Hi Stringer,
I really wish I had more time to discuss this issue, because I think it really exposes the problems with the reigning philosophical paradigm of our culture,
relativism and the problems that occur when we come into conflict with a culture that still believes in
absolutes. Unfortunately, I'm insanely busy, so all I have time for is the following lame reply...
Originally posted by Stringer
Seagoon,
I think all terrorist's should be wiped off the map, including the IRA ones (I'm christian, btw).
Stringer, that might work if there were a fixed number of terrorists whom we could get to. That isn't the case however.
Terrorism is not an end in and of itself. Terrorism is the violent application of a particular ideology. The ideology is central, terrorism is viewed as a tool in furthering the aims of the ideology the terrorist confesses. So for the Muslim terrorist, Islam is central, Jihad is just a key to realizing the ultimate aims of Islam. So even if we could kill all the presently active terrorists, that wouldn't end the world problem of terrorism.
As the men of my congregation have found, you can kill any number of Taliban in Afghanistan, the problem is more are being churned out every day as boys leave the Madrassas in Pakistan and cross the border to join the Taliban (which literally means 'student of Islam') in Afghanistan. You'd have to wipe out that which promulgates the ideology in Pakistan, and then replace it with a winsome alternative, in order to get rid of the Terrorists in Afghanistan, and we certainly aren't allowed to go after Pakistani Imams or replace Islam with a religion that eschews and condemns the use of Jihad. So we aren't going to run out of Jihadis, especially when one considers that being killed in the war against the infidels is a victory for them and something they are actively pursuing. Killing them isn't the disincentive that it would be to you or me. Quite the opposite.
But I will not accept being asked what my religious belief is when boarding an airplane, and have that be a determining factor as to whether I board or not. Today it is the Muslim flavor of choice, tomorrow it could be a different religion.
[snip]
As a man of faith and a preacher, are you seriously advocating prejudice based on one's religious faith?
You see here is where the relativism issue really becomes a stumbling block. For you and probably most other Westerners, religion is a relative issue, it is not something that can be "true" or "false" and certainly we are militantly committed as a society to the idea that all religions must be viewed as equal. In fact one of the many reasons I irritate so many people on this board is I am an absolutist who believes that religions should be judged ultimately on the veracity of both their truth claims and the fruit that the most authentic living out of that religion produces.
Interestingly enough, the members of this board make those distinctions daily about something they consider far more important (and I consider far less important) namely political and economic systems. Members of the board have no problems labeling Communism or Capitalism, Democracy or Socialism, and their associated parties wrong or right, good or bad, unjust or stupid, and judging them according to their claims and their fruit.
Now that practice of discernment isn't necessarily wrong. It would have been ridiculous for instance for us to have concluded "all political systems are the same and must be respected" and concluded that by that standard whether you were a Democrat or a Nazi didn't matter and attempted to conduct the fight the Second World War on that basis.
Oh we definitely have a problem with the Germans who are attacking us, but since Nazism is a political viewpoint and must be respected, we can't have a problem with that. So we'll leave the Nazi school masters, scientists, and politicians in place and just attempt to wipe out their fighting men. Clearly that wouldn't have worked.
Unfortunately we are fighting "the war on terror" on exactly that basis and when we are reminded that
"its the ideology, stupid" by events like the
umma (not terrorists) throughout the Muslim world rising up and acting violently in "defense" of their ideology and threatening to behead and burn if their religion isn't given accorded a status no other religion enjoys in the West, we either twiddle our thumbs and refuse to draw any conclusions or worse yet cave in and give them "most favored religion" treatment.
As a Christian, I am called to discernment, I am told by Christ regarding how to discern a false prophet
"You will know them by their fruits" I am also called upon to consider their truth claims. We have had almost 1400 years to judge the fruit of the teaching of Muhammed and you may disagree with me, but I don't think they've been good in any sense. I've also had time to analyze and judge their truth claims, and aside from the fact that the claims of Christ and the claims of Muhammad are irreconcilable, I don't believe them to be true or accurate. I certainly am not in favor of the society that the Quran and Sharia are seek to establish and do not want that to be the society my children have to live in, either as Dhimmis or worse as converts.
- SEAGOON
