www.byzcath.org Forums General Discussions Town Hall Is Europe Dying.? Is the Pope too late?

Indeed, Dan, but resisted in love, and with sympathy! The more we characterize everyday Muslims as jihadists, the more we encourage radiclism.
We must study, and understand the broader picture: that Wahhabism is a reaction against western Imperialism, that we of the West bear some responsibility for its spread, that the Bush family, which has grown rich from its contacts with the Saudis [the promoters of Wahhabist extremism] cannot claim to be innocent, that this nation is not righteous.
-Daniel

There is no justification for what the Wahabbists have done. None. Never. Every Western and developing Asian country is guilty of buying oil from the Middle East. Everyone. There is not one nation outside of the Middle East who is not complicit with the the House of Saud. You can try to make it a Bush issue but that is not honest. The British, The French, the Germans, the Americans, and the Chinese are all complicit. If you drive a car, used plastics, or travel anywhere you are complicit as well.

Now, after admitting this, what are you and I going to do about it?

I encourage people to use alternative fuels. I like what GM is doing with hydrogen fuel, but as some have suggested it may take as much energy to produce the hydrogen as what we might save in using a hydrogen car.

I like what Pope Benedict is doing.

I like Sufism but still believe it is heretical.

I don't like the secularism of Europe and America but I'm still not interested in becoming a Bedouin.

So, I really wish you'd suggest something positive.

At its best Islam is a heresy, even if they worship the same God. A proposition which is only true in the most general of definitions, unless we are to deny the Trinity.

Dan L

Dear Daniel you said:

"In the Middle Ages, men had the sense to call the Muslim invaders "the scourge of God"; they didn't call them Satanic, or insist they only had children for evil ends."

I say:

In the mind of a Muslim having children in order to propagate one's faith is not an 'evil end'. In their mind it is a productive end for it expands Islam.

Let's not forget that in the mind of a Muslim a suicide bomber that kills himself in order to kill others is considered a 'martyr'. After all it is done for the expansion of their faith. Please don't place our own idea's and values into the minds and hearts of those with a religious basis different than ours.

We musn't ignore the fact that in the minds of the Muslims we are totally degenerate and that they plan on filling that moral gap. Not that they are wrong in the degenerate part...Let's face it! It seems we are really faced with two evils...and isn't it always two.

Before WW II it was the athiest communist system that led up to Fascism and Natzism. One extreme spawned the other. Well today we have our immoral secularism spawning a revival of fanatical Islam. Woe is us! They have only to look at how they conquered Byzantium with diplomacy and the sword and repeat the same strategy.

Islam is a heresy and I believe it was Saint John of Kronstadt that said any spirit of desension is not from God. Therefore if it is not from God, then from where does that spirit come from?

Actually Islam amazes me though because of the extent that it has borrowed from Christianity... yet everything became so twisted. As an example the concept of 'martyr'. Here we consider a martyr one who died for his faith, yet this was twisted into being someone that dies for his faith by killing others.

Therefore in your mentality born and nurtured in a Christian world, you can only think that the concept of having children in order to propogate one's faith as being 'evil'. That is not so in the Muslim world.

Actually these differences between the Christian value system and the Muslim one, caused quite a bit of contention during the writing of the EU constitution. Cardinal Ratzinger wanted to have Christianity mentioned as a basis for European culture, as did almost everyone in Europe.

Turkey on the other hand, threatened that she would not join if it was stated, and as usual Turkey managed to get her way and it was left out.

Zenovia

Pope Urban II didn't think to highly of all that was happening http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/sbook1k.html#The%20First%20Crusade

Dear Dan,

What about creating energy with our sewage and garbage. That way we'd solve two problems at the same time.

I'm not joking you know. If we keep it up we'll have to send it to Mars, which reminds me of something.

The biggest joke in this country was and is recycling. I noticed that ever since it started, the manufacturers have been producing thicker plastics. Notice the thick zip top bags that rarely existed before recycling started.

That means we are being fooled into believing recycling is helping the problem, and spending our time and energy separating products, and yet the manufacturers just keep producing larger and larger quantities.

It all comes down to competition with other nations. If it wasn't for that we would be able to better our life style, the environment by producing less products, etc., simply by lessening the work hours.

Who knows maybe that's what the so called world leader, the culmination of all evil the 'anti-christ' is going to offer everyone. Less competition and more vacations.

Just an interesting thought!

Zenovia

Moving away from Muslims and energy issues-

Do you think France's measures are going to help raise birthrates?

I see it the chief impediments to having large families for modern couples seems to be an unwillingness to sacrifice and materialism. I also have the feeling that rampant over-dating and (even worse) premarital sex also makes one unable to live a Christian marriage.

If so, the statist subsidies Mr. Villepin is proposing (quite uncomfortable to my American mindset) aren't going to do France's birthrate a lick of good.

No, a sickness of the soul is not going to be healed by government policies.
And Rose, I finally got around to skimming the links you posted.
Am I to believe that an alliance with polytheists [India] against our fellow monotheists is a good thing?
-Daniel

And really, has anyone seen the wonderful Iranian movie The Color of Paradise? It is perhaps my favorite film of all time, a tender and deeply human portrayal of life in rural Iran [which is really green and hilly, beautiful country, at least this region]. The grandma, with her prayer rope and bubushka, seemed the archetypal baba .
The film is about a blind boy, his father, and his granny; truly glorious and illuminating...
-Daniel

Daniel,

You are right. We do need sympathy for the human drama of living within a Muslim setting that is really not healthy.

Your reflection that Muslim aggression against the Western world may well be the judgment of God against us. Should we resist it I guess we'd be resisting God. Nevertheless, I don't imagine I'd let my family be blown to hell willingly by a person trying to kill them. I have thought for a long time about God's judgment against materialism. I'm not sure what lesson we are supposed to learn from this. But I'll keep trying to discern. One does wonder since both secularism and Islam are heresies which one are we supposed to resist more.

I will try to locate that movie you referenced. It sounds like a good one.

CDL

Dan- You know, when you first started posting as "carson daniel lauffer" I thought it was your son. I thought "What a chip off the old block", as your opinions and ways of stating them seemed so kindred...then I figured it out.
Of course you are right; whoever attacks my family, whatever the larger picture, will see my wrath. Goes without saying. However guilty the American Empire may be, my little ones are innocent [well, relatively!] and I will protect them.
By all means check out the film; you will love it, passionate and soulful and compassionate man that you are.
-Daniel

Dear Daniel,

I'm shocked at what you said about our 'guilt'. Obviously you haven't read in the Garden of the Martyrs. Read it, maybe then you'll get an idea of the different mentalities of the world. It's amazing the attrocities some people can do to one another without the least bit of guilt.

Zenovia

You mean like vaporizing an entire city? Or devastating cultures and ecologies for sake of profit? You mean like coddling dictators because they serve our political aims? Or sending captured suspected terrorists to our dictatorial allies so they can be tortured? Or training death squads?
The myth of American Innocence is a central part of the Religion of Americanism, and I am a heretic.
-Daniel

Dan:

Speaking of the re-evangelization of Europe, the Presidents of the National Episcopal Conferences of Catholic Bishops of 34 Western European countries are now meeting in Rome to plan for such an endeavor.

Full story at:

http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/new.php?n=4997

Amado

Iconophile,
Yes, I saw 'The Color of Paradise' last winter. I too loved it! In fact, if I really want to watch a good movie, I get a foreign one. I especially like the French ones, which usually have a lesson in morality in the plot. I was really surprised by the Iranian films I have watched.
Mr. Lauffer,
Do you know any Europeans? Have you traveled to Europe, off the beaten path?
I find Europeans' faith expressed in their politics - a deep concern for the poor & underprivileged in their countries. Many may be cultural Catholics, but the faith is integral to their identity & their society.

Dear Daniel you said:

"And Rose, I finally got around to skimming the links you posted.
Am I to believe that an alliance with polytheists [India] against our fellow monotheists is a good thing?"

May I jump in and say:

No doubt the bombings today in Bali were by Muslim extremists against the Hindu businesses as well as the Christian tourists in Bali. Who did you say we should unite with?

Zenovia