Feiler Faster 2.0 Relaunches on Monday, July 23 Wednesday, July 18, 2007
I'm taking a few days off to take a few beachcombers to Tybee Island. Please come back Monday when Feiler Faster relaunches in a big way, with new features, a redesign, and a new home. Also, a major headline: I've been invited to the Oval Office next Friday to meet the president, who recently read and praised ABRAHAM. All next week I'll be taking suggestions for what steps I should ask him to take for interfaith relations.
Vacation should be a time for Christians not only to relax but to get closer to God, Pope Benedict said on Sunday from his mountain retreat in the Italian Dolomites.
"Every good Christian knows that vacation is the time to rest the body but also to nurture the spirit through more time for prayer and meditation, to grow in one's personal relationship with Christ and follow his teachings ever more closely," he said.
The 80-year-old Pope was speaking at his regular Sunday blessing amid the tall pines surrounding a church-owned estate in the Dolomite mountains north of Venice where he is on a three-week private retreat.
"Amid this sight of fields, woods, and peaks pointing to the sky, the desire to praise God for the wonders of his works rises spontaneously in the soul and our admiration for this natural beauty is easily transformed into prayer," he said.
Benedict is only the second pope in modern history to take private holidays outside the Vatican or the papal summer residence south of Rome, a tradition started by his predecessor John Paul 20 years ago.
Benedict has been taking short evening walks and spending much of his time reading, listening to music, playing the piano and is believed to be in the initial stages of writing a new encyclical, the highest form of papal writing.
The NYT announced tonight that a young Arab reporter on its staff was killed, and likely murdered. This would be the second-such murder on its staff since the war began. As someone who traveled in Iraq a few years ago with the most extraordinary help from local Iraqi journalists, this story made me sick to my stomach. The paper is running testimonials on its site.
Khalid W. Hassan, 23, an interpreter and reporter in the Baghdad bureau of The New York Times, was shot and killed today, the bureau chief, John F. Burns, reported. He was the second Iraqi employee of the Times to be killed during the current conflict.
Mr. Hassan was shot in the Saidiya district of south central Baghdad while driving to work under circumstances that remain unclear, Mr. Burns said. He had called the bureau earlier and said his normal route to the office had been blocked by a security checkpoint.
“I’m trying to find another way,” he told the bureau staff.
About a half an hour later he called his mother, with whom he lived, telling her, “I’ve been shot.”
His family later called the bureau to report that he had been killed.
Bill Keller, the executive editor of the Times, issued this statement: “Khalid was part of a large, sometimes unsung, community of Iraqi news-gatherers, translators and support staff, who take enormous risks every day to help us comprehend their country’s struggle and torment.
“Without them, Americans’ understanding of what is happening on the ground in Iraq would be much, much poorer. To The Times, Khalid was family, and his death is heartbreaking.”
Mr. Hassan was one of the longest-serving local members of the bureau, having joined in the fall of 2003. He was of Palestinian descent; his family had fled to Iraq after the conflict with Israel in 1948. He lived with his mother and four sisters, all under the age of 18.
Over 100 journalists, most of them Iraqis, have been killed since the 2003 invasion, the Committee to Protect Journalists has reported. The total prior to Mr. Hassan’s death was 109, including 87 Iraqi citizens and two Americans, according to the group’s Web site.
Harry Potter Is Christopher Hitchens' Best Friend Thursday, July 12, 2007
First Harry Potter is bad for reading. Now he's bad for God. What's next: England?
Rowling's work is so familiar that we've forgotten how radical it really is. Look at her literary forebears. In The Lord of the Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien fused his ardent Catholicism with a deep, nostalgic love for the unspoiled English landscape. C.S. Lewis was a devout Anglican whose Chronicles of Narnia forms an extended argument for Christian faith. Now look at Rowling's books. What's missing? If you want to know who dies in Harry Potter, the answer is easy: God.
Harry Potter lives in a world free of any religion or spirituality of any kind. He lives surrounded by ghosts but has no one to pray to, even if he were so inclined, which he isn't. Rowling has more in common with celebrity atheists like Christopher Hitchens than she has with Tolkien and Lewis.
What does Harry have instead of God? Rowling's answer, at once glib and profound, is that Harry's power comes from love. This charming notion represents a cultural sea change. In the new millennium, magic comes not from God or nature or anything grander or more mystical than a mere human emotion. In choosing Rowling as the reigning dreamer of our era, we have chosen a writer who dreams of a secular, bureaucratized, all-too-human sorcery, in which psychology and technology have superseded the sacred.
TPM Cafe has a great report on the showdown today in the U.S. Senate after a first-ever Hindu invocation was offered in the morning and some Christian activists interrupted it.
Today was a historic first for religion in America's civic life: For the very first time, a Hindu delivered the morning invocation in the Senate chamber — only to find the ceremony disrupted by three Christian right activists.
The three protesters, who all belong to the Christian Right anti-abortion group Operation Save America, and who apparently traveled to Washington all the way from North Carolina, interrupted by loudly asking for God's forgiveness for allowing the false prayer of a Hindu in the Senate chamber.
"Lord Jesus, forgive us father for allowing a prayer of the wicked, which is an abomination in your sight," the first protester began.
"This is an abomination," he continued. "We shall have no other gods before You."
The TIME coverstory has an interesting poll attached. Here are some highlights:
Only 15% of registered voters believe that Hillary Clinton is "strongly religious," compared to 22% for John Edwards and 24% for Barack Obama. Perhaps more problematic for Clinton is the fact that nearly one-quarter of respondents (24%) say they know she is "not religious" — that's almost twice the nearest candidate, Rudy Giuliani (13%).
On the ranking of candidates with strong faith, Obama comes in second (24%) among all voters. And even Republican voters put him (18%) above John McCain (17%), Rudy Giuliani (14%), and Newt Gingrich (14%).
When it comes to the Republican field, Mitt Romney ranks far above the rest of the pack. Fully 26% of all voters think Romney is a person of strong religious faith, and among Republicans that number rises to 32%. What should worry Republicans, however, is that Romney's numbers are nearly double the closest Republican and still far below George W. Bush's in 2004. They also suggest an opening for Fred Thompson, who is expected the enter the race within weeks. James Dobson may have declared on his radio show that Thompson isn't a Christian, but given the alternatives, social conservatives are likely to disagree.
I've been writing about this months -- notably here in the NYDN in the spring -- and now TIME hits big today with the Dems effort to close the God Gap. If nothing else, their illustration (above) is great.
In this campaign season, if Clinton and Barack Obama and John Edwards are any measure, there will be nothing unusual in Democrats' talking about the God who guides them and the beliefs that sustain them. Clinton has hired Burns Strider, a congressional staffer (and evangelical Baptist from Mississippi) who is assembling a faith steering group from major denominations and sends out a weekly wrap-up, Faith, Family and Values. Edwards has been organizing conference calls with progressive religious leaders and is about to embark on a 12-city poverty tour. In the past month alone, Obama's campaign has run six faith forums in New Hampshire, where local clergy and laypeople discuss religious engagement in politics. "We talk about ways people of faith have gone wrong in the past, what they have done right and where they see it going in the future," says his faith-outreach adviser, Joshua DuBois. Speeches on everything from the budget to immigration to stem-cell research are carefully marinated in Scripture. "Science is a gift of God to all of us," said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi during a debate on increased embryo-research funding, "and science has taken us to a place that is biblical in its power to cure."
The Democrats are so fired up, you could call them the new Moral Majority. This time, however, the emphasis is as much on the majority as on the morality as they try to frame a message in terms of broadly shared values that don't alarm members of minority religions or secular voters. It has become an article of faith among party leaders that it was sheer strategic stupidity to cede the values debate to Republicans for so long; that most people want to reduce abortion but not criminalize it, protect the earth instead of the auto industry, raise up the least among us; and that a lot of voters care as much about the candidates' principles as about their policies. "What we're seeing," says strategist Mike McCurry, "is a Great Awakening in the Democratic Party."
Today's Lame Name Tag of the Day goes to the Allen & Company retreat. First of all, it's a clip-on, thereby hurting the clothes. Second, it's on the wrong side. Third, it's tiny. Fourth, the first and last names are the same size. And fifth, it doesn't tell you anything about the person, even if it is Rupert Murdoch...
Those of us from Georgia monitor changes to the Coke can like Shakespeare scholars rate performances of Hamlet. I'd rate this one as fair, a little flat, and way too two-dimensional. And the "classic" is far too trendy. But the design blog Under Consideration rates it a rave:
They've essentially done absolutely nothing. All the extra bits and doodads and extraneous graphics are gone. Classic coke imagery: the red, the ribbon, and the coke script. "Classic" is even in a simple lowercase sans serif. This is a confident design. Coca-cola is acknowledging that we all know the product, so just drink it. They've given similar treatment to the majority of the Coke line, including Diet and Zero. Simple, back to basics, pure equity. Compared with Pepsi's blow-it-all-out how-many-designs-can-we-produce-in-a-summer strategy, this takes guts. You just don't see that all too often from one of the largest brands in the world and I certainly appreciate it.
A huge new faux downtown, right alongside the old downtown, at a cost of $900 million. Imagine how much they put into this computer-generated video, though you have to imagine pretty hard to see trees this size, as there's not a tree on the site right now.
Predictions that increased urbanization around the world would lead to a more secularized society are unfounded, and in fact the opposite may be true, according to a new report from the United Nations Population Fund.
"Rapid urbanization was expected to mean the triumph of rationality, secular values and the demystification of the world, as well as the relegation of religion to a secondary role," the report said. "Instead, there has been a renewal in religious interest in many countries."
George Martine, a demographer and the chief author of the report, said the renewed religious fervor has been spurred by the increasing waves of immigrants flooding major cities around the globe.
"It's a noticeable fact that people in cities nowadays tend to find in religion a new form of belonging," he said, pointing to the immigrant experience in European cities as an example.
"In Europe, urbanization was initially marked by a growing labor movement," he said. "The labor movement gave (new immigrants) solidarity and promise. But since the labor movement has basically been eroded by globalization ... religion is fulfilling much the same kind of role."
The report, issued Wednesday (June 27), found that 3.3 billion people - more than half the world's population - live in urban areas. That figure is expected to grow to 5 billion by 2030.
I've recently reestablished contact with Irshad Manji, a onetime acquaintance who's become one of the most outspoken voices in moderate Islam since we first met back in 2002. You can hear an audio of a recent interview she did over here at VOA.
Irshad Manji notes that the Qur’an contains three times as many verses calling on Muslims to “think and reflect and analyze” as those that tell believers “what is absolutely right or wrong.” Thus, she says, Islam gives permission “not just to interpret but to continually reinterpret to update [one’s] practices for a brand new time.” Ms. Manji says that in Islam all individuals are equal in the eyes of the Creator, “whether you are a man or woman, young or old,” and have both a “conscience and free will.”
What she regards as the “trouble” with Muslims today is literalism. And by that Ms. Manji means an “uncritical and unquestioning approach to the faith.” She emphasizes that every major religion in the world has its “share of literalists.” But, she argues, it is “only in Islam today that literalism is mainstream worldwide.”
Ms. Manji says that even “moderate” Muslims take the Qur’an as the “final – and therefore supreme – word of God.” But, she suggests, that concept “disproportionately empowers the radical fringe in [her] religion” – for example, the jihadis. Furthermore, it stops those who call themselves “moderates” from asking hard questions “about what happens when faith becomes dogma.” What Ms. Manji’s book argues is that Muslims have lost an important element of their Islamic heritage – their “glorious tradition of questioning.” And she suggests that Muslims today need to “start taking responsibility for traditions such as ijtihad,” and by reviving those traditions it will become apparent “how much more glorious [their] religion is for the 21st century.” Ms. Manji says the revival of ijtihad has the “best chance of success when it is pursued by middle-class, reform-minded Muslims from open societies” where there is no fear of government retaliation. However, she says she believes that even those who are illiterate, including women, “deserve the opportunity to be able to interpret the Qur’an for themselves.”
My sister-in-law, who's planning a wedding for this fall, sent this to me. I have no idea if it's real; it purports to be from the former coach of the UCLA hoops team. Either way, anyone who has ever planned a wedding can attest to the horror -- or the fantasy -- of this scenario:
"Unexpectedly we have received a stunning 95% RSVP on sent out wedding invitations. As a result, our wedding guest list has far exceeded the maximum capacity for a traditional ceremony and reception at The Montage Resort.
After giving serious consideration to alternative plans we have decided the best option at this late stage is to head to Europe to create a magical wedding day.
Please accept our sincere apologies for any inconveniences this change in our wedding plans may have caused you.
We are sorry that we will not be able to share our big day with family and friends. We will be sure to send you photos of our wedding upon our return from Europe.
Please confirm that you received this email.
Thanks in advance for your understanding.
Warm regards, Steve & Mary
Update: I found it mentioned on an LAT blog that insists it's real.
I was at a dinner on Tuesday tonight and was seated next to an executive at Harry Potter's publisher who talked about the extreme crisis in childhood reading habits. Young people don't just do one thing at a time anymore, he said. They watch TV and IM. They do their homework and listen to music. They do whatever and surf the computer. That's fine for most media, of course, but for books it's a disaster. Especially for fiction. The children's book business is in a tizzy trying to figure out how how to solve this problem.
As it happens, the NYT has a piece about this in the paper on Wednesday. Their hook is that Harry Potter hasn't changed reading habits as many people had hoped.
As the series draws to a much-lamented close, federal statistics show that the percentage of youngsters who read for fun continues to drop significantly as children get older, at almost exactly the same rate as before Harry Potter came along.
There is no doubt that the books have been a publishing sensation. In the 10 years since the first one, “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone,” was published, the series has sold 325 million copies worldwide, with 121.5 million in print in the United States alone. Before Harry Potter, it was virtually unheard of for kids to queue up for a mere book. Children who had previously read short chapter books were suddenly plowing through more than 700 pages in a matter of days. Scholastic, the series’s United States publisher, plans a record-setting print run of 12 million copies for “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows,” the eagerly awaited seventh and final installment due out at 12:01 a.m. on July 21.
But some researchers and educators say that the series, in the end, has not permanently tempted children to put down their Game Boys and curl up with a book instead. Some kids have found themselves daunted by the growing size of the books (“Sorcerer’s Stone” was 309 pages; “Deathly Hallows,” will be 784). Others say that Harry Potter does not have as much resonance as titles that more realistically reflect their daily lives. “The Harry Potter craze was a very positive thing for kids,” said Dana Gioia, chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, who has reviewed statistics from federal and private sources that consistently show that children read less as they age. “It got millions of kids to read a long and reasonably complex series of books. The trouble is that one Harry Potter novel every few years is not enough to reverse the decline in reading.”
When asked earlier this year how Matthew factored into Obama's political thinking, the Illinois Democrat told me:
"It's powerful, and I think it's one that's important for all of us to pray on. One of the things that I'm always interested in when it comes to politics is making sure I can continually translate values that are grounded in my religious faith into universal values that appeal to all people. If I'm in church I might quote some Scripture. If I'm outside a church I might quote FDR. Hopefully, they both lead to the same place."
Other candidates have adopted other Scripture to define their message. U.S. Sen. Hillary Clinton's (D-N.Y.) campaign staff said she often draws from James 2:26 -- "Faith without deeds is dead" -- a sign of her Wesleyan upbringing. The verse has become a running theme in the campaign of the senator, who grew up a United Methodist. She attended a church in Park Ridge and as first lady addressed the United Methodist denomination.
In interviews, former U.S. Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina has attributed his commitment to alleviating poverty in part to Scripture.
"If you took every reference to taking care of the least of these out of the Bible, there would be a pretty skinny Bible," he said.
The first interesting thing I noticed about the book was that across the pages opposite the bindings it has JEWISH AUTHOR written in black, permanent sharpie. It struck me as amusing, mostly because they're still important to us too. But anyway...
So this guy spent three or something years of his life visiting all of the places we can locate in Genesis through Deuteronomy. And, what I think makes it the coolest is that he is a Jewish author and speaks so much of his spiritual connection to these places. I'm not sure that a Christian author/writer would focus nearly so much on the significance and connection to these places in the Middle East.
Feiler's account of being at these places and having them bring the Bible stories to life is absolutely inspiring. He started with the purpose of learning about where the Bible took place, purely as an archaeological and academic endeavor. But so far he continues to speak of his awe at visiting the geographic locations and how they give stories so much more meaning and give him a greater understanding of the people, their situations, and how they speak to us in contemporary society.
One really cool theme he explores through all of this is what we learn about the Bible and its stories through literal critique, archaeological exploration, and scientific knowledge.
Mrs. Feiler Faster got some props on Tuesday from the Secretary of Commerce at the White House.
“But it is not only U.S. companies that are helping create opportunity in the hemisphere—Latin American entrepreneurs are stepping up to the plate as well.
Endeavor, a non-profit which helps support, train and grow entrepreneurs in developing economies, has hundreds of case studies of successful Latin pioneers.
Entrepreneur Francisco Gross has a company in Uruguay that is helping deliver drinkable water and wastewater management through affordable water treatment devices. His patented product is so affordable and efficient that the company has been hired to consult with companies in China.
Alltournative, a company run by Carlos Marin in Mexico, is supporting thousands of impoverished Mayan Indians by helping them develop a sustainable tourism infrastructure. So far, over 200,000 tourists have visited the Alltournative-Mayan sites.”
Bill Clinton: Always TAKING while he's GIVING. From PublishersLunch:
Former President Bill Clinton's book about citizen activism and public service, GIVING: How Each of Us Can Change the World, has a pub date--Knopf announced a laydown of September 4, with an announced first printing of 750,000 copies. Though the publisher was vague on promotional details when they signed the book last May, with his wife Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign well underway, it now turns out that "Clinton has committed to a national author tour at the time of publication." Spokesman Paul Bogaards expects to have details "in the weeks to come on where he'll be going, what appearances he'll be making, and what national media he'll be doing."
An Episcopal priest who announced that she is also a practicing Muslim has been suspended from the priesthood for a year.
The Rev. Ann Holmes Redding has been a priest for 23 years and until March was director of faith formation at St. Mark's Episcopal Cathedral in Seattle. In a story published in The Seattle Times last month, she said she also has been a practicing Muslim for 15 months after being profoundly moved by an introduction to Islamic prayer.
Redding said she removed her priest's collar last week in a meeting with the Rt. Rev. Geralyn Wolf, bishop of the Diocese of Rhode Island, who suspended her in an e-mail received by church leaders in Seattle on Thursday.
Redding should "reflect on the doctrines of the Christian faith, her vocation as a priest, and what I see as the conflicts inherent in professing both Christianity and Islam," Wolf wrote in an e-mail to church leaders.
For the next year Redding "is not to exercise any of the responsibilities and privileges of an Episcopal priest or deacon," Wolf added.
She has maintained that she did not violate any of her baptismal or ordination vows.
"I am both Muslim and Christian, just like I'm both an American of African descent and a woman. I'm 100 percent both," she said.
I was a devout Catholic until I was about 20 years old. I am now in my 60's. After many years of thinking about it, I converted to Judaism about 15 years ago.
Jews are overreacting to the reemergence of the Latin Mass. I was raised with it and I don't believe that, in and of itself, the Tridentine mass was an agent of anti-semitism. In fact, I think that the Catholic Church made a big mistake when it dumped the unversality of Latin, in pursuit of a kind of faux multiculturalism. It was divisive, not unifying.
Jews have nothing to fear from people who love the old Latin Mass. Jews should NOT get involved in protesting this. It won't stop anything, but it might make some mad at us for no good reason.
My post a month ago about knocking got people hot under the transom. Now the battle moves to the Bay.
Roughly 70,000 Jehovah's Witnesses are converging at the Cow Palace in Daly City for a series of conventions this summer, and they'll be knocking on tens of thousands of doors along the way.
By the end of the summer, each believer will have attended a three-day convention that consists of intensive Bible study, prayer, song, mass baptisms and a biblical drama. They also will have invited thousands of perfect strangers.
Those gathering at the Cow Palace will have tried to knock on every door from the Oregon border to Reno to the Central Coast. It's a process that will be repeated for 287 conventions in 75 cities around the nation this summer in the largest mobilization of the year for the nation's 1 million Jehovah's Witnesses.
Jehovah's Witnesses are strict biblical literalists who say the Bible does not call for a celebration of Easter, Christmas or individual birthdays. Save for the commemoration of Jesus' Last Supper, the regional conventions are the most important events of the year for the faithful.
When I was growing up, a common line we used to encourage complainers to stop complaining was, "Write a letter." Now comes word that it may actually work! My Dad sent along this link to these tips:
1. Take Notes. 2. Act Fast. 3. Send the Letter to Somebody. 4. Keep it Short and Polite. 5. Ask for Something.
The controversy about the return of Latin to the Catholic mass, which first stirred up controversy at FeilerFaster last week, has now stirred up a much bigger problem, as Jews from New York to Jerusalem got up in arms. Here's a bit of background.
A decree by Pope Benedict allowing priests to say the old Latin Mass more frequently has sparked criticism within both Catholic and Jewish ranks, with one Italian bishop saying he was "in mourning."
The decree, a nod to traditionalists which the Pope said was meant to heal divisions within the Church, was regarded by some as a blow to reforms introduced in the 1960s that promoted mass in local languages and understanding with non-Catholics.
"I can't fight back the tears. This is the saddest moment in my life as a man, priest and bishop," Luca Brandolini, a member of the liturgy commission of the Italian bishops' conference, told the Rome daily La Repubblica in an interview on Sunday.
"It's a day of mourning, not just for me but for the many people who worked for the Second Vatican Council. A reform for which many people worked, with great sacrifice and only inspired by the desire to renew the Church, has now been cancelled."
The Pope, in a letter to bishops on Saturday, rejected criticism that his decree could split Catholics and reverse the reforms of the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965).
Some Jewish leaders have sharply criticized the decree, which revives a passage from the old Latin prayer book for Good Friday calling for Jews to be converted.
And more on the prayers.
The old prayer, contained in the 1962 missal of the Tridentine rite, read: "Let us pray also for the Jews that the Lord our God may take the veil from their hearts and that they also may acknowledge our Lord Jesus Christ. Let us pray: Almighty and everlasting God, you do not refuse your mercy even to the Jews; hear the prayers which we offer for the blindness of that people so that they may acknowledge the light of your truth, which is Christ, and be delivered from their darkness."
The prayer used in the New Mass according to the Pope Paul VI missal reads: "Let us pray for the Jewish people, the first to hear the word of God, that they may continue to grow in the love of his name and in faithfulness to his covenant. Almighty and eternal God, long ago you gave your promise to Abraham and his posterity. Listen to your church as we pray that the people you first made your own may arrive at the fullness of redemption."
But David Rosen, one of the most respected men in interfaith relations, who is a character in ABRAHAM, says Jews should not be alarmist.
In the wake of controversy over the recital of a Catholic prayer concerning the conversion of the Jews, David Rosen of the American Jewish Committee said Sunday that Jewish groups' responses were exaggerated.
Rosen said that while the Pontiff's move demanded clarification, the inclusion for conversion of the Jews contained in the old form of the Latin Mass was an implementation of a decision made by his predecessor pope John Paul II in 1998.
He added that very few worshipers recited the said section on the conversion of the Jews.
Camelicious. You heard it here first. The bandwagon is building.
Why would anyone choose camel milk? Ulrich Wernery, whose small pilot milking program became the launch pad for a $27-million dairy housing 500 lactating camels, says: "It is the nearly perfect animal product for humans."
Health properties have played a key role in the fledgling camel milk industry's marketing efforts. Advocates say it contains five times more vitamin C than cow's milk; is rich in enzymes with anti-bacterial and anti-viral properties; and is effective in treating a variety of ailments including tuberculosis, peptic ulcers, psoriasis and diabetes.
The one thing camel milk lacks is fat; it has only 2% fat, compared with 4.5% in cow's milk. As a final selling point, even people with lactose intolerance can drink it, even though it contains about as much lactose as cow's milk.
Emirates Industry for Camel Milk & Products is not the first camel dairy in the United Arab Emirates, but it is the first to produce exclusively its own milk, use automatic milking machines and operate within a closed hygienic system, with milk traveling from udder to cooling tank to processing plant. "Previously, camels were hand milked and they poured it into a bowl," says Wernery. "You can imagine the hygiene difficulties, especially with sandstorms."
The dairy produces about 4,000 liters a day. On the shelf, a liter costs about $2.75, more than cow's milk, but production is barely keeping up with demand.
Don't look now, but the breakdown of the so-called Religious Right gets another step closer.
On Friday in Washington, two of the larger groups – the American Baptist Churches and the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship – are worshipping together for the first time. They are commissioning two missionary couples who will represent both groups, and are organizing a national Islamic-Baptist dialogue to improve relations with Muslims.
“It is an effort to celebrate our common heritages as Baptist Christians and to affirm our commitment to work together more collaboratively,” said the Rev. Daniel Vestal, national coordinator of the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship. “The Baptist witness is much richer and more nuanced than is characterized so often in the public square now.”
In January, an even broader group of Baptists will host an Atlanta meeting “to speak and work together to create an authentic and genuine prophetic Baptist voice in these complex times,” according to a joint document they issued called a “North American Baptist Covenant.”
The covenant grew out of meetings of Baptist leaders organized by Carter, a longtime Bible teacher who severed ties in 2000 with the Southern Baptist Convention because of what he called its “increasingly rigid” creed.
At 16.3 million members, the Southern Baptist Convention is the largest Protestant denomination in the country. However, millions of other Baptists have churches nationwide that are either independent or affiliated with smaller groups.
Catching up on a few things after the holiday: Tony Blankley writes a thoughtful piece about the new book by our mutual friend Akbar Ahmed.
His new book, "Journey into Islam: The Crisis of Globalization," is thus particularly heartbreaking for me. As a trained anthropologist, he took three of his students on a six-month journey around the Muslim world to investigate what Muslims are thinking.
His conclusion: Due to both misjudgments by the United States and regrettable developments in Muslim attitudes, "The poisons are spreading so rapidly that without immediate remedial action, no antidote may ever be found." And Dr. Ahmed has always been an optimist.
He divides Muslim attitudes into three categories named after Indian Muslim cities that have historically championed them: Ajmer, Aligarh and Deoband.
Ajmer represents peaceful Sufi mysticism, Aligarth represents the instinct to modernize without corrupting Islam, Deoband represents non-fatalistic, practical, action-oriented orthodox Islam. It traces to Ibn Taymiyya, a 14th-Century thinker who lived when Islam was reeling from the Mongol invasions. He rejected Islam's prior easy, open acceptance of non-Muslims.
In short, Dr. Ahmed is an Aligarth. As a young man he was one of new Pakistan's best and brightest, led by Pakistan's founding father and first president, Dr. Jinnah. They hoped to build a modern democracy, overcome tribalism and the more obscurantist aspects of Islam while still being "good Muslims." The Deobands are the Bin Ladens and all the other Muslims we fear today.
It would be nice to think this debate would spread around the world, but not that many countries are likely drafting constitutions right now. Which reminds me, a second constitution in a decade??
The group drafting Thailand's new constitution voted Friday against a proposal to include a clause designating Buddhism as the national religion.
The decision triggered protests by Buddhist monks and others who have been staging rallies and hunger strikes in favor of the measure.
The Constitution Drafting Assembly voted 66 to 19 against the proposal to recognize Buddhism — followed by about 90 percent of Thailand's 64 million people — as the official national religion.
The assembly was appointed in January to draft a new charter to replace the previous 1997 constitution that was scrapped in a military coup last year.
"It is not appropriate to register Buddhism as a national religion in the constitution simply because we will lose more than we gain from it," said Jaran Pakdithanakul, a member of the constitution drafting body.
The vote sparked an outcry by hundreds of Buddhists, including monks, who have been staging an around-the-clock rally outside Parliament. They threatened to vote against the constitution when it is submitted to a national referendum, probably in September.
They say that Buddhism has been under threat by an Islamic separatist insurgency in the country's Muslim-dominated southern provinces, and its official recognition is necessary to guarantee it will continue to be the country's main religion.
Reads to me like more propagandistic hype. The battle over the Temple Mount has been going on for decades, with Right Wing Jews as guilty as Right Wing Muslims. How about a little perspective! I have an entire chapter about this in WHERE GOD WAS BORN, but here's the latest chapter designed to rile naive Jews around the world.
Hamas's attempts to take over control of the Temple Mount as well as spread its ideology and recruit new members in Jerusalem have been foiled by the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency), a senior security official announced Monday.
According to officials, Hamas has invested millions of shekels in recent years in Jerusalem charities and religious institutions, as well as in construction on the Temple Mount, in an effort to recruit Israeli Arab residents of Jerusalem into its ranks, thus bolstering its presence in the capital.
The official said that Hamas has recently enlarged a library and several prayer halls in Solomon's Stables and also built a public bathroom facility.
"Their goal is to gain full control over the Temple Mount," a high-ranking security officer said Monday, adding that Hamas also tried to infiltrate members into the Temple Mount as maintenance staff, in addition to its religious leaders who preach, give tours, and teach Koran classes there.
The official said Hamas had taken advantage of the Jordanian Wakf, which is responsible for the holy site. The Wakf has been suffering from financial constraints since 2000, when the Temple Mount mosques were closed to visitors.
I've been waiting for this, and now it's come. A credible, lefty-wing voice on why the UK terror plot suggests that Muslim extremism is in trouble in the UK, not on the rise. It comes down to this: Why didn't the car go off? Car bombs go off on a daily basis in Iraq, and used to go off on a monthly basis in the UK under the IRA. What's wrong with the "Al Qaeda" bombers in the UK that they can't make three different bombs successful. Maybe they're not that talented.
Looks like we have yuppie Muslims who, despite a medical education, don't understand fundamentals about how to build and detonate quality improvised explosives. They obviously spent all of their cash on the Mercedes and neglected to sign up for the suicide bomber course. Thank your deity or religious object of affection for their fecklessness. Or, thank your lucky stars.
These latest events will further erode the capability of Muslim extremists in the U.K. British and Scottish police certainly have new leads to follow. And the ham handed execution of this plot is not going to attract eager copycats. What genuine fanatic is going to be inspired by amateur terrorists who have trouble igniting gasoline? Not many.
This analysis is bound to make some people unhappy, and apparently has over at the comments section at TPM. But these questions are definitely worth asking.
