muslims on tape less scary
Greg the explorer (who recently celebrated a birthday - check out the comments on that thread, by the way) pointed me to this short article:
St Paul’s in Paraparaumu says any church which tries to put on a choral work including the Muslim call to prayer is going to run into problems.
A choir due to sing the work at the Kapiti Coast Anglican community objected to the Adhan being performed inside the church.
Archdeacon Lyall Perris says in a hard-won compromise, a recording of the Adhan will be played in the foyer. He says the problem is the declaring of another faith within a church.
I have a bunch of these stories. Once a speaker at a young adults event set out his theory about why nobody should participate in martial arts because you would be required to stand in certain stances which are actually positions of worship to bad and evil gods. In short, don’t do martial arts because you might find yourself inadvertantly worshipping another God. Or the heaps of people who object to yoga or tai chi or similar exercise programs being carried out on consecrated church grounds.
Our church ministry centre also doubles as a convention centre which for some reason is really popular with wedding receptions for people of other faiths. Does that mean we are all going to hell?
May 5th, 2006 at 4:13 pm
#56 emergingblurb said:
Problem is we see the world as a farm with a heap of cows with cow shit scattered all over the paddock. We’d really love to talk with the cows but insist they clean up all their shit before we’ll engage or even talk with them. Of course they don’t so we demonise their paddock for all its evils and justify our absence with a call to be clean and set apart.
Thing is, we can learn to step around and over the shit so we can reach the cows in their world without compromising the call to be clean.
So when farmers put cow shit in their boots to keep their feet warm on cold mornings…does that have a missional point ? Or perhaps it’s Friday and I’;m being stupid just for the sake of it.
Gues what…I’m giving a talk tonight to our young people at a youth service (PHAT Friday it’s called -Pursuiing Holiness and Truth PHAT). I’m going to talk about how the 5 pillars of Islam are very similar to the essentials of pursiuing a life of faith as a Christian - I hope I don’t plummett straight down into a firey furnace.
Homer please pray that I won;t be too sinful!
May 5th, 2006 at 4:35 pm
The only similarity is with the cows etal.
Muslims believe good works outweigh bad deeds. Luckily the good deeds have a much greater weighting otherwise you would be a goner.
But hey you die your good deeds out weigh your bad deeds by an order of 1000 -1 but unfortunately for you Allah is having a bad hair day.
He tilts the scales and instead of paradise and all those virgins you go to the other place.
the only guaranteed way to paradise?
Die in a jihad. That is the smaller Jihad!
very similar to what Jesus said
oops. They do not believe he died on a cross. Indeed some will get quite violent when you suggest that.
Another similarity.
May 5th, 2006 at 5:16 pm
thanks for the support Homer - you old softy you!
May 6th, 2006 at 8:11 am
Homer,
Once again you are showing a complete lack of respect for those who have a different faith than you.
How can you justfy saying this:
“oops. They do not believe he died on a cross. Indeed some will get quite violent when you suggest that.”
Have you ever personally told a Muslim that Jesus died on the cross and they become violent with you? Do you carry scars of this? If so that is very sad. This is far different to my experience with Muslims.
Do we disagree - yes. Does it get it to violence over a theological difference - definitely not!
May 6th, 2006 at 11:17 am
Maybe someone can correct me here but just in response to Bring Back EP at LP, I have always been under the impression that muslims believed that man is not inherrently sinful. Muslims then believe they can approach perfection by controlling or excluding environmental influences that would otherwise corrupt. Christians on the other hand believe that we are basically sinful and need redemption, and can only approach a sinless state before God through Christ.
But given the cow analogy in the previous comment, its as though we Christians have a more Islamic approach to life than we care to realise. We are very good at works salvation and sanitising our world, staying away from the cow shit as it were when all we needed to do was remove the cow shit in our hearts and minds.
May 6th, 2006 at 11:39 am
You disagree with Muslims over theology. Tell me, who is right? Or is everyone right?
This is an important question to answer because it can be very confusing for the outsider trying to choose the correct faith.
May 6th, 2006 at 3:18 pm
DD
Jesus said ” I am the WAY the TRUTH and the LIFE , no one comes to the Father but by me
Jesus is the only way to eternal salvation
No other religion or belief system will give you eternal life.
Heaven is REAL - only by believing in Jesus Christ can you be saved
May 6th, 2006 at 3:42 pm
Phil,
I do know people who organised a seminar on Jesus and Islam or something like that.
RMC actually had to change the name of its seminar to avoid any similar behaviour. I doubt if it can be done in Sydney.
very nasty things eventuated. Some Muslims get infuriated by the fact that Jesus claimed to be god and died on a cross for our sins.
god would never submit himself to anything so humiliating etc.
May 6th, 2006 at 5:16 pm
Homer,
You said that Muslims get violent when you suggest that Jesus didn’t die on the cross. How is what you have now said - related to this statement.
Changing the name of a seminar (dont understand that completely by the way) is significantly different than saying that people are getting violent.
Even saying that some Muslims get infuriated is different than saying that they get violent.
May 6th, 2006 at 5:43 pm
Homer, I am soooo tired of you trotting out that line. I *know* the people who organised that seminar you keep talking about, and that is *not* why they cancelled it. I have discussed it with them on more than one occasion.
Several Muslims help out with running a free meal that MY CHURCH runs. They know what I and others believe. They are often proselytised by the people who come for the meal.
Never once have I seen them throw a punch…
May 6th, 2006 at 8:13 pm
Homer, Ned, all this they love and tolerate us too stuff, reminds me of Chamberlain’s touchy feely love embrace of Hitler in late 1944. As individuals, all men and women in the same way are in need of Christ. I agree wholeheartedly with reaching out to all people groups, regardless of colour creed or religion; but it would be a mistake to assume those we reach out to necessarily share the same good will towards christians. It would also be a mistake to assume that people are open faced!
May 6th, 2006 at 9:06 pm
Not one person in these 71 posts has bothered to look at the original context of the “offensive” statement. The choral work in question is Karl Jenkins’ “The Armed Man” a large-scale choral work in English, Latin and French. The performance was a public concert for which an entrance fee was paid - it was not a service of worship.
The work is subtitled “A Mass for Peace.” In a very similar way to Fanshawe’s African Sanctus(see post #40), it is primarily music , the words are the scaffolding upon which the composer places the sounds to which we humans react emotionally. The parishioners of St Paul’s were placing more reliance on their inferred meaning of the words, than the composer intended.
May 6th, 2006 at 9:07 pm
Pastor Reverend Jerry Vines of First Baptist Church in Jacksonville, Florida, USA, contends that Mohammed is a “demon-possessed pedophile”.
Would you agree with this assessment, EP?
May 7th, 2006 at 3:41 pm
I know a Islamic man who converted to Christianity. He personally told me he doesn’t trust fellow muslims and is very secretive of his faith.
There are some moderate muslims but many of them live in fear and they will quickly toe the party line if threatened by more radicals.
May 7th, 2006 at 8:04 pm
Ned, this speaks volumes!
May 7th, 2006 at 9:26 pm
Homer says: “ONLY Christianity is the truth.”
Jesus says: “I am the truth.”
I know whom I believe.
May 8th, 2006 at 8:31 am
Bec,
I very much doubt it as there was in the seminar I am talking about.
When this came up at RMC for discussion I was amazed at how many tales from different areas there were.
We promptly changed the name of the seminar and experienced little trouble.
Only Nigel could think there is any different in the two statements!
May 8th, 2006 at 9:08 am
EP, Mohammed’s youngest wife was nine-years old. That’s some of the background to Pastor Rev. Jerry Vine’s comment.
Does this not raise concerns with anyone? Or is it politically incorrect to comment on?
May 8th, 2006 at 9:37 am
DD,
as one of Mohammed wives said he was very ‘fortunate’ that allah would change his mind to Mohammed’s good fortune.
It follows since Islam was not founded on Christ then Mohammed was Satan’s agent in bringing in such a religion of lies
May 8th, 2006 at 10:36 am
I didn’t fully understand you first sentence. What does “that allah would change his mind to Mohammed’s good fortune” mean?
Could you possibly add in the missing words and re-arrange the sentence? I don’t mean to be personal, but I find gramatically parsable sentences easier to comprehend. It would also help to fill in the missing logical steps in your argument. If you can do this, you might have a very persuasive argument on your hands.
May 8th, 2006 at 10:45 am
Mohammed was able to change things because he received messages from Allah.
Twas just luck it was always to his benefit
May 8th, 2006 at 10:55 am
Thank you, EP. Yes it is rather coincidental that Allah would conveniently approve Mohammed’s actions as circumstances changed. Another example is in Mohammed’s shift from peacable means to using the sword to spread Islam.
Of course, it doesn’t have to mean that some other supernatural force (eg Satan) was behind it all. Although you seem to be agreeing with Jerry Vines on that point. What do you think about Jerry’s other point?
May 8th, 2006 at 11:14 am
Some read into the history of Islam under Mohammed a pattern of Muslim behaviour applicable to today. When in the minority, Muslem’s will appear reasonable, co-operative and law-abiding. However, when they achieve a powerful enough position in society, the tactics change to ruthless subjugation and conversion of the entire population to Islam and Shariah law.
Now this may be a whole lot of rubbish, but it does appear to be an underlying fear many have of the Muslim faith.
May 8th, 2006 at 5:08 pm
I have a real problem with this widely accepted paradigm where we have the option of
A. Staying safely wrapped up in our little Christian bubble
or
B. Only stepping out of our bubble in order to persuade other people to come into it.
In response to A, Jesus certainly never had a problem spending time with people who were different to him.
As for B, the breathtaking arrogance and judgementalism implied by only making contact with others in order to tell them that we’re right and they’re wrong, goes against all principles of humility and letting God be the judge.
Sharing with someone how grace has touched our lives and listening respectfully while they tell their own story and share their beliefs and experiences is about as far removed as is possible from arguing that they are following a fundamentally flawed, satanic religion, and will be going to hell when they die.
If you are contemptuous of other people’s beliefs, are you really surprised when they don’t want to listen to yours?
May 8th, 2006 at 6:50 pm
yep, that’s what Jesus was a judgmentalist.
Yeah he also thought a lot of what the religious elites thought too.
He said he was the only way.
Damned exclusive arrogance!
May 8th, 2006 at 7:19 pm
Greg, you said “Do I believe that other religions are entitled to respect and being treated with dignity? Yes. Do I think they are as valid as mine? Yes. Do I think I’m wrong? No…but I could be!”
I’m not having a go at you, but can you explain to me how other religions are “as valid as [yours]”? Surely if you believe the truth claims of one, then by logical extensions, you must deny the truth claims of another?
Agree with you about respect and dignity, though. We see far too little of that.
May 8th, 2006 at 7:21 pm
Dang, extension should be singular, not plural.
May 22nd, 2006 at 9:14 am
It’s becuase I accept that I could be wrong about the whole faith thing. I don;t think I am - that’s why I remain a Christian…but I accept that others are just as convinced about their faith and therefore if I accpet that my faith is valid I have to by logical extension accept the validity of their faith as well. I also think that we could learn a whole lot from some of the religious practices of others - for instance Muslims and Ramadam as well as Muslims and the call to prayer - I konw my prayer life is sadly lacking and I could leqrn a heap from my Islamic brothers and sisters.
May 22nd, 2006 at 9:31 am
The Jews said much the same thing about baal.
tis a pity greg has NO biblical evidence for such a belief if one could call it such.
May 22nd, 2006 at 3:26 pm
Actually there’s heaps Homer…there Old Testament is littered with references to indigenous spiritualities that were treated with respect, and people even acknowledged each other’s Gods as being ‘The Most High God’. I can’t think of any off the top of my head right now, but that’s just because I’m preoccupied with thinking about causation and calculation of damages in contract…I’m sure you’re quite capable of pursuing this line of inquiry yourself though. I know Mark Brett from Whitley College has written quite a bit on this (and yes, he’s a respected biblical scholar), and I’ve also heard Graeme Paulson (an Australian indigenous minister) speak on this.