Terrorism is Islamic issue, say some Muslims

[John Mundinger]

Perhaps before Obama retires he could designate you to go around the world on another apology tour, Mr. Mundinger. It's worked so well in the past... 

I'd prefer a "truth and reconciliation" approach here at home.

[John Mundinger]

Where is the call for moderate Mormons to reign in "Mormon Terrorism"?

http://www.opb.org/news/article/explainer-the-bundy-militias-particular-brand-of-mormonism/

[Fletch]

Where is the call for moderate Mormons to reign in "Mormon Terrorism"?

http://www.opb.org/news/article/explainer-the-bundy-militias-particular-brand-of-mormonism/

Shhhhh.  Don't poke the Mormons, they are busy working on social justice issues.   

... Fletch

[Team Hesse]

Perhaps before Obama retires he could designate you to go around the world on another apology tour, Mr. Mundinger. It's worked so well in the past... 

I'd prefer a "truth and reconciliation" approach here at home.

The beatings should continue until morale improves. Right?


Lou

[John Mundinger]

Perhaps before Obama retires he could designate you to go around the world on another apology tour, Mr. Mundinger. It's worked so well in the past... 

I'd prefer a "truth and reconciliation" approach here at home.

The beatings should continue until morale improves. Right?


Lou

There have been no such beatings in the few instances in which truth and reconciliation has been employed.

[James_Gale]

Here's my thesis for why that article was chosen (as well as all of the others): the editor thought they would interest people. No more, no less. No weird conspiracy theories.

I will become a believer when I read criticism of Republicans. The article which leads this thread does indeed report harsh criticism of President Obama's war strategy. One can be a strict confessional Lutheran while agreeing with the current war strategy of the Commander-in-Chief. The Bible does not tell us how best to fight ISIL.   

Peace, JOHN

The ELCA suffers the same malady.  Of course, it throws its support to the other side of the spectrum. 


Is it any wonder that Lutheran disunity is growing?  If only our churches could give up their fixation on advocacy of political positions that are neither required nor prohibited by our faith!  Such advocacy invariably divides us over inessential matters.  Much worse, it also gives law the paramount place in a church's life, usually giving those within the church a smug sense of assurance that they are on the right side of the law.  The sinners are those outsiders who just don't get it.  They need Jesus, if for no other reason than to give them the insights that the insiders achieved on their own.     


If only our Lutheran churches would leave politics to the secular sphere and focus instead on the Scriptural use of Law and Gospel and on the Confessions to which we all (supposedly) are committed.  If only.


(By the way, I personally think that the current administration's policies toward Islam, terrorism, and the Middle East have been disastrous.  Others here no doubt disagree.  The issues are worthy of debate.  Even here.  But the church ought not take sides in "how best to fight ISIL" or on other political questions.)

[John Mundinger]

If only our Lutheran churches would leave politics to the secular sphere and focus instead on the Scriptural use of Law and Gospel and on the Confessions to which we all (supposedly) are committed.  If only.

I agree that politics have no place in the pulpit.  At the same time, however, I think the Church has a duty to make the Scriptural use of Law and Gospel and the Confessions relevant in the age in which we live.  I also think that the Church can do that while speaking to issues of day, which necessarily are in the political realm, without taking sides.

[Randy Bosch]

Perhaps before Obama retires he could designate you to go around the world on another apology tour, Mr. Mundinger. It's worked so well in the past... 

I'd prefer a "truth and reconciliation" approach here at home.

The beatings should continue until morale improves. Right?


Lou

There have been no such beatings in the few instances in which truth and reconciliation has been employed.

Again, whether you like it or not, a term that has been appropriated by people and groups with which you (and I) would probably rather not affiliate, except to share the Truth in love.

"Truth and reconciliation" in Chicago seems to have a different meaning than, perhaps in Montana or Wyoming.  And, the appropriation is not only to advocate and act upon societal endeavors that are possibly antithetical to your viewpoint, but to any Christian's.

You have built up quite an lexicon of terms and, sadly, apparently use them with the expectation that they will be  misunderstood, furthering your advocacy of an undefined "Third Way".  How can they be understood and a conversation civilly continued when you first declare, then claim possession of the code and object to any question or usage that disagrees with the ones that you do not define.

Long ago (well, late last millennium...), a wise man expressed better than I can what I feel about this:

"I describe the ability to communicate as being able to understand what it is like not to understand. And in order to pass a piece of information to somebody else I have to understand what it is like not to understand that piece of information."
(Richard Saul Wurman, Educom Review, Nov/Dec 1997 issue)

At the least, perhaps you could advise us to "read the book"  , but I am becoming convinced that you have the autographs and that there are no copies available.

[James_Gale]

As it relates to the post that began this conversation, I think:

1) We should talk about terrorism as terrorism, distinct from the religious motivations that the terrorists claim and/or we ascribe to the terrorists;

Why?  Islam is a political/social/religious system - how do you intend to separate them when they themselves do not? 

This is a critically important point, although I think that you paint with too broad a brush. 


Many Muslims view their religion as a "political/social/religious system."  Many do not, embracing individual liberty and a separation between the religious and political realms.  (The brilliant and heroic Ayaan Hirsi Ali, along with others, uses the terms "Medina Muslims" and "Mecca Muslims" to describe the two groups.  Mecca Muslims generally embrace the religious and moral teachings of Muhammed during his time in Mecca but not his political and legalistic teachings stemming from his reign in Medina.)


What, then, is a moderate Muslim?  It's easy to exclude the violent Islamists.  What of those who support the Islamists but do not themselves commit violence?  Or those who utterly renounce violence as a tactic but endorse the Islamists' goals (a caliphate or other system in which political power ultimately rests with religious authorities, whose rulings are final)?  (This was the view of the "moderate" imam who met with my congregation in NYC shortly after 9/11 -- much to the shock of many of us in the room.)


Presidents Bush and Obama understandably have wanted to avoid the impression that the west is at war with Islam.  But this, I think, has prevented them and other leaders from talking openly about the nature of the challenge that confronts us.  Thus, we generally don't understand it.  We therefore lack the skills and the strategy to confront it effectively.


The vast majority of Muslims in the US are likely "Mecca Muslims" -- our compatriots in the current struggle.  However, throughout the world, "Medina Muslims" are very powerful.  And they do influence people in the west.  Until we understand this, articulate it clearly, and act accordingly, we will not win the current war.  Medina Muslims want conquest, not reconciliation.  They are uninterested in any truth that a US commission might propose.  They have their truth, and it is beyond challenge or discussion.

[Randy Bosch]

[The vast majority of Muslims in the US are likely "Mecca Muslims" -- our compatriots in the current struggle.  However, throughout the world, "Medina Muslims" are very powerful.  And they do influence people in the west.  Until we understand this, articulate it clearly, and act accordingly, we will not win the current war.  Medina Muslims want conquest, not reconciliation.  They are uninterested in any truth that a US commission might propose.  They have their truth, and it is beyond challenge or discussion.

In reality, both groups have and espouse (and enforce wherever they are able) a system of "social justice" and "truth and reconciliation" that they find to be inspired by god.  In either case their definitions are incompatible with most of the very, very many definitions and usages of the same terms found hereon and in (currently) most of the world.  Even apparent understanding and usage of "democracy" and "democratic socialism" is as far different from an early 21st Century North American understanding (pick one from the a la carte menu of usages here) as an Atlantic-removed understanding of Scandinavian "social justice", "truth and reconciliation" and "democratic socialism" is from the same concepts imposed into reality after September 1919 in the first socialist state on earth, the former USSR.

(Edited to correct typo)

[John Mundinger]

Again, whether you like it or not, a term that has been appropriated by people and groups with which you (and I) would probably rather not affiliate, except to share the Truth in love.

I offered the idea as I think Archbishop Tutu intended it.  That is a spirit in which we mutually agree to confess our own sins with the mutual commitment to then forgive one another.

[Dave Benke]

As it relates to the post that began this conversation, I think:

1) We should talk about terrorism as terrorism, distinct from the religious motivations that the terrorists claim and/or we ascribe to the terrorists;

Why?  Islam is a political/social/religious system - how do you intend to separate them when they themselves do not? 

This is a critically important point, although I think that you paint with too broad a brush. 


Many Muslims view their religion as a "political/social/religious system."  Many do not, embracing individual liberty and a separation between the religious and political realms.  (The brilliant and heroic Ayaan Hirsi Ali, along with others, uses the terms "Medina Muslims" and "Mecca Muslims" to describe the two groups.  Mecca Muslims generally embrace the religious and moral teachings of Muhammed during his time in Mecca but not his political and legalistic teachings stemming from his reign in Medina.)


What, then, is a moderate Muslim?  It's easy to exclude the violent Islamists.  What of those who support the Islamists but do not themselves commit violence?  Or those who utterly renounce violence as a tactic but endorse the Islamists' goals (a caliphate or other system in which political power ultimately rests with religious authorities, whose rulings are final)?  (This was the view of the "moderate" imam who met with my congregation in NYC shortly after 9/11 -- much to the shock of many of us in the room.)


Presidents Bush and Obama understandably have wanted to avoid the impression that the west is at war with Islam.  But this, I think, has prevented them and other leaders from talking openly about the nature of the challenge that confronts us.  Thus, we generally don't understand it.  We therefore lack the skills and the strategy to confront it effectively.


The vast majority of Muslims in the US are likely "Mecca Muslims" -- our compatriots in the current struggle.  However, throughout the world, "Medina Muslims" are very powerful.  And they do influence people in the west.  Until we understand this, articulate it clearly, and act accordingly, we will not win the current war.  Medina Muslims want conquest, not reconciliation.  They are uninterested in any truth that a US commission might propose.  They have their truth, and it is beyond challenge or discussion.

Presidents Bush and Obama and whoever comes next are the top elected officials of a government that pledges religious freedom and neutrality.  They're in a tough position.  And the various swirls of opinion on what the religious problem is at its root are going to be mitigated through various Christian and Jewish leaders giving authoritative religious opinions that may be in direct conflict with one another, to say nothing of the strains of Muslim leaders, and those of other faiths, and those with no faith.

That being said, I agree with your perspective indicating that failure to both understand and articulate the different strains or versions of Islam is to effectively invite profiling against the "Mecca Muslims," who bear the same basic religious identification mark.

Dave Benke

[Dan Fienen]

Some observations.  I can certainly understand Muslims' weariness at continually being asked to denounce Islamic terrorism, or what they intend to do about Islamic terrorism.  It is like pro-life Christians being asked what they intend to do about those who in the name of pro-life shoot up Planned Parenthood clinics or murder abortion providers.  We have and continue to denounce such violence and do not support it.  Not a whole lot else we can do beyond being careful that we do not call for violence.  Ditto white supremacists.  Other than their own people, are there any other Christians that support them?  Many, many Muslims have and continue to repudiate and denounce terrorism in the name of their religion.  Has anyone been listening?  Or are their denunciations not shocking enough to be considered news so as to be not reported until another pundit wants to pontificate on how moderate Muslims need to denounce terrorism?

Let's not forget that the majority of victims of Islamic terrorism are Muslims.  The conflict within Islam seems to be deepening all the time.  The recent execution of the Shiite cleric in Sunni Saudi Arabia (itself no hotbed of moderation in Islamic teaching) and the violent reaction is Iran and elsewhere (more violence against a foreign embassy, this time Saudi Arabia) just heightens the tensions in the region between Sunni and Shia.  While hatred of the West and hatred against Christians, Jews and other faiths, and hatred of Israel, are a feature of many of the warring groups in the Islamic world, conflicts between Sunni and Shia and also tribal conflicts are also a major motivating factor for violence as well as resorting to radical Jihadist factions from one's own brand of Islam as the perceived only option to protect oneself and ones family and community from the depredations of the other brand of Islam. 

Is it too extreme to say the Islam is at war with itself?

Naturally there are other factors that feed into these conflicts.  One is that several of the "nations" of the Islamic Middle East are really not national groups but areas on a map drawn by the victors of WWI and WWII and declared nations without in any way resolving the rivalries of the groups that were no supposed to be one nation or another.  And there are nationalistic urges being fed.  On a smaller scale the Kurdish ethnic group desires to carve areas out of several existing countries to form a new Kurdish nation.  Iran has ambitions to dominate if not outright rule the Middle East (to the benefit, among other things, of Shias over Sunnis) and become a major world power.  Saudi Arabia also has ambitions even if they do not necessarily include territorial expansion.

Terrorists have many ways to enter the United States covertly.  Pretending to be refugees would be only one, and likely not the best or easiest.  Meanwhile we are handing the terrorists a victory if we allow fear to dictate a refusal to allow any Muslims to enter the country for any reason.

[Dave Benke]

Some observations.  I can certainly understand Muslims' weariness at continually being asked to denounce Islamic terrorism, or what they intend to do about Islamic terrorism.  It is like pro-life Christians being asked what they intend to do about those who in the name of pro-life shoot up Planned Parenthood clinics or murder abortion providers.  We have and continue to denounce such violence and do not support it.  Not a whole lot else we can do beyond being careful that we do not call for violence.  Ditto white supremacists.  Other than their own people, are there any other Christians that support them?  Many, many Muslims have and continue to repudiate and denounce terrorism in the name of their religion.  Has anyone been listening?  Or are their denunciations not shocking enough to be considered news so as to be not reported until another pundit wants to pontificate on how moderate Muslims need to denounce terrorism?

Let's not forget that the majority of victims of Islamic terrorism are Muslims.  The conflict within Islam seems to be deepening all the time.  The recent execution of the Shiite cleric in Sunni Saudi Arabia (itself no hotbed of moderation in Islamic teaching) and the violent reaction is Iran and elsewhere (more violence against a foreign embassy, this time Saudi Arabia) just heightens the tensions in the region between Sunni and Shia.  While hatred of the West and hatred against Christians, Jews and other faiths, and hatred of Israel, are a feature of many of the warring groups in the Islamic world, conflicts between Sunni and Shia and also tribal conflicts are also a major motivating factor for violence as well as resorting to radical Jihadist factions from one's own brand of Islam as the perceived only option to protect oneself and ones family and community from the depredations of the other brand of Islam. 

Is it too extreme to say the Islam is at war with itself?

Naturally there are other factors that feed into these conflicts.  One is that several of the "nations" of the Islamic Middle East are really not national groups but areas on a map drawn by the victors of WWI and WWII and declared nations without in any way resolving the rivalries of the groups that were no supposed to be one nation or another.  And there are nationalistic urges being fed.  On a smaller scale the Kurdish ethnic group desires to carve areas out of several existing countries to form a new Kurdish nation.  Iran has ambitions to dominate if not outright rule the Middle East (to the benefit, among other things, of Shias over Sunnis) and become a major world power.  Saudi Arabia also has ambitions even if they do not necessarily include territorial expansion.

Terrorists have many ways to enter the United States covertly.  Pretending to be refugees would be only one, and likely not the best or easiest.  Meanwhile we are handing the terrorists a victory if we allow fear to dictate a refusal to allow any Muslims to enter the country for any reason.

I agree with these observations.

Dave Benke

[John_Hannah]

Some thoughtful observers speculate that the intra-Islamic will end up as a "Thirty Years War." Grim, indeed.

Peace, JOHN