www.byzcath.org Forums General Discussions Town Hall Ask a Dhimmi if Islam is benign

Fr. Mitch Pakwa gave several talks at our conference this weekend. They were totally awesome on Islam. He said so much, explained so much. The tapes are available, as soon as I have the email address I will post it. They truly are a must hear! So much information in them.

Pani Rose

Dear Pani Rose,

He is very knowledgeable about the Middle East isn't he?

He seems like SUCH a wonderful priest. Tell me more.

Love in Christ,
Alice

Hey Alice,

The talks were awesome. He spent he spent a good bit of time explaining the basice history, how the different types came to be, but especially the Wahabi(sp). Then he explained how they have things so confused in the Koran when it comes to Christ and Mary and where they get it from and how they came up with it.

He explained how they have Marium and Mary mixed up. Where they get paradise from, oh so much. The bottom line to all of it they totally contradict themselves and the stuff can't be because if they say it is, they it becomes a lie because of the contradictions. He brought it all around to being able to point out to them that Mohammad was a sinner as was his mother, while Jesus and Mary did not sin. Mohammad never worked any miracles, Jesus did inclulding raising people from the dead and so forth. So how can Mohammad be greater than Jesus.

But it was really good, if I can get my thoughts straight on what he said, I will type them down.

Pani Rose

Marya- you ask good questions; my answer is "I don't know and I will live with the mystery". But the apparent differences between Old and New Testament revelation have lead many in Church history to deny that they are the same God. The Marcionites taught this and others. Indeed some have taught that the god of the OT is Satan! This is heretical, of course.
But, Mr ByzanTN, it is not so simple as you propose. God does not change, and God is love. That is his essence. Mystics like St Julian of Norwich tell us that "there is no wrath in God". Attributing wrath to him is a projection of the human experience of alienation that sin begets. Further we know that it is grave sin to kill the innocent. So, when God in the OT commands what is sinful, what does it mean? As I said , I don't know. One possibility is that revelation is receive d according to the capacity of the receiver. To a primitive warlike people that can sound like the sort of thing the OT describes. Actually, I haven't found an explanation that respects the reality of divine revelation so I stick with "I don't know". I have had Protestant friends quote those texts to justify nuclear warfare. My answer is that if "Thou shall not kill" doesn't mean that it is always wrong to intentionally kill the innocent it means nothing and furthermore the USA is NOT Israel...

When you get to Heaven, perhaps St. Julian will explain to you why scripture often refers to God's anger, which is a righteous anger that is not a projection of the human experience. It is always interesting to hear liberals try to turn God into a teddy bear. God can get angry if he chooses. Who are we to judge Him?

So St Julian is a liberal?
Obvioiusly Scripture often describes the unknowable God in human terms. Attribution of anger to Him is an example of this; it tells us something about the effects of sin but if you conclude from this that God is now in a good mood, and now full of wrath, and that it is your acts that inspire this change, I fear your understanding is pretty flawed. God is unchanging and unchangeable and beyond our comprehension. I am no liberal and this incomprehensible consuming fire is no teddy bear! Certainly insipid liberalism is a problem, but so is bitter conservatism, which would project our own anger and prejudices onto God.
-Daniel

Thank you Daniel. I don't know either.
How CAN there be wrath in our Creator God?

It goes back to my same nagging question. Are each of us is guilty to different degrees of trying to create God into our own image - Protestant, Muslim, Jew, C and O. (I won't say the words)?
None of us can begin to comprehend God fully and until we admit and accept that, and stop killing each other over it there won't be any peace on this earth.
Was this Adam and Eve's sin?

Marya

Well, I guess when Christ returns, there won't be a judgement, but a service of affirmation followed by a group hug.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

http://www.asianews.it/view.php?l=en&art=1501

17 September, 2004
RUSSIA

Slaughter of Beslan children done as murderers shouted "God is Great", says theologian

According to deacon Kuraev, Islam must not let itself be used by terrorists.

_____________________


Moscow (AsiaNews) - Beslan was a "religious" crime, a "ritual murder" carried out by people shouting Allah Akbar (God is great), this according to Orthodox theologian Andrei Kuraev, professor at the Moscow Orthodox Theological Academy.

In "How to perceive Islam after Beslan?", an article published on September 15 in the Moscow daily Izvestia, deacon Kuraev writes: "What happened in Beslan is not just a crime. It was a religious crime. It was ritual murder, the murder of children with prayers in the background. The terrorists killed in the name of their faith. They killed people shouting Allah Akbar and sacrificed innocent children on the altar of their religious ideas."

Kuraev goes further: "They were not just gangsters who killed. They were people of one faith who killed Christians in the name of their creed." One episode, he believes, makes this point clear. Sacha, a 13-year-old boy, was among the children taken hostage in the school. He wore a cross around his neck. When one of the terrorist saw it, the man turned his gun towards the boy and shouted: "Pray!" Sacha reacted by shouting "Christ is risen!" and escaped through a window.

In his message of condolences to President Putin, Patriarch Aleksij II said that "terrorism showed its satanic face" in Beslan. For Kuraev terrorism is "satanic", not Islam as a whole. For this reason, he considers the Beslan terrorists satanic. "When I speak of Satanism in relation to the terrorists," the theologian writes, "I am not defining Islam as a satanic religion. The Beslan terrorists killed many Muslims as well because they saw them as evil Muslims".

Deacon Kuraev is certain that the fate of the world in the 21st century is in the hands of Muslim theologians. Someone like Mullah Omar (an Afghan spiritual leader linked to Osama bin Laden) supported the 9/11 attacks in New York. By contrast, other Muslim religious leaders strongly disapproved of them. Similarly, he adds, "whilst Saudi Wahabi ulema (legal scholars) have recommended sending women as shahida (martyrs) to Russia, Russian Muslim leaders have repeatedly stated that terrorism in the name of Islam violates Islam's own principles."

Kuraev suggests the Russian government create the appropriate conditions for the national media to serve as a forum for those who can offer a peaceful interpretation of Islam and curtail the sermonising by firebrand Muslim radicals.

"Even if the Islamic world refuses to admit it, it is responsible for Muslim terrorism," Kuraev claims. "Its major fault lies in the fact that it allows itself to be used." However, the Russian theologian believes the West, too, has to bear some of the responsibility. Deacon Kuraev is in fact convinced that there is anti-Muslim and anti-Christian terrorist plan concocted in the West that seeks to set up a "new global order". For this reason, he berates those who are "are trying to confuse us and pit us one against the other." For him, Russia has already become the bulwark "that protects Europe against an aggressive Islamic world".

In the nineties, Russia opted for a hedonistic culture in lieu of the Christian faith. For deacon Kuraev, the war on terrorism can drive her back into the fold of religion. (AF)

[/qb][/QUOTE]Well, I guess when Christ returns, there won't be a judgement, but a service of affirmation followed by a group hug. [/QB][/QUOTE]

Hey Byz- Why do you insist on misrepresenting what I am saying? I suppose it is easier to refute the straw man you are setting up. What I am saying is elementary mystical theology.
Now let me get this straight: you believe in a wrathful God, who commands the slaughter of innocent civilians, men women and children? Hey, that sounds like the God of Osama bin Ladin! Hiding out in Tennessee! How ingenius!

Well, I guess when Christ returns, there won't be a judgement, but a service of affirmation followed by a group hug. [/QB][/QUOTE]

Hey Byz- Why do you insist on misrepresenting what I am saying? I suppose it is easier to refute the straw man you are setting up. What I am saying is elementary mystical theology.
Now let me get this straight: you believe in a wrathful God, who commands the slaughter of innocent civilians, men women and children? Hey, that sounds like the God of Osama bin Ladin! Hiding out in Tennessee! How ingenius! [/QB][/QUOTE]

No, I think it is you who often misrepresents others. Perhaps I misunderstand you, but you do come across as something of a liberal who reflects American liberal Catholic theology. I believe what scripture says. Granted, God probably doesn't get angry in the sense that we do. Most of his "anger" is the reaction of a perfectly just being whose justice has been offended or slighted in some way. That is a mystery and I don't understand it. But I don't question his judgment when he decrees that groups are to be destroyed in the Old Testament. He is God, I am not! God doesn't have to run his will by the PC police - or the American liberal establishment, either - when he decides to do something. If God decreed something similar to his actions in the Old Testament, what could we do but accept it. I think perhaps we don't fully understand Him to the degree we think.

I wonder how the families of the most recent contract workers who were beheaded would describe the benign Muslim actions? If we are to believe that Islam is more than a barbaric false religion then let us hear from them how they plan to stand up to these brutes within their religion.

Dan L

It seems like each day's news is worse than the day before. I don't know what the long-term solution is in terms of getting Muslim authorities to condemn these thugs.

byz,

I understand that some may be intimidated into silence because of the fear of retribution by these thugs, but near silence for 1400 years is inexusable. If such lack of courage is the best this religion has to offer it is something to be avoided at all costs. Thankfully, I've met a few braves ones but why doesn't it translate into action in the homeland? Then when we try to help we are condemned by our own people for doing so. :rolleyes:

Dan L

Does the fact of God having punished his children who were disobedient mean that he is less a God of love?

Do parents love their children less if they discipline them?

I know you say that killing is a bit extreme discipline, but remember, this is God...He knows what will happen to them after death, and treats all according to their individual selves. "Kill 'em all, and let God sort 'em out" is an oft-repeated callous comment, but when you think about it, He will take the innocents to Him, and what better "life" can they lead than to be in His Presence?

If 90% of a population is, in His Eyes, wicked to the point that they will cause havoc if left alive to slaughter others, and He plans to take the innocents to Him, is that not better from a practical, loving standpoint, than to leave small children orphans in the hands of those who killed their family, and destroyed their village (even if at God's command)?

I'm just tossing out comments, here...that may provide food for thought re: Old Testament WRATH O' GOD.

WE do not know His point of view...I would compare to a parent who has an extreme miscreant for a child, and doles out a swat and banishes child to room for a time...the parent doesn't have less love for their child, but it may be necessary to protect other siblings, say, and this may be the only thing that makes an impression on the child...

And, yes, before I have the 'You Must REASON With a Child' crowd after me, that's all well and good, and I'm sure those one minute time-outs are every bit as effective as you claim...but in SOME, not all, cases, the only appropriate discipline is a good swat. Reason with 'em after they cool down. :rolleyes:

Anyway...providing punishment to creation does not change the nature of God...Man must learn that the way to live it to constantly strive toward theosis. I think that we see very clearly that He responds instantly to those who practice this above all else. We have records of Holy Elders being so close to Him that they literally shine with His Uncreated Light, and their prayers were always answered, as they were only asking for what was necessary and proper, not serving themselves.

We have the example before us of Christ, and His Blessed Mother to teach us that mere human nature can live in a sinless way, if we but try...But we turn away from this, and from the examples of other Saints. Then we evolve the "kumbaya" view of Christ, forgetting that He said "Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord', shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven."

He, who loved us so much that He, the Creator, took on the form of His Creation,and suffered, and died a shameful Death that WE might live..warns us...it isn't enough to call to Him with our lips, while our hearts turn away from Him, that we may pursue our selfish lives.

"By their fruit, you will know them"...So far, I am unimpressed with the fruit of Islam. I am rather less impressed with those who defend those who kill and maim others in pursuit of the false teachings of a false prophet. By all means: defend them against those who will punish them for simply BEING...but never embrace or make excuses for their ideology. Love them as they are His children also, but such love need not mean justifying their position where it clearly is contradicted by the Words of The Word, Himself.

Gaudior, who apologizes for this ramble on the subject of....well...everything. :rolleyes: