sunday homily the week after the Boston Marathon bombing, Cardinal Sean O’Malley said that the action of the bombers was a “perversion of their religion.” We have grown accustomed to hearing such statements from prelates, as well as from presidents and prime ministers. Terrorist have “perverted” their religion or “distorted” it or “misinterpreted” it. But how accurate are such assessments?

On one occasion, Muhammad ordered the beheading of more than 700 Jews who had surrendered to him. On another occasion, when a severed head was tossed at his feet by one of his men, he exclaimed that it was “more acceptable to me than the choicest camel in Arabia.” On still another occasion he exulted, “I have been made victorious through terror.” Indeed, the Qur’an is full of admonitions to terrorize. Was Muhammad perverting the religion he founded? Was he a “misunderstander” of Islam?

Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev felt obliged by their religion to wage jihad. A song on their YouTube playlist is titled “I will dedicate my life to jihad.” Had they misunderstood or perverted the meaning of jihad? Many of Islam’s official representatives in America would like us to think so. They tell us that jihad is simply an interior spiritual struggle or a quest for self-betterment. For example, the Council on American Islamic Relations in Chicago sponsors a bus ad campaign that presents a benign interpretation of jihad. Sample: a picture of a young Muslim woman wearing a gym outfit and a hijab accompanied by the caption, “My jihad is to keep fit despite my busy schedule. What’s yours?”

That’s one possible way to interpret jihad, but it’s not the main way that jihad has been understood in Islamic tradition throughout the centuries. When.........

[x_plus_one]

A fish rots from the head down, the new pope says allah and yahweh are one and same. What hubris he has to correct a billion moslems about their theology. The blinders of social justice prevent good men from seeing the truth.

[RobbyS]

Well, Allah and "Yaveh "are the same in their way of thinking. One has to take the muslims at their word about the God they think they are worship. Just as Protestants claim that Catholicism is a perversion of true religion , so they claim the same about Judaism and --of course-- Christianity. Their concept of God is certainly closer to the Biblical view than Joseph Smith’s. As for myself, However, I think that both the Koran and the Book of Mormon are false revelations.

[MDLION]

I wonder if Pope Benedict XVI was trying to speak the blunt truth about Islam in Germany in 2006 but then backed off because of the firestorm. The reason I personally don’t want to be around Muslims is I don’t know how each one is going to interpret the Koran.

[x_plus_one]

Salman Rushdie is right. Satanic Verses. Islam is a war plan.

[RobbyS]

Pope Benedict was trying to speak the plain truth about EUROPE! They think they can make an alliance with Islam, as a way of converting Muslims to rationalism. Given the fidism of Islam, and the ascendancy of radical Islam, this is impossible.