(By Michael Stürzenberger)

Various Swiss newspapers are reporting about the end of the ecclesiastical “investigation.” 20-Minuten Online, for example, adorned the story with the headline “Pastor To Keep Distance From Agitation Blog.” The synodal council, after ongoing investigations gave the decree: Hands away from PI. Even though her articles there most obviously produced nothing that could be objectionable:

The investigation resulted in no proof of islamophobic statements or writings by the pastor from Siselen-Finsterhennen, the synodal council recorded. No “hate sermons” were recognized, and the agitant expressions for which she was charged did not come from her.

But yet, she is supposed to stay away from PI, since “degrading and agitating articles” can be read there. At the end of the Inquisition, she bravely promised the following according to 20-Minuten Online (whether she had already been put on the rack wasn’t mentioned):

She stood positively in favor of dialog with an enlightened Islam.

The fable of the legendary “enlightened” Islam – also readily called “Euro-”islam – exists only as long as Muslims are in the minority. Anyone who has even a beginning in dealing with this ideology knows that. When positions of power are finally achieved, then the complete program of the Quran is employed. Anything else would mean blasphemy and apostasy. It is a tragedy that such a knowledgeable, well-read and likeable critic of Islam could be rendered invalid. That’s life in 2012.

“Whose bread I eat, his song I sing,” is how things are. What is left to do when someone is threatened with their existence? As for Islam, we have already long lived under lack of any democratic conditions. These unbearable measures of censorship and reeducation are all precursors of coming religious dictatorship, the full force of which our children and grandchildren will suffer.

The fact that 20-Minuten Online likes at times to fashion its own truths together can be recognized even from the article’s photo series where several factual errors can be seen right away. Fine that Christian Jung and Marco Pino are no longer with the FREEDOM party, but more than likely it still hasn’t been talked about much around Switzerland. But the fact that I was kicked out of the CSU for “islamophobia,” is something new to me. I always thought I had declared my departure in writing on May 25, 2011, so that I could candidate on June 4th for a post on the Bavarian regional FREEDOM committee. But perhaps somebody in the 20-Minuten Online editorial office knew better. And without asking at the branch office of the Munich CSU, as journalists who are interested in objective reporting should actually do.

Der Bund in Bern also reports about the subject: “Seeland Pastor Keeps Hand Away From Agitation Blog“:

The synodal council concludes in their investigation that the controversial Seeland pastor has improved her ways.

“Improved.” Isn’t that nicely formulated. The main thing is that the pastor no longer write anything negative about Islam. Hardly worth talking about is the fact that annually 160,000 Christians are murdered in islamic countries, and around 100 million are being persecuted or discriminated against. It is much more important that a pastor “improve” her ways.

If every critic of Islam had such rigid employers as Christine Dietrich, then we could just hand over the keys to the local imams in a couple of decades. And the Swiss church rulers would be able to turn their churches into mosques and their towers into minarets. My compassion in such a case would be held in serious check because the butchers themselves are paying courtship to only the stupidest of calves.

Posted by byzanz on PI / Translation: Anders Denken

Idea reports:

Churches in Hesse have aided the islamic social service “Green Crescent” in the education of volunteer hospital chaplains. It involved a “very successful cooperation, the charitable organization, which is located in Frankfurt/Main, communicated.

Participating in the education, according to the statements, were departmental representatives from the Hesse-Nassau Church and the (Catholic) diocese of Limburg. As idea found out, there were ten Muslim chaplains educated in the previous year. In addition, in January, the Green Crescent will begin a course for Islamic emergency chaplain that will likewise be accompanied by the Hesse-Nassau church. The education stretches over a half year and takes place one weekend each month. Islamic scholars and evangelical partners are collaborating as lecturers. The organization is counting on 20 to 25 interested individuals. The Green Crescent was founded in 2006 in Frankfurt and sees itself as “transcending the bounds of confession,” although it provides guidance primarily for Muslims. It is active in the areas of nursing service, social and family counseling, private tutoring and islamic pastoral care. Of around six million residents in Hesse, almost 300,000 are Muslims.

Many Christian Missionaries around the world are often active in islamic countries under danger to their lives in order to bring the Christian message of love to people. At the same time, the Church here in Germany is working on sacrificing its Christian fundamentals for Islam.

Contact:

» info@ekhn.de
» ordinariat@bistumlimburg.de

Posted by PI / Translation: Anders Denken

One of his core circle – Judas Iscariot – misunderstood Jesus. He tried to force Jesus to call for an uprise against the Romans and hence, to start a revolution. Judas did this by betraying the one he allegedly believe in.

Anders Breivik refers in his over 1500 pages manifest he wrote under the pseudonym Andrew Berwick – and which is linked in the new English Wikipedia entry on him – to statements of several Islam critics he obviously misunderstood as much as he misunderstood Christianity, he believed fighting for. He saw himself as a crusader of Christian anti-jihad (picture – from his manifest). Breivik writes in his text, on which he must have worked for several years, about eschatological plans, crusades against Islam, the reconquista of Europe like it probably never existed and about “false prophets”. Probably he read the Quran, but did he read the bible? Did he know anything about the God he believe fighting for?

When Judas Iscariot had betrayed Jesus to his persecutors with a kiss, Jesus didn’t call for a revolution. We read in the gospel of Matthew 26,50-52:

And Jesus said to him, “Friend, do what you have come for.” Then they came and laid hands on Jesus and seized Him. And behold, one of those who were with Jesus reached and drew out his sword, and struck the slave of the high priest and cut off his ear. Then Jesus said to him, “Put your sword back into its place; for all those who take up the sword shall perish by the sword.

The grace of God isn’t to find in killing people in his name, but in love towards all other people. Their life is precious and and worth saving, even if they don’t share our opinions. Jesus asks a lot from us, if we take his statements seriously: No cheap appeasement, but real reconciliation, forgiveness and true peace, not only on paper, but with ourselves and each other. For whomever Anders Breivik believes fighting for, it’s not the God manifested in the bible.

We pray for the victims and their families and we ask our readers to please do the same.

In so many words, Jung said:

“We need a public that deals confidently and calmly with the phenomenon of immigration and that doesn’t see a burden in it first of all, but rather a human gain and an enhancement in the cultural diversity that also benefits a country. They are actually young people for the most part that have a promise of something in life, that are setting out to achieve something. Too easily missed in the debate is that there isn’t only immigration but also emigration. Many of the Tunisian refugees will actually not remain for the long term, rather they will move on or return to their homeland to help in the rebuilding of a new Tunisia. Others would like to remain for good reasons and use their energy and skills to forge an existence here among us – if we will let them. Our land needs such motivated young people, that hsould not be forgotten.”

In light of the clear facts regarding the immigrant portion of social aid, criminality, etc. and the fact that there is an issue among the Tunesian refugees of overwhelming unemployment, this naïveté is incomprehensible.

» volker.jung@ekhn-kv.de

(Hat Tip: Samiel)

PI: In the German Wikipedia page about you, you are described as a US-pastor who worked for over 30 years as a missionary in Germany. Would you agree with this description and if so, what is your mission?

I would agree with that statement. I was first, two years down in Munich, and after two years there, we moved to Cologne. Of which we spent around thirty years there as a missionary Pastor. My mission, as I was in Germany was to bring the Salvation message, the Gospel message of Jesus Christ, to the German people. The Church in Germany, as well as in all of Europe, is pretty dead. From my experience, they in general do not really preach the Bible or the Gospel Salvation message. They preach some type of green political gospel. Our mission, now, is to bring an awareness and a warning, to be a type of voice, a type of prophetic voice if you want to call it that. A type of voice that gives a warning concerning radical Islam, the dangers of Islam, and the dangers of Sharia as Islamic law in our society. Also part of our mission here in America and worldwide, besides Islam, is to awaken the Church. The Church needs to stand up on issues whether it be Islam, whether it be an issue like abortion. It is partly the Church’s job, not only to preach the Gospel message and a standard within the confines of the walls of the Church, but to also come outside of that. The Church is one of the last hopes because the Church is to be accountable to God and preaching the message of God. It is very hard to rely upon the worldly system, such as politicians, because politicians are elected and they usually go with what happens to be popular this particular moment. Usually what happens to be popular right now is not often the correct thing, or the correct way to go.

You are often quoted for having said “Islam is of the devil”. In which context have you made this remark? Do you see the relationship between Islam and the devil rather on a theological or on a political level?

I mean it in both of those aspects. Christianity is the only way. The Bible is very clear. Jesus said himself, ‘He is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. That no one comes to the Father, or Salvation, except through Jesus Christ.’ So of course, as a Christian Pastor, I believe the only true Salvation is found in the Bible. It is found in Jesus Christ. In other words that would make any other religion, including Islam, any other ideology, any other theology, other than Christianity of the devil. All others do not lead to eternal life nor to Salvation. As a Pastor, that would be my view. Islam is of the devil could be also be referred to in a political sense, although in that sense it was meant more spiritually. As an American I realize the rights of Islam, the rights of Muslims to worship in our country, to worship freely, and to build mosques. As an American, that is not the problem that we have with Islam. We recognize those rights under our Constitution. The problem we have is with the radical element of Islam that wants to destroy and tear down our way of life, our civilization, the element who wants to replace our constitution and our laws of the land with Sharia. That, of course, we are very radically against. We welcome any Muslims into our country who are willing to obey, submit to, recognize the laws of the land in other words the Constitution of the United States. Otherwise, all Muslims and the radical element that desire to change our Constitution or to replace our Constitution with Sharia, are not welcome here in America. It is very important that Muslims understand from the very beginning what is expected of them when they decide to immigrate into our country.

If Islam is of the devil, what would be salvation? And how could it come? What would you suggest us to do, to be saved from the evil?

Of course, when we’re talking about Salvation, then to me, Salvation is a spiritual word. Then, Salvation is only found through repentance, through the blood of Jesus Christ, through the Bible, through Christianity. That is the only way to find Salvation. This Salvation comes through forgiveness, it comes through repentance, it comes through accepting Jesus Christ.

“What would you suggest us to do, to be saved from the evil?” That I have already answered in a spiritual manner. To be saved from the evil of Islam as far as a society goes, we need very clear rules and regulations. We need to set for Islam very clear boundaries. Those boundaries would be as I have already described. Muslims, their religion and their mosques are indeed welcome in our society. In our free society where we recognize the human rights of individuals and the civil rights of individuals, where we recognize their right to worship, to build mosques. That is not a problem. However, very clear boundaries need to be set when we get into the political aspect of Islam. Sharia, the overthrow of our government, those types of things are not welcome in our society. When it comes to the radical element of Islam, it needs to be clearly stated that that type of ideology, that type of thinking, that type of goals are not welcome here in America. They are, I assume, not welcome in Europe. We will fight that radical element, we will resist that type of attitude, that type of takeover or plan.

You have become internationally famous by your annunciation to burn a copy of the quran. What was your intention to do this? What have you hoped to achieve and what was the outcome of the prevented action?

It came about because of September the eleventh. We had already been active for quite some time concerning Islam and radical Islam. The 9/11 event was to honor those who were murdered at that time, and it was also intended to send a very clear message to radical Islam. It was to send them a warning. It was to be a type of protest, demonstration against them burning Bibles, burning churches, burning people. Muslims are welcome in America. What is not welcome is Islam’s desire, as they have said many times, as the founder of CAIR has said, is to replace our Constitution, to make the Koran the highest law of the land, by instituting Sharia. Those types of things are not welcome. The burning of the Koran was a protest and a demonstration against that. Later on it came into connection with the mosque in New York, which we are also opposed to. We are not opposed to the mosque because of it not being their right to build it. They have a right to build the mosque there as long as they meet certain building regulations. Building the mosque at Ground Zero is in very poor taste. Most of Americans do not desire the mosque to be built there and want the mosque moved to a different location. It would be a very positive gesture by a so-called religion of peace, if they decide to bow to the will of the people and move the mosque. Their lack of doing that, their persistence, and their stubbornness further proves that Islam is not a religion of peace, also that Islam is not willing to give and take. Islam is not willing to be integrated into a society. As far as Islam is concerned, it is Islam’s way or nothing at all. As you can see, amidst all of the protests, they still are not willing to simply move the mosque to a different location.

“What have you hoped to achieve and what was the outcome of the prevented action?” We hope to have achieved and continue to bring an awareness of Islam, so people will begin to look at it, and see that there is a very, very dangerous element of Islam. Our point was proven very well. On 9/11, we did not burn the Koran. We did not break any laws according to our Constitution and freedom of speech. But all around the world, especially there in Indonesia and Pakistan violence broke out. There is a root element of Islam that is fueled by the radical statements and violent statements that you find in the Koran. Islam proves itself to be a violent, radical religion because of the violence that breaks out around the world, and because of the people who are involved in it are so afraid of Islam themselves.

What do you think of the criticism coming from other Islam critics who condemned your idea of burning the quran?

Most people who criticize Islam are just talkers. As a society, we have lost our guts to stand up. We see that very clearly in the Church. Even here in America, very famous people like Franklin Graham and other ministers of the Gospel have spoken out very boldly against Islam in the past. When we decided to actually do something by burning copies of the Koran in protest, they did not side with us. Instead, they came against us. Even our own government, our own President, and other government officials came against us. Instead of siding with us, for our right to freedom of expression and freedom of speech, they agreed with the decision of Islam to build a mosque near Ground Zero. Thus proving that our society has become a society of talkers and not a society that is willing to do something. Thus proving that our society has been infiltrated by cowardness, it has been infiltrated by political correctness, it has been infiltrated by people who are more willing to appease evil than to actually stand up and speak out against a very, very apparent threat.

A lot of people fighting Islam are Christians, others are Jews, agnostics or atheists. On which level do you think the own religious background matters in the fight against Islam? And would you like to replace Islam by Christianity?

It does not matter in the fight against Islam, in the fight against Sharia, in the fight against the advancement of the lie and deception of Islam through Europe and through the United States,. In that particular aspect, the religious background does not matter. Whether they are Christians or Jews, whether the are Atheists, whether they are believers or non-believers, in this particular fight we can all unite together on the fact that Islam, radical Islam, is very, very dangerous and we must fight together. We can stand together for their rights just like Christians have rights, Jews have rights, Atheists have rights, Muslims have rights. They have a right to religious freedom, freedom of expression, freedom to build places of worship. We can all unite together under these causes. It is very important, that in this particular aspect, the religious views, or the lack of religious views does not matter. We need to, and we must unite together against this common evil, this threat, radical Islam.

“And would you like to replace Islam by Christianity?” It depends on who you’re asking. When you ask Terry Jones, the Pastor, of course I believe that Jesus Christ is the only way. It is my desire that everyone is saved and comes to the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ as being the one and only way and Savior. It would be my desire that the 1.5 billion Muslims get saved. When that question is put to me as a Pastor, of course that is my desire. As an American, I recognize the Constitution of the United States, freedom of religion and freedom of speech. I recognize and honor their religion or their right to practice their religion without any form of persecution or social or economical disadvantages. In that sense we are a hundred percent for their rights, and stand to our Constitution, freedom of speech and freedom of religion.

Like Geert Wilders before, you were hindered to enter the UK in the beginning of this year. How did the British authorities justify this? Are you going to fight such kind of treatment in any way?

You can find we received, on a Tuesday a letter from the British government informing us that we would be denied entry into the UK. That letter can be found on our web site www.standupamericanow.org if you would like to read that. It said they felt that our coming to the UK would not be beneficial for the good of the general population. Of course we are in very much disagreement with that. We had assured the British government, as well as the British news media, when we did many, many interviews in that period of time, that we would not have been there to break any type of laws. We recognize that Britain has a type of limited freedom of speech. We had no intention in violating that. Our message would have been a very positive message. It would have been a message of acceptance and obedience. In other words it is our job as Americans, as Brits, as citizens of a country, to accept people who immigrate into our country. People who we allow to immigrate into our country should be allowed the same human rights, religious rights as anyone else. In that sense it is a message of acceptance and even of tolerance, if you want to use that word. The other message would have been a message of obedience. We do indeed expect people who immigrate into our country to be obedient. In other words, for them to respect, honor and obey the laws of the land, in our case here in America the Constitution of the United States. We do not expect and we will not allow them to alter or change our Constitution. We expect for them to honor, obey and submit to the laws of the land. If they wish to be governed by Sharia then that is definitely a desire that we do not have here. If they wish to be governed by Sharia, then they should go back to countries who honor that. There are many countries around the world who honor Sharia, Islamic law. If that is their desire, then they should go and immigrate to those countries. It is not our desire here. So in that sense it would have been a very valuable message for the UK or for any other European country, a message of acceptance on our part and a message of obedience on the part of the person who has immigrated into a foreign country.

“Are you going to fight such kind of treatment in any way?” We are checking into fighting that ban. From what we have been able to understand and from what we have been informed by a couple different authorities, the British government did indeed act contrary to International Law and violated our human right to freedom of speech.

We have heard about your idea of bringing the quran into court, which was reported in German media. What do you hope to achieve? Do you think there are realistic legal ways to forbid the quran like “Mein Kampf” is forbidden in Germany, for example? How exactly would you reason a quran-ban?

We have declared, March the 20th, 2011, International Judge the Koran Day. That event will be set up like a regular court. We will have a judge, a jury or type of counsel. We will have a prosecuting attorney and a defense attorney. At that time the Koran will be put on trial. The trial will take place in Arabic and in English. We need to go back to the original language of the Koran because as we are all aware, the Koran in its original state is even more violent than the watered down English translation. We believe the Koran will, without a doubt, be found guilty. If it is found guilty, then it will be punished. We have chosen one of four punishments. The Koran will either be burned, drowned, shredded, or face a firing squad. We will show the whole world that indeed the Koran, when strictly followed, does lead to terrorist activity. It does lead to murder. It does encourage the murder of unbelievers, of anyone who resists or criticizes the Koran, or its so-called prophet Mohammed. We will take those findings to Washington DC, present them to our government officials, in the hope that they will demand and convince countries dominated by Islam to institute in their land freedom of speech and freedom of religion. For many, many generations the Christian Church and other minorities in countries dominated by Islam have been persecuted.

We hope that in finding the Koran guilty, by revealing the true violent nature of the Koran, we will be able to convince our government and our government will try to convince other governments to open up their minds, open up their borders to freedom of speech and freedom of religion.

“Do you think there are realistic legal ways to forbid the quran like “Mein Kampf” is forbidden in Germany, for example? How exactly would you reason a quran-ban?” I know in Germany Mein Kampf has been banned and in Holland also. It is at this time not our intention to get the Koran banned. Our intention is to warn the people and to reveal the deception of the Koran, the violence of the Koran. The Koran and Islamic religion is actually a religion of great, great seduction, and of great deception and oppression.

Thank you.

(By Peter Stiegnitz / Translation: Anders Denken)

Now these were just a few characteristic examples of the mentality of submission throughout all of Europe. All of these and many other examples demonstrate our attitude from a world without self-respect and self-esteem. The answers to the threat of an ever more radical Islamism show up either in the functions of the West’s own culture or in racist outbreaks of hate over the circuitous route of a “battle of the cultures.”

But since both of these extreme variations are mistaken and useless, it befalls our intellectual and cosmopolitan representatives to recommend nothing other than “dialog.” They forget in this that only equally qualified partners and those of equal standing can lead a targeted dialog. “Dialogs” are conversations that are carried out between two groups in order to become acquainted with one’s own and the other side’s points of view. Our point of view should represent the Western tradition and present.

The geopolitical concept of “The West” was originally limited only to Europe, that lies in the West, in the direction of the setting sun. In order to prevent any kind of Eurocentrism, the “West” is considered to be the Occident, the Western World, in contrast to the Eastern World, or the Orient.

According to former Federal President Theodor Heuss, the Western World rests on three hills: the Acropolis, the Capitol, and Golgotha. In modern opinion, this also includes Mount Zion and the mountains of corpses from the French Revolution. And Judaism and the Enlightenment make up the other origins of the Western World.

Also, the Western World is nothing monolithic, like all other cultures in the world, it enjoys rich origins, such as the Mesopotamian and Egyptian high cultures, for example. This is where the first great differences with the Islamic Orient appear, which leaves out such Asiatic cultures as Buddhism and Hinduism; therefore, the harsh demarcation of Islam from every “infidel” culture.

The first great character of the united West was Charlemagne, who was crowned in the year 800 as the “Roman” Caesar, and no longer as the Frankish Caesar. The second great symbol of the West is, without doubt, the “Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation” (1474-1806). This first great multi-ethnic kingdom was more accurately neither “Roman” nor “holy,” and in now way “German.” The living and successful embodiment of our tradition was a rather strange entity; it had no capital, it’s head was chosen from seven electoral princes and confirmed by the Reichstag (royal session) in Regensburg. Of course, the Empire deteriorated under Napoleon’s enlightened imperialism, however the body of thought of the European West remained further uninterrupted. Thus certain writers and intellects like Novalis and the Schlegel brothers openly professed the Hellenistic-Roman-Germanic and Christian heritage of the Western World.

In contrast to the citizen movement of the Enlightenment, which encouraged the creation of nation-states and dictatorships, the Western tradition preferred the Judeo-Christian national concept of supranationality that we experience more than celebrate today as the European Union. And that the liberal-lay politicians of our time don’t wish to see “God” and “religion” – much less “Christianity” – in our EU Constitution, is a stupid, dull and unjust break with our tradition. And so we stand here like children with empty hands who have disowned their parents as a consequence of this internal hollowing out of our tradition in the face of Islam.

Emancipation from Tradition

Under the shadow of the constant flare up of the “War of Cultures,” we discover the deciding formula of the difference between Orient and Occident: While our Occident cultivates emancipation without tradition, the Orient indulges in tradition without emancipation. Also, the flipside of both characteristics is ominous: Knowledge without faith in the Occident is foolish, and knowledge without faith in the Orient is dangerous.

We have finally gotten our revenge on Adam and Eve: God drove both of the apple-eaters out of Paradise, and we have driven God out of our pitiful world and declared the European Union free of Western tradition and of religion. The recipe against this psychological void is the rediscovery of Western tradition.

The five origins of the Western World are recognized as: Greek philosophy, Roman policy, Jewish religion, Christian missions, and ultimately the Enlightenment:

• Greek philosophy created among other things the idea of dualism (Socrates, Plato, Aristotle and Plotinus) and those of absolutism (Plotinus’ archetype), the entry into humanism by Protagoras (“The human is the measure of all things”) and the teachings of Aristotle (reason as virtue) created the cornerstones of our culture.

• Without Rome’s policies between the 6th century before and the 6th century after Christ’s birth, we could hardly say anything about the Western World. And if so, it would more be like a closing guard than a waking guard of Western culture. The Roman millennium can in short be best characterized with “administration and policy.” Rome didn’t only create the first European empire, it was also the foundation for arts and science.

• The Jewish religion, this instrumentalization of the Egyption Echnaton’s monotheistic faith, is in itself the unification of three concepts: God, faith and history. The law of Moses, Jesus and Paul is sealed up in all three. Only at the Jewish Disaspora – and before that, in Babylonian exile – did religion become the connective link of this people. Also, that which is normal course in our Western life, and unavoidable for our entire development – science, research and publication – is of Jewish origin. Knowledge developed out of mandatory study of the Torah, research from the commentaries in the Talmud and the publication of the writings of these commentaries

• But why the Christian “missions”? Because Christianity is not a Western religion, rather the sequel that is the universal dissemination of the Jewish religion. The real founder of Christianity was not the Jewish rabbi Yeshua, but the Roman-assimilated Jew Saul of Tarsus who from that time on called himself Paul, and as “the Apostle to the Gentiles” and the great repackager brought the teachings of Jesus into the world.

• The civilization of the Enlightenment, this child of Evangelical disobedience to the Pope and clergy, this jealous daughter of humanistic emancipation, had a real father: Immanuel Kant, on whose hands stuck, in contrast to the French revolutionaries, blood from the highest noses, who laid out the marching trail for the Western epochs of enlightenment. Man should “use his own intellect” and rescue himself from “the immaturity for which he himself is responsible.” While in France the executioners worked overtime in their executions, those in Germany with fixed employment had to work overtime; in any case, it wasn’t the executioners, but the writers and printers of books and newspapers. These children’s children of Martin Luther advanced the Jewish tradition: they were free thinkers, without ecclesiastical pressure, commented on God and the world and were the pioneers of our modern democracy along with secularism and prosperity. It was on the shoulders of the French “sufferers” and the German “leaders,” that the civilization of Enlightenment blossomed.

“Learn … Safety”

The admonition of Bruno Kreisky that has meanwhile become a classic (“Mr. Editor, learn history!”) is more current than ever before. When, on the one side, we carry on dialog with Islam at eye level, and on the other, push integration (“integration with the whole”) forward with the Muslim immigrants, it becomes necessary to understand our own cultural position, the roots thereof that import security.

Kreisky’s admonition reminds me of a question from my Muslim friend – “How can you take your religion, your culture, seriously if you no longer know what it is…?” And he was right. How can we expect an outward adaptation from the immigrants of this faith, a certain acceptance of our Western culture, if we ourselves don’t know what our culture is? “Look,” my Muslim friend and conversation partner said, we endeavor to follow the laws of the Quran. You all should accept that and not misinterpret it with the shake of your head. We want respect from you. However ‘respect’ is not a one-way street; we also intend to respect your culture, however, we don’t see it; it doesn’t appear to be available anymore – and your social and sexual freedom, certainly also consequences of Enlightenment, are not enough for us.”

Every person in this world desires not only freedom but also order, stability and tradition. Even Wittgenstein’s statement (“everything that happens is the repetition of something that has happened before”) depends on the knowledge of that which has already happened, which we must learn in order to understand our times better.

Our ongoing error of raising the “Enlightenment” to the sole source of our tradition already strikes against Freud’s teaching, “Psychoanalysis warns us of the autonomic ideal of the Enlightenment that will degenerate into a psychological ‘culture of narcissism.’ (Eli Zaretsky in “Freud’s Century”).

The necessary dialog between Orient and Occident requires not only the particular strengths (from tradition) of each of the dialog partners but also the knowledge of the other side. Especially so in our concrete case. In contrast to the Jewish love of tradition, to Catholic universalism and to Protestant cosmopolitanism, Islamic tradition is controversial. Since Muhammad didn’t spread out God’s word into all areas of life, the Sunna (tradition) proceeded to do so more carefully. And that is something that must be taken into account in the dialog. At the same time, we should not forget that tradition influences all of our lives. If it becomes hollowed out or completely pushed out of our historical conscience, then we must count on general insecurity, and insecurity is the worst position thinkable in any dialog.

We will only be done with the problems of the present when the Western world becomes mindful of its history. – Today, the international political situation between the Orient and the Occident is quite different: Without history, people (of the West) will not understand the present and have no future; without a future, people (of the East) dwell in past history and consider it to be the present.

» About the Author: Prof. Dr. Peter Stiegnitz (born September 30, 1936 in Budapest) ist a sociologist, Professor Emeritus at the Budapest University and a Publicist.

(A reflective discussion — by “Wegbereiter” / Translation: Anders Denken)

What really happened? What was so horrible that compelled politicians all over the Western world with sharp tongue and and chopping block rhetoric to disassociate themselves from one man whom they had never before heard of? The answer to this is obvious. Somebody did that which according to an unwritten law should have been strictly kept from happening. Somebody exercised unnecessary as well as distasteful provocation against Islam. Not a sympathetic caricaturist that could be brought in for the purpose of free press and free speech, but a madman who wanted to burn a couple hundred copies of the holy book of the Muslim world.

All of us know what would happen, some Mullah in Somalia announced the burning of a couple hundred editions of the New Testament. Apart from a marginal note on the back pages of the average local paper and a request by the Pope for forbearance — nothing! This situation should really surprise us. And, in fact, regardless of whether three workers in a Bible publishing house were massacred in the Turkish city Malatya “for the homeland,” whether Sunni terrorist groups are on the hunt for those of other faiths in Irak, whether dozens of Christians are on death row awaiting their execution in Pakistan because of offenses against the “blasphemy law,” or a Catholic priest in Trabzon on the Black Sea or an Italian nun is shot in Somalia, or perhaps whether a Yemeni farmer is executed because he departed from the “true faith” and converted to Christianity — the reaction is pretty much the same: a mixture of indignation, ignorance and trivialization spreads out far and wide among us. But no German chancellor, no US president or vice-vresident has come before a camera in any one of these cases with the same enthusiastic indignation or threatening speeches to announce their contempt.

And the leaders of the Muslim world have done just as little — with great difficulty would they ever find the time to follow up on the affairs of their governments. In the Arab as well as in the Western world, the protest of the Muslim people is more notably absent. There aren’t any mass protests by peaceful Muslims against the gruesome acts of Islamic fundamentalists, whether in progressive Beirut or in front of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin. Actually the behavior is different as soon as an Israeli tank rolls into the Gaza Strip. Why shouldn’t the impression of quiet tolerance spring up on the side of the majority of peaceful Muslims for their radical brethren in the faith? This happened, as is too well known, when the peaceful citizens, the civilians, also made the Holocaust possible only through their tolerance. Because, sometimes even doing nothing can be sinful! Perhaps, even this defines the often lacking difference between Islam and Islamism because the image, however, seems notorious: On the one side there are millions of Muslims who within hours organize in worldwide protest marches as soon as they think they’ve been wronged. On the other side, however, there is unimaginable silence, the sinister lack of surprise over monstrous beheadings before running cameras after the butchering of Western aid personnel and complete families in the Middle East.

And even in this, the circle is drawn around Pastor Jones. Because among us here in the West things remarkably seem to be conducted in the opposite way. We ignore the injustice against members of our culture on the part of Islamic fundamentalists, and with a shrug we declare it to be one unexplainable isolated case after the other, not worth a further look — however we spit poison and gall when one of ours sets out to perform a similar act of barbarity. Just how is this to be explained? Do we keep a different standard for Muslims than for ourselves? Do we consider those to be noble savages whom we can’t expect to live by our fundamental values and on whose level we don’t want to be placed?

This viewpoint would be most profoundly racist, and in fact an extremely rude insult to all peaceful and well-integrated Muslims. And anyway, since not everyone in the West can be racist, starting with Angela Merkel and all the way to Barack Obama, then there must be another explanation. Do we feel that we are endebted or under obligation to them? Have we not simply made ourselves into slaves of political correctness and made this into an end in itself? Are we tolerant to the point of sainthood, or week and decadent? Who is capable of producing the correct answer to this?

One thing, however, seems certain: while we turn xenophobia in a great style into a phobia against ourselves, produce prohibitions of speech and thought against ourselves, concede to ourselves hardly a fraction of tolerance that we show to others, we are harming our Western society and rule of law. We have managed to achieve the opposite of that which we intuitively hope to achieve through our attitude.

(Photo © www.islamisofthedevil.com)

Idea writes:

CHURCHES AND RAMADAN

This year, the Muslim Ramadan fasting month goes from August 11th to September 9th. Because Ramadan occurs at different times of the year in accordance with the Islamic lunar calendar, the duty of fasting during the day presents a seasonally changing concern. During this time it is not permitted to eat or drink during the day, the Muslim is also among other things to restrain from sexual activity and smoking. After sundown everything is once again permitted that was forbidden during the day. Muslim fasting, therefore, distinguishes itself fundamentally from Jewish and Christian fasting which is set up to turn toward God in a special way. In this, fasting is often a sign of repentance for wrongs committed. The Bible often mentions of such fasting.

Similar to the Muslim “prayer” (=recitation of certain Suras), Ramadan is a commendable action that is supposed to effectuate the way into Allah’s paradise. The prophet, “peace be unto him,” said, “if one fulfills his obligation in Ramadan, this is equivalent to 70 months of other fulfilled obligations. … It is a month whose beginning is mercy, whose middle is forgiveness, and whose end is liberation from Hell fire” (A. Khoury, Islam Lexicon, Freiburg 1991).

Of course, the lunar cycles bring to mind the lunar god Allah, who besides 360 other gods was worshipped in Mecca before Muhammad lifted him up to be the only deity. His symbol, by the way, is the crescent, which to this day decorates every mosque and can be seen on the flags of many Islamic countries (Ramon Bennett, Philistine — or the Grand Deception, Lüdenscheid 1996 [German]). The night of the 27th Ramadan is considered especially sacred, the “Night of Calling” in which the first revelation of the Quran, along with accompanying phenomena, was given to Muhammad. With this commenced the reign of the Quran over many people who gave up their freedom and subjected (= ‘islam’)themselves to the misanthropic doctrines of Allah.

Like hardly at any other time of the year, Muslims have the feeling in Ramadan of a great fellowship that also demonstrates a presumed superiority over the “infidels,” by which they attack Jews and Christians in a special way during this month. It is not seldom that in Islamic countries churches still available then go up in flames, or it leads to massacres against Christians.

But in spite of that, many church leaders and politicians regard Islam as enrichment — whether out of ignorance or from the belief that all religions, after all, are still the same. Thus, not only does the Federal President but also the church leaders consistently convey their “cordial wishes for success and blessing” at the time of Ramadan. The Wetzlar Christian weekly magazine “idea-Spektrum” reported about two examples in its newest edition (Number 33) on August 18, 2010:

Islam is an Enrichment

Church president Jung greets Islamic associations at the month of fasting, “The Hesse-Nassau church president Volker Jung (Darmstadt) has advocated that ‘the presence of Muslim religious fellowships not be recognized as competition, but rather as enrichment.’ The occasion is the Islamic Ramadan month of fasting that began on August 11th. Jung conveyed ‘cordial wishes of success and blessing’ to the top representatives of three Islamic associations. For the Muslims, he wishes Ramadan to be ‘an important time of reflection for body and spirit’ and ‘a festival of peace.’ The dialog with the Muslim associations has grown in on all levels of Church (!) life. With this common interests for the formation of society have come to light: ‘We are bonded together by the wish for a confession-linked religious upbringing of our children, according to educational fairness in schools, equality for chance in the workplace and according to social fairness. We intend to engage ourselves to the end that poverty, racism and fundamentalism have no chances in our soceity.’ The great festivals of faith (!) are support for this. …”

Muslim-Evangelical Banquet in Delmenhorst

In Delmenhorst, the regional bishop Jan Janssen has taken the effort to show unity and a good togetherness between Christians and Muslims during Ramadan.

“The Oldenburg regional bishop Jan Janssen has expressed his support of genuine, neighborly relations between Muslims and Christians.” He acknowledged the good togetherness at the fist Muslim-Evangelical (!) banquet at the beginning of the Islamic month of fasting Ramadan in Delmenhorst…. The Delmenhorst Mevlana Mosque Fellowship and the Church Fellowship ‘for The Twelve Apostles’ sent out an invitation to the Iftar meal on the evening of August 11th.” In a greeting before more than 200 religious and political guests, Janssen stressed the importance of dialog without prejudices.

The Mevlana mosque and the church fellowship have cultivated exchange and encounter for years. The Muslim meal for breaking the fast has taken place in the Evangelical house of fellowship many times!

For Christians, love of neighbor — and also toward the “infidel” — is a binding duty by the Bible. In the Quran, however more than 200 Sura passages call for the battling against non-Muslims “until all of them believe in Allah” (Sura 8:40. “Fight against every one of them to whom the Scripture was given (the Jews and Christians) who don’t believe in Allah. (…) Allah slew them to death! How are they without understanding!” (Sura 9:29f). The Taliban (= ‘pupils’ of the Quran) also are of the same viewpoint as the “holy” Quran, in which the death penalty can neither be criticized or altered, and a short while ago killed ten medical helpers in Afghanistan, no murders. They did what the Quran expressly teaches.

So the question remains: How do the above-mentioned courageous ecclesiastical friends of dialog deal with this reality?

Not at all. Islam is treated as a request program that masks out real existence. Nothing negative is allowed to be brought in connection with it, not even the Quran. The latter will not be quoted one single time. Otherwise that would then be “right-wing populist.”

(Hat tip: Herbert N. / Translation: Anders Denken)

Evangelisch.de reports:

Jerusalem-born Younan is seen as a valiant fighter for a suitable peace in the Middle East and developer of interreligious dialog. Because of his sharp criticism of Israeli occupation policy and the fence that separates Israel from West Jordan, Younan, who comes from a refugee family, has also had the career as an advocate of Palestinian liberation theology since 1998. …

In an appeal cosigned by Younan at the end of 2009, the authors label the occupation of the Palestinian areas “as sin against God and the people.” It states further, “We believe that we as Christians must exercise resistance against the Israeli occupation.”

The Lutheran World Alliance has also voted for a man at the top who intends to help the Arabs drive the Jews into the sea, and who signifies the Jewish presence in the “Holy Land” as “sin against God (Allah) and the people.” Nobody seems to be upset over this: In Germany his election garnered applause from the Evangelical as well as from the Catholic side.

The churches in Germany welcomed the election of Younan. As bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and in the Holy Land, he comes from a small church that in addition has to confirm that it is in a difficult situation, the officiating head of council for the Evangelical Church in Germany (EKD), Nikolaus Schneider, stated. He guaranteed Younan the support of the EKD in his difficult duty as the new head of the Lutheran Church Alliance of 70 million Christians.

The head of the Catholic German Bishops Conference, Archbishop Robert Zollitsch, expressed his hope in a congratulatory letter that “the dialog between the Catholic Church and the Lutheran Alliance will also be advanced in constructive fashion in the future.” Zollitsch wished the new president God’s blessings, “above all also in your responsibility as bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land.”

And there again is “Holy Land” — as if one would have to burn his tongue for saying Israel and not one single spark of the lightest criticism is allowed for the Grand Muft Bishop of Jerusalem…

(Thanks to all contributors / Translation: Anders Denken)

(By Anders Denken)

Jesus Christ said, “By this shall they know that you are my disciples, if you have love one to another.” John 13:35

The true hallmark of Christianity, at least outwardly, is the demonstration of love to your fellow man. Jesus Christ even quoted the shema (Deuteronomy 6:4,5) when answering a lawyer’s question of what was the most important law (Matthew 22:35). He said that the most important law was to love God with all your soul and might, then to complete the package he said that there was a second like the first one. That was “you shall love your neighbor as yourself.” He defined what a ‘neighbor’ is in His parable about the Good Samaritan.

Jesus said that the whole Law hinges on these two commandments.

How can you love your neighbor as yourself, if you don’t love God with your soul and might first. Paul explains in his letters that those who don’t love God simply follow their own lusts (or desires), and he describes in many places how the fulfillment of those desires are carried out. A good example of the set of sins represented by lust (self-desires) is found in Romans 1:29-31: “Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness, full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers, backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, without understanding, covenant breakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful”.

Among those are mentioned murder, debate, deceit, malignity, inventors of evil things, without understanding, covenant breakers, implacable, and unmerciful. And Paul includes with them the sins of sexuality, but also points out in the middle of the whole heap the ‘haters of God.’ Thereby he equates all of these sins with hating God. Many of these sins are acceptable in Islam, such as deceit, murder, malignity, invention of evil things, breaking of covenants, implacability and mercilessness — as well as the treatment of non-Muslims with the same sins that non-Muslims commit in their judgment. This is a do-as-I-say-not-as-I-do way of conducting life that God (in Arabic ‘Allah,’ but not the Allah of the Quran) condemns and will judge.

Before we go any further, let’s see who Paul was.

Before Paul converted to Christianity, he was a devout Jew, educated under one of the foremost scholars of his day, Gamaliel. You can see an explanation by Paul himself in Acts 22 and in Philippians 3.

Paul was so zealous that he sought to persecute and kill the Christians (‘people of the book’ as Muhammad would call them 550 years later) as we see in Acts 8 and 9. He even got letters of the very religious leaders that had Jesus crucified permitting him to pursue them. However, God did not like the track of persecution and murder he was taking, and He had different plans for him. He stopped him on the way to Damascus with a blinding light. God Himself told Paul (Saul) that he was persecuting Him by persecuting the people of the book, and that he wanted him to repent and turn to Jesus Christ. This revelation of God was witnessed by the men he was with, so it was not a self-proclaimed revelation, as in the case with Muhammad. Thus, we see here that God is not pleased with persecution and murder. This same Paul has given us 13 letters in the New Testament in which he talks not only about his conversion to Jesus Christ, but also about what a life devoted to serving God produces. None of the evil things mentioned above are a part of anybody’s life who is wholly dedicated to serving God.

Paul also points out in Romans 2 that we are not to judge others, that God alone is the judge. Now, here’s the sticky point. God may (and I emphasize the word ‘may’) appoint men to execute His judgment against men, but he doesn’t tell a religious group that they are supposed to carry this judgment out. Men who are used in His plan will not know that they are being used for this purpose, for He is the Creator of the Universe and has every right to do with His creation what He wishes. It is not for man to say, “I am set up as judge to kill those who do not follow God’s commands or will.” That is simple presumption. We see this in the Paul’s life before his conversion. When extra-Biblical sources are used as the foundation for dogma, the risk of error increases dramatically.

Much less are we to say that we are the appointed ones for setting up God’s kingdom on the earth. God will be the judge, and He will set up His kingdom on the earth in His time. The things we do in this life will, however, be judged by God — either here on the earth or at the beginning of eternity. Hebrews 9:27 says, “it is appointed unto man once to die, and after this the judgment”. Paul also says in Galatians 6:7-8, “Be not deceived, God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. For he that soweth to his flesh, shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting.” John, the writer of the Apocalypse, also points out that if our names are not written in the “book of life,” then we’ll be cast into the lake of fire for eternity.

Before you write this article off, consider who we’re dealing with here. If you do a project for yourself and make, for instance, a car. To whom does the car belong? If you would make a fleet of cars, to whom would these cars belong? Do you not have all rights to these cars? Does any one of these cars have the right to destroy the other car, except you would appoint it to do so? Thus, if God created the universe, does He not then have all rights to it? Are we not also part of this universe that He created? Thus, where do we get the right to kill others, if He hasn’t appointed us to do so?

Now, back to the track I left a few paragraphs ago.

God said, and His Son Jesus Christ reiterated it, that we are to love Him with all our heart and strength, and that we are to love our neighbor as ourselves. And He said in John 15:13, “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” Thus, if we are to love our neighbor as ourselves, how do we do this? I understand ‘loving myself’ as being good to myself, getting those things that please me, and ultimately, as much as is possible, preserving my life. Thus, if we love our neighbors as ourselves, then we would be good to them, do and get things to please them and help them, and ultimately, as much as is possible for us, do things that help preserve their life.

This is diametrically opposite to the doctrine of interneighborly relations put forth by Islam. Let’s look at a few of the aforementioned words in points.

1. Deceit. We have seen the references in the Quran that allow the Muslim to deceive (Sura 3:54 as one example), if it will achieve the so-called will of Allah for them to dominate the world. We hear ‘Islam is peace,’ but that which is said and that which is done are poles towards each other.

2. Murder. How many articles have I translated and seen about this subject? So-called ‘honor murders,’ have no place in Christianity, and they were wrongly justified by the ‘Church’ in the Crusades and the Inqisitions. Jesus Christ reiterated the commandment, “Thou shalt not kill (murder),” and also took it a step further by saying that those who would call his fellow person a “fool” were in danger of Hell fire itself. He DIDN’T say that others would commit them to Hell, but that they would be judged by Him for their actions.

3. Malignity. Evil actions. What is good about the destruction of others’ property? Cars, windows of houses, churches, etc. are being destroyed in the name of Allah. God (Arabic ‘Allah’ but not the Allah of the Quran) condemns actions of evil. Period. There is NO excuse for it except by a self-proclaimed prophet Muhammad who excused his violence (which God hates – Psalm 11:5) with such a statement that it was acceptable for non-Muslims. The desecration of non-Muslim religious symbols such as of a cross is included here.

4. Invention of evil things. Planes that fly into towers containing 3,000 people. That was an evil invention set up by al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden, amongst others, that are all adherents of writings that call for such things. Thus, the writings themselves are evil as well because they call for evil things.

5. Breaking of covenants. “Democracy is the train we’ll ride on until we reach our destination.” –Erdogan

6. Implacability. The world-wide reaction to Israel’s actions of self-defense in the Gaza flotilla incident speaks volumes to this, not to mention the reactions to Geert Wilders’ film and sayings.

7. Mercilessness. Girls are mercilessly killed for so-called desecration of honor; non-Muslim women are brutally and mercilessly raped for hours on end, simply because this is allowed by the Islamic writings and they are non-Muslim.

I forgot to mention another one that Paul talks about.

8. Boasting/Pride. The thing of late that comes to mind is Cordoba and Cordoba House. For those who have forgotten their history, Cordoba is the place where the Muslims built the first mosque after they had conquered what is now Spain. How symbolic is it then, that the “community center” in New York City being built across Ground Zero should be called “Cordoba House”? Proverbs 16:17-18 says, “The highway of the upright is to depart of evil: he that keepeth his way preserveth his soul. PRIDE goeth before DESTRUCTION, and a haughty spirit before a fall.” Be careful Muslims how proud you become; God is the ultimate judge.

So, we see the evil of Islam as it stands against the Word of God — that which was truly revealed to men. And to demonstrate that the revelation of the writings in the Holy Bible were truly revelations by God to man, He enabled the writers themselves to do miraculous things that were witnessed by thousands throughout the time that the Holy Scriptures were being penned. Muhammad, five centuries after the last book was written in the Bible, didn’t have that authority demonstrated in his life. And the writings of the Hadith were post-mortem, so any claims there would be quesitonable.

Now, back to the love of Christianity.

Paul mentions the evidences of Christian love in Galatians in which he says there is no law against the actions of love. Remember, this is the guy who was out for blood before he became a Christian. In Galatians, I’ll start with Chapter 5, verse 13, where it says, “For, brethren, ye have been called unto liberty; only use not liberty for an occasion to the flesh, BUT BY LOVE SERVE ONE ANOTHER. For all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this; Thou shalt love they neighbor as thyself. But if ye bite and devour one another, take heed that ye be not consumed one of another… Now in verse 19 it starts with the manifestations of the flesh, which we have seen above. But in verse 22 is the crux of Christian love: “But THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: AGAINST SUCH THERE IS NO LAW. And they that are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts.

Thus, in conclusion, the big difference between Islam and Christianity is the direction of goodness. Islam is directed toward self, Christianity toward others. The evil deeds mentioned above are selfish deeds, the deeds manifested by true Christianity are selfless.

How is it possible to live true Christianity out? I have already hinted at this in the conversion of Paul. There is no way that one can do good deeds 100% of the time. It would be Utopia to think this. Paul himself shows in Romans 7 how much of a struggle this is.

True Christian living comes about only when one first recognizes that he is a sinner. Romans 3:23, “For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.” Also, one must recognize that there is judgment for sin that starts with death (not incurred so much by another individual, but by the judgment of God Himself). “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is Eternal Life through Jesus Christ our Lord (Romans 6:23).”

Since we recognize that God Himself is the Judge of all men, we need to know that God doesn’t want to judge us because He truly loves us, and therefore sent His Son to die on the cross for our sins. John 3:16, “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” Romans 5:8 “But God commendeth (shows) His love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”

This means that God has provided a way of escaping His righteous judgment of sin because he loves us so much. All we have to do is place our faith in Jesus Christ as our Savior. Romans 5:1 “Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” Romans 10:9-13 “If thou shalt confess (think the same as God thinks) with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him off the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. For the Scripture saith, Whosoever believeth on Him shall not be ashamed. For there is no difference between the Jew and the Greek: for the same Lord over all is rich unto all that call upon him. For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.”

This is the by far the most profound difference. Islam says convert or die. Christianity says convert and have eternal life.

Which do you want today? Jesus said, “I am come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly.” and “I am the way, the truth, and the life, no man cometh to the Father, but by me.”

All you have to do is believe that Jesus Christ is the Savior of your sins, confess your sins to God (not to another man), and repent. This is the beginning of eternal life, and a true life of Christian love here on earth. Islam doesn’t offer this, only God does, through Jesus Christ His Son. Death or Eternal Life? Which do you want?

“…Until a short while ago at the BBC, an Anglican pastor was responsible for the religious programming; today, it is a practicing Muslim.”

The BBC is afraid of provoking radical Muslims. BBC General Director Mark Thompson defends himself with the protective assertion that

“Christianity is a part of the whole culture, while Islam is the religion of a minority, and therefore deserves greater attention.”

Whether Thompson would really by qualified to make such a statement, should Islam dominate all of culture, is highly dubious.

(Hat Tip to gerndrin / Translation: Anders Denken)

Finanznachrichten.de reports:

The Islam community now intends to sue the paper for 100 Million Euros, it was said in a publicized protest against the faith community in Belgrade. It was said that the religious sentiments of all Muslims were most deeply insulted by the photo montage in which Zukorlic is wearing a cap with a cross.

Because of this, the Islamic community is calling for an immediate apology from the paper and a “symbolic compensation” valued at 100 Million Euros. Should “Blic” not comply, the community threatens to press charges and call for all Muslims in Serbia to boycott the newspaper. “Blic’s” chief editor Veselin Simonovic reacted immediately. His newspaper didn’t intend to offend anyone, and besides all that, the photo was on the humor page.

The feelings of the Muslims are seemingly very valuable and can also be insulted — as we sadly have already been made to learn — by humor. Whether the “Grand Mufti” has determined in the scope of an instant survey among the more than 1.8 billion Muslims, that they all have been insulted by the photo montage, is information that can’t be drawn from this report. In addition, it isn’t clear how this “symbolic” compensation is to be distributed among all the world’s Muslims. At least the four-fifths that remain after deducting the portion belonging to Allah and his emissary (Sura 8, Verse 41) and yielding 80 Million, can be passed around the umma.

Perhaps the Muslims could agree to the burning of a few embassies and Serbian as well as Swiss flags, upon which the affected countries would then appear insulted. The claims could then be settled among each other. We should enter into dialog about this matter.

Hint: The Blic photo montage from Blic is still not available to PI. If one of our readers should happen to obtain it, we would like to ask you to send a copy to pi-team@pi-news.net.

In order to form an educated opinion, the bishops traveled to Lebanon and Syria and met with leading Muslim and Christian figures there. They were strengthened in their idea of rejecting full-body covering through the experiences of their trip. In addition, there is no justification for the burka in the Quran nor in the Sunna. Jewish advocates fear a general cutback of religious freedoms and, therefore, are against a burka ban: There exists “no foundation where a liberal rule of law can be engaged.”

(Contributor: Wolfgang H. / Translation: Anders Denken)

The origin of the Quran has been more poorly researched than the Hebrew and Greek Bible, not the least because of the fear about the results. Is the Quran nothing more than a misunderstood, poorly translated Bible, or perhaps even a Christian heresy?

Die Welt reports:

Islam scholars face significant problems today that research of the Old and New Testaments have long overcome: their most important subject of research, the Quran, has not been textually affirmed; there is no textually critical edition of the original Arabic text. Indeed, there are up to 14 different versions recognized by the Islamic world that have become established in the centuries after Muhammad. Also, in many countries, there is a shortage of scientifically error-free Quran translations that, at the same time, read in agreeable language, for example, a few translations in Germany. Both problems are now to be solved.

The things we can be certain of in the origination of the Quran are as follows: At the beginning of the seventh century, a merchant named Muhammad lived in the city of Mecca in the southwestern part of the Arabian peninsula. All around him there lived Bedouins who worshipped many pagan gods at the same time; there were also Jews and Christians. At the age of around 40, Muhammad began to reject the pagan idols. He had heard the teachings of those who possessed books (whether he could read or write is still subject to question), he knew the Arabic cults, and he had his own reservations. …

In 632, Muhammad died in Medina — suddenly and unexpectedly. This was a catastrophe for the young community… In the first hour, followers of Muhammad fell in every battle. Those who themselves had belonged to the “blessed one” or his closest circles began gradually to die out, and with them the knowledge of Muhammad’s message threatened to get lost. Right away, there were those who already began to argue about the various sayings and what they meant. …

And yet a greater problem is presented by the Old Arabic writing: Even if some lucky individual would happen to find a forgotten manuscript from Caliph Uthman in some hole in the ground, nobody would know exactly what pronunciation of the words in the Quran Uthman and his associates, or even Muhammad, would have used. For the Arabic writing has many meanings: first, only the consonants are kept intact, not the vowels. Simply put, it would be like writing down the German consonants “LB,” and the reader would have to decide whether meaning of the context called for “Liebe (love),” “Laub (foliage),” or “Lob (praise).” …

Therefore, the essence of the oldest manuscripts is such that they can be understood only with the help verbal transmission. Only those who would still have Muhammad’s words in their ears, either himself or his pupils, would be able to read the ambiguous texts with reliability. But it is impossible to ask them anymore…

(Arabist) Michael Marx says, up until now science has hardly paid attention to manuscripts and the reconstruction of the Quran text, at least not the Muslim scientists anyway.

This skepticism, however, is aimed not so much at the philological criticism of text going on in Potsdam. Marx and his team are not working just on the pronunciation of the Quran — he would also like to look into where its ideas originate. The Quran contains allusions in great number to Jewish and Christian stories, Abraham, Isaac, Jesus, Mary; all of them show up in the Quran and there are numerous theological parallels. Aside from this, the sound of old Arabic poetry also makes itself evident. The “Corpus Coranicum” researchers are documenting these parallels for their Internet project. There are many whom that doesn’t please.

What Muslims fear most, is that the research could prove the Quran got its ideas from a mixture of old Arabic and poorly acquired Christian ideas, or that devout faith in Allah and his prophets, which is greater than all others, might ultimately turn out to be Christian heresy. This blasphemy against Allah is already calling Islamic fundamentalists to action against the research project.

Anything that could help in this direction will be critically examined by Muslims, and may even call extremists to action. Therefore, some western researchers are publishing their findings under pseudonyms in order not to be put in danger. Lebanese Samir Kassir was one of the first Muslim scholars to call for research of the Quran prior to the setting of Christian-Jewish Late Antiquity. He was murdered in Beirut in Summer 2005.

In fact, in recent times there have been repeated attempts to come to terms with the originality of the Quran. The Anglo-American research above all, but also some German philologists hold that the Muslim idea of the actions of Muhammad are complete fabrications — and therefore they look for other ways to research the origin of the Quran.

You can find the full report about the “Corpus Coranicum” here.

I don’t want to link to everything, but it seems that Rev. Frida Rothe had this document in mind in her reference this past Saturday. In doing so, she compared Gaza and the Palestinan autonomic regions directly to the former Apartheid regime in South Africa, and thus equated Israeli government with that regime.

Excerpt:

Today Christians from Palestine are succeeding. From suffering under the occupation, they make — so they say — a cry of hope. They call it “Kairos Palestina.” They hope that God will free their people from occupation and the seizure of land just like he freed the people in South Africa from Apartheid. The expect that Christians in the whole world will take up their cry in the spirit of Easter faith of love and reconciliation.

And we? Will we recognize the determining moment?

I don’t want to go into complete detail; others can do that much better. On Israelaktuell, they show among other things the massive pressure and threat of violence by Hamas of signing such a document. PI readers have already received enough examples of this kind, where persons who have pitted themselves against Hamas have been shot in the knees as warning. Those individuals have, therefore, come to understand what it means to stand against Hamas. Israelaktuell phrases it a little more politely.

There was an interesting lecture from even this same Rev. Frida Rothe on July 1, 2008, in the church of Kohlesbach in Weilheim-Teck. The title of this lecture was “60 years of the establishment of the State of Israel — 60 years of Nabka of the Palestinians.” Truly a praiseworthy, neutral title, however since both viewpoints were mentioned in the title, then it seems that a neutral lecture would have been given. The worst expectations that some participants had in spite of that — since we know the kind of people we’re dealing with here — were well exceeded. First, she mentioned her desire of telling about her last trip to visit Palestinian friends in Ramallah. The CD, stupidly enough, didn’t function with the pictures; however, she had an older CD with her that contained previous visits. After these beginning problems, she finally was able to get on with the presentation. In a word, it was the typical antisemitic method used by our leftwing and extreme Left.

My definition of antisemitic is this: when equal results from identical treatment receive differing evaluations, regardless of whether one is Palestinian or Israeli. It became clear in a very short time that the Israeli was to blame for everything, the old well-known antisemitic method. Of course, she showed pictures from the border fence for proof, or she called it the border wall. She then showed a picture from the middle of the Old Quarter where the wall is nine meters tall. The indignant whispering of the older listeners could not be overheard, even though some of the ideology of the Hitler Youth era certainly came to mind in some listeners. One listener indicated that about 95 to 98 percent of the fence’s length exists right where the TV team had been invited by certain appointments — and where the exposed area in this photography was taken — in order to stage the gleeful throwing of stones at Israel through effective media coverage. He also pointed out that the wall was nine meters tall right in these places so that stones can’t be thrown over, since some Israelis had suffered from fractured skulls from such stone throws. Furthermore, she was informed that the real reason of the border fence’s erection was because of the suicide attackers from Gaza and Western Jordan, that indeed 211 Israelis had been killed by them in 2002, and that after the building of the protection fence, the count of those who were murdered fell to six in 2006 and to one in 2007. The minister pushed this objection aside with the words that a wall or a fence was no solution for the conflict.

Then she took a mental jump and started reporting about Ahmadinejad’s rumored speech: the old, well-known, extreme left version, where he absolutely did not say that he would drive the Israelis into the sea, but that his speech had been incorrectly translated. Which begs the question, whether this splitting of hairs is really so decisive, for it is simply undeniable that he is a most vicious anti-Semite. And any ally is justified in her antisemitism. Next came the story of the alleged robbery of land by the Israelis. That this is the direct result of the attacks from the Arab countries was, of course, kept quiet. Then she told next of a Palestinian wedding to which she was invited and was able to participate in. Of course, the Apartheid of the sexes was the rule, men and women were strictly separated in the celebration, and she stressed as well, how nice it was to celebrate without the men around.

The most impressive thing was when she recounted, with a glimmer in her eyes, how her daughter — apparently, very much the mother — wanted to buy and wear a Hijab, and she reported how nice, enthusiastic and friendly the lady of the shop was, and especially how happy the daughter was about her new head covering.

At the end, another listener asked, that since she had lived a good while in Jerusalem, whether she had also found Israeli-Jewish friends, or perhaps gotten to know some then. The answer wasn’t surprising anymore by that time. No, she lived in the Arab part of Jerusalem, and therefore she had Arab friends exclusively, and had also not sought out any Israeli ones, since by that time “she had already stood on the side of the oppressed, defenseless, and those without rights.”

Aha, the world is so simple.

P.S.: I heard later on, that a participant had offered to do a presentation from the Israeli viewpoint to Pastor Brigitte Turnacker of the corresponding church. He is still waiting to this day for an answer to his letter.

» Email Frida Rothe at: pfarramt@kirche-gutenberg.de

(By Anonymouse / Translation: Anders Denken)

The Tagesspiegel reports with disgust:

A teacher at the Hellersdorf Ark Primary School has apparently attempted to stir his pupils up against abortion. Using worksheets that describe abortion in drastic form, the children are supposed to have dealt with the details of an intervention. Since then, the school has distanced itself from the teacher. There is the threat of damage to their image because the material has been made public: Councilwoman for Youth Manuela Schmidt (left) had the worksheets leaked to her and she passed them on.

According to statements from school director René Schlüter, the issue has to do with an educator that had been hired as a substitute teacher for half a year until December. “If he were still with us, we would fire him right now without notice,” Schlüter stated clearly on Tuesday. “We are sad and angry, and condemn the teacher’s action.” On the worksheet there is mention of “children being cut into pieces,” so that they can fit through the hose as they are being vacuumed out. Arms and legs would be “separated from the body” first, then the “trunk from the head.” Since the head is too large, the doctor must break it down. Furthermore it says that the “shredded body” is then put into a “furnace.” In the text there are missing words that the fifth-graders had to fill in. The Senatorial Administration for Education were appalled at the material. “The school must pay closer attention in the future,” the speaker of the Senator for Education Jürgen Zöllner (SPD) demanded of Jens Stiller.

The school is a cooperating partner with the Christian youth organization “Die Arche” (“The Ark”) and belongs to the Independent Evangelical School organization whose administrators had already distanced themselves from the school supervision in the face of this incident.

It is dreadful that a teacher — moreover one in a Christian school — doesn’t impart to the children that abortion is a totally normal form of “protection”. Children cannot be taught soon enough about every detail of “free love.” But nobody wants to have anything to do with the consequences.

By the way: at the youth convention “You”, a life-sized little doll was pressed into the hand of young people so that they can get a feeling for how large and complete a little person already is at the stage when an abortion is permitted to take place. It is really disgusting by what means amusement is used with youth about a “totally normal termination of pregnancy.”

(Translation of German PI-article by Anders Denken)

Turkey’s ambassador to the Holy See, Kenan Gürsey has also emphasized this.

Radio Vatican writes:

“Islam in Europe is becoming more and more like Christianity — only we don’t want to recognize it.” So the French philosopher Olivier Roy, leader of the National Research Center in Paris, stated lately to the Zürich “Sonntagszeitung” newspaper. The Internet pages of Muslim congregations in France and Germany, for example, are written in French and German respectively, the political scientist stressed. He especially criticized the Minaret Ban of last November in Switzerland. For the minarets are an attempt to become more like Christianity. They demonstrate the desire of creating Muslim congregations that are conspicuous and that function similarly to Christian congregations, so Roy said.

That Islam and Christianity stand closer to each other than often thought, was stressed by the Turkish ambassador to the Holy See, Kenan Gürsay. He argued his point about the cooperation of religions in the framework of the lecture series “Identity and Religion” that started Tuesday evening at the papal Jesuit college Gregoriana in Rome:

“We are all impressed with a certain tradition, and furthermore believers of a certain religion. That common thing among all of us. That is the ethical claim that our religion lives within. Your consciousness of values. This is where the universal greatness of religions, in spite of all the differences, presents itself. Somewhat like an interreligious ethic. And each of us must go in search of this universal message.”

Islamic mysticism can build a bridge to this universalism, the diplomat delved more deeply into his views. So the centuries-old tradition of Sufism unites various mystical currents that have existed, from the meditative recitation of the “99 most beautiful names of God,” to the reflection of one’s own relationship with God. That prepares the way for interaction with other religions and contributes to the dismantling of prejudices, especially those that have grown in connection with radical Islamic terrorism:

Sufism is no doctrine, and can found none of its own churches. It is also no religious or philosophical school, rather it is much more an energy. And this enables us to see the various lines of Islam in a new light. In this way, the Sunni and Shiite traditions can be brought into harmony with each other. And still more: the Sufist line of vision enables us to recognize all monotheistic religions! Such a thing as a new interpretation of the history of religions being done on a philosophical level is now possible — even if a utopia is portrayed the first time.

Hence, minarets serve the purpose of drawing the mosque closer to the church. Aha! Good that it has been said now.

It’s sad that the church, in the endeavor to heighten its own influence, has actually made a pact with the devil.

(Translation of German PI-article by Anders Denken)

What we know for sure, and what is more important, is that Jesus preached the love of God for all people. Even though Elton John spoke of Jesus, he will not have to fear for his life because of what he said. Fortunately for him, Elton John is no Muslim and he didn’t interpret the prophets in his statement.

(Translation of German PI-article by Anders Denken)

Dom Radio writes enthusiastically:

St. Theodor and St. Elisabeth in the areas of Cologne Höhenberg/Vingst gave a donation in the amount of 5000 Euros for the building of the Cologne mosque.

The leader of the Turkish-Islamic Union for the Institution of Religion (DITIB), Sadi Arslan, and the representative for dialog, Bekir Alboga, received the check at the construction site’s information container.

The parishes, church members, and other Cologne citizens collected the money. Michael Paetzold and Margo Gaska handed the check over. They are part of the church fellowships that Cologne Pastor Franz Meurer, who is known for his social engagement, looks after.

Alboga said that the donation is an important foundation for the building of the new mosque. The Northrhein-Westphalia Integration Representative, Thomas Kufen, made a positive statement about the information container that was recently put up. This is important for the transparency of the building plan.

What the donation has to do with “transparency,” reveals nothing to us. But it is nice that the Catholic Church has laid the foundation for a large mosque…

(Translation of German PI-article by Anders Denken)

Bashir’s boss, who sexually abused, tortured, and murdered her, is himself a very influential and prominent Muslim attorney. His colleagues are preventing the case from going to court, and they are threatening anyone with being “burned alive” who dares to represent the side of the murdered girl. When the relatives try to enter the courtroom, the Islamic group of attorneys react as if offended and with violence (photo). The requested sentence for the perpetrator is only four days jail time. The complete lack of rights for Christians is the concept of “righteousness” in Pakistan.

(Translation of German PI-article by Anders Denken)