Islam, The Threat of the Sword

Give me a few moments today to speak about the Western view of mores, gentility, and shame, and how they apply to the Muslim-street. From the Pocket Merriam-Webster Dictionary, gentility is defined as: "good birth and family; the qualities characteristic of a well-bred person; good manners; superior social status shown in manners or mode of life." Mores is defined as: "the fixed morally binding customs of a group, habits, manners." For brevity, let's agree that mores and gentility are not associated with financial status within a given society/culture. Nor are these qualities dependent upon academic acumen. Your mores and gentility are associated with your up-bringing, not your birth, ethicity, religion, gender. They are represented through your behavior. Shame is associated with behavior which goes against the established mores or taboos of your society. It seems to me that when we take away shame from behavior, we rob the person committing the "bad" act of the avenue of remorse and therefore improvement of character and "good" behavior the next time. A person must know the limits to which his behavior can attain and still remain "accepted" into the society for the good of the society. We do this through our churches. The state cannot legislate morality, gentility, or shame. These come from within and shape a person's "behavioral" character, if you will. It appears to me that Islam does legislate minute behavior, leaving little to the responsibility of the individual. Much easier to be a follower - the Koran made me do it; than a thinker, going around slicing off peoples heads is a little tacky. From the demonstrations and brutality we see in the Muslim-street, we have no choice but to believe that the up-bringing of these people is diametrically opposed to ours. It is a society seemingly built on the insecurity of one's god and in hatred. Mohammed did take up the sword and wielded it well. That cannot be denied. What is the saying, the Truth hurts. Somebody got their feathers ruffled. God does not have to defend Himself. He does not have to be defended. He's not insecure; if He were, He wouldn't be God; he'd just be a little, chest-beating god, right? Christ, let us not forget, did not establish Christianity. Paul did that. Jesus, it is sugggested, made a few of his fellow Jewish folks angry because he did not take up the sword against Rome. On its face, it seems that Jesus has the moral high ground when it comes to a duel between Christianity and Islam. The Pope was right. It seems that the actions of some Muslims bear out the truth of the quotation. Certainly not all who practice Islam are running around killing infidels. But, that the non-believers (also God's children and creation) would be automatically condemned to death seems contrary to "good" religious mores and more like a militant conquering view. "Storm the gates. Kill the infidels, every man, woman, and child! Allah akbar!" Boy, howdy! The Christian world is challenged to "study" and to learn more of Islam to better understand Muslims. Where are the Islamic centers exhorting their followers to study Christianity to better understand the Christians? Just yesterday, The Washington Times (9/19/06), in "Muslim calls for Pope to be executed", attributed the following statement to the Mujahedeen Shura Council, an unbrella organization of Sunni Arab extremist groups in Iraq:

"You infidels and despots, we will continue our jihad (holy war) and never stop until God avails us to chop your necks and raise the fluttering banner of monotheism, when God's rule is established governing all people and nations."

With all due respect for the "peaceful" Muslims of the world, that's all I need to hear. I ask you to denounce this sort of message loud and clear so that the Western World has no "wrong" view of your aims. What your leaders seem to take as our weakness (negotiating) is our strength. And right now we're getting the message. But intimidation is not a good ploy. I ask responsible Muslims, please do not push the West. Certainly, not with out-of-control migration and not with the threat of the sword. We just don't like being threatened. It can make us grumpy.