September 11, 2010

On the ninth anniversary of the Islamic terrorist attacks on America, we sense among Americans important and valuable progress in understanding the nature of the evil confronting humanity. Obama, Michael Bloomberg, the GZM proponents, the Florida pastor, rent-a-mob demonstrators in Afghanistan, and various and sundry scolds lecturing Americans on their bigotry and ‘Islamophobia’ —all are serving a useful purpose in stirring thought to get past the mind-numbing orthodoxy of political correctness and face a fact that most living members of Western civilization have had the luxury of ignoring: theology matters.

Americans are finding that when they cut through the surface level niceties, the two pillars of guidance that the elites have handed down: (1) Islam is a ‘religion of peace’, and (2) ‘we are not at war with Islam’—are 180 degrees out of phase. More accurately, all individuals on the planet are capable of being ‘people of peace’, and we are not necessarily at war with any individual human beings, including individual Muslims. But the theology of Islam is in fact the bane of humanity, including especially those who know nothing else, because it teaches a hateful, tyrannical, oppressive and bloodthirsty deity, with a prophet and followers acting in this deity’s likeness. America wasn’t built on this concept of Deity, and Americans know it.

This appears to be very rocky discussion-territory that ought to be avoided. A centuries-old religion with more than a billion adherents is a bane of humanity? How dare anyone venture into right and wrong pronouncements about theology and the nature of Deity? Search around in the Bible’s Old Testament, and you can find passages that make the Judeo-Christian Deity sound pretty nasty and fierce, too. So who’s to say what is right?

This is the beauty of what is happening in America and the world in 2010. We are waking up to our ability to reason with common sense on this topic, and common sense is cultivating a sort of renewed spiritual sense that tells serious individuals of all kinds that this really isn’t a close question. Centuries have shown that life, civilization, compassion and human progress just can’t and don’t follow in the wake of any theology built on a tyrannical and oppressive concept of Deity.

So what can be done short of catastrophic and cataclysmic war over religion?

Here’s one idea we don’t hear voiced much: how about worldwide public encouragement of all people to read the Bible, especially the Gospels, and the Koran? To examine for themselves the historical accounts of Jesus and Mohammed?

Of course Islamic teaching prohibits the exploration of other faiths, and confers the penalty of death on those who leave the Muslim faith. (That by itself should tell common sense thinkers around the world that something isn’t right with Islam). But the public encouragement to read both holy books and examine both ‘prophets’ doesn’t compel anyone to leave any faith. It would, however, do much more than might appear on the surface to open humanity’s thought on an issue critical to its well-being.

Sure, there would be camera-seeking Imams all over the place issuing fatwas against any reading of anything besides the Koran. There might even be a few Florida pastors ordering their Christian flocks not to read the Koran. A certain portion of humanity would dutifully fall into line as directed by either ‘authority’. But the thinkers would not fall into line; they would keep questioning and questioning—and the only thing left standing after all questions have been answered is Truth itself.

For many, all of this may sound a little too lofty and philosophical for the muddled species called humanity. But understanding and choosing between the theology of Christianity or of Islam is actually the calling of the era. It can't be ducked. We’re slowly coming around to understanding that fact, but the events of 2010—and most especially the timely convergence of the ninth anniversary of 9/11, the GZM, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the nuclear arming of Iran, an anti-American President who seems strangely distant from his professed Christian faith and strangely warm toward the Muslim faith of his youth—are accelerating the focus on this question.

It’s unrealistic to expect humanity to ride a fresh impetus of religious investigation into some quick resolution and ensuing utopia—and a lot of observers would likely say they expect things to get worse before they get better—but the advance toward asking better questions and getting past elitist pabulum can be positive and helpful, and it is happening even without an orchestrated public call to compare and contrast. This is all way beyond Pravda’s ability to grasp, investigate or report on, but we think it’s happening more and more around the world. We think it is the basis for an encouraging outlook on September 11, 2010.

Paul Gable

September 11, 2010