When I was young, I never understood John Lennon's lyrics in his song "Imagine":"Imagine there's no heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today...
Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too"
But now I can say that I do understand them. Very well.
I had some problems embedding this CNN video, so please feel free to watch.
http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/us/2009/07/10/pkg.fl.islam.is.devil.sign.wcjb
This Florida "church" has posted a hateful sign that reads: Islam is from the Devil. Misguidedly, in an effort to pull congregants in? What?!
Not only does this go against the core message of Jesus to Love They Neighbor and to cultivate peace and understanding, but it represents an ignorance and intolerance that I can't even comprehend. In the interview, the "pastor" says "It is our way or no way." This is exactly the spiritually immature view (topped with a lack of biblical / education), that starts wars, creates distrust and widens existing social divisions.
Since I personally believe in the Universal Salvation of all (a Gospel of inclusion, not exclusion) I believe there are many paths that lead to grace. The purpose of organized religion, in short, is to keep people in line and to behave, not to encourage bad behavior by sneering at another belief structure. And I don't consider this form of "Christianity" to be in line with nature of Christ.
Unbeknownst to themselves, these bigoted "Christian" people are waging a spiritual jihad against the grace of God, for God loves Muslims, too. They don't want to hear that Jesus Christ died on their behalf as well. They lick their chops at the thought of "the bad people" supposedly burning in hell for eternity. They had a "bad people" slot to fill in their story, so they happily insert: Muslims, Gays, Pro-Choicers. Yeah, not the way of Christ at all.
There is a saying: "You catch more flies with honey than you do with vinegar." How true.
This Florida "church" has posted a hateful sign that reads: Islam is from the Devil. Misguidedly, in an effort to pull congregants in? What?!
Not only does this go against the core message of Jesus to Love They Neighbor and to cultivate peace and understanding, but it represents an ignorance and intolerance that I can't even comprehend. In the interview, the "pastor" says "It is our way or no way." This is exactly the spiritually immature view (topped with a lack of biblical / education), that starts wars, creates distrust and widens existing social divisions.
Since I personally believe in the Universal Salvation of all (a Gospel of inclusion, not exclusion) I believe there are many paths that lead to grace. The purpose of organized religion, in short, is to keep people in line and to behave, not to encourage bad behavior by sneering at another belief structure. And I don't consider this form of "Christianity" to be in line with nature of Christ.
Unbeknownst to themselves, these bigoted "Christian" people are waging a spiritual jihad against the grace of God, for God loves Muslims, too. They don't want to hear that Jesus Christ died on their behalf as well. They lick their chops at the thought of "the bad people" supposedly burning in hell for eternity. They had a "bad people" slot to fill in their story, so they happily insert: Muslims, Gays, Pro-Choicers. Yeah, not the way of Christ at all.
There is a saying: "You catch more flies with honey than you do with vinegar." How true.
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I found a better idea online:
In support of a magazine for Muslim-Christian dialogue:
As Muslims and Christians in the University of London, we don’t talk to each other enough. It follows that we don’t know much about each other and don’t spend much time together. The ultimate aim of this magazine would be to provide a channel for discourse which would at least sow the seed for a “network of open, honest and committed personal relationships between Christians and Muslims” in London’s student population.
And here is another multi-faith online forum: http://en.allexperts.com/q/Islam-947/Multi-Faith-Society.htm
2 comments:
Hi,
I saw this site linked from Erin's site and read through a couple of your posts and saw your recommended resources and was wondering: have you read "The Varities of Religious Experience" by William James? Just curious, as it is an interesting read--whatever your spirituality odometer reading is.
Anyway, wanted to ask you that out of curiosity and to say that your site is interesting and I'm going to try to burn through your archives as quickly as I can.
Michael D. Smith (aka Grigr, aka Some Dude)
Hi Michael -
Thanks for taking a read to my blog. I have not read "The Varities of Religious Experience", but I will make note to. Am currently making my way through dissecting the gospels of St. Paul. Hope you enjoy my posts. I haven't been posting at the frequency I'd like, but I do what I can.
God Bless!
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