Thwarting a supremacist power play by the increasingly Islamic government. The government insulted its own constituents' intelligence by claiming that The Herald's use of "Allah" (as has been used in Arabic-speaking lands well before Islam) would confuse Muslims. Of course, the true meaning of the gesture was to portray the non-Muslims' claim to authentic worship of the one, true deity as invalid or tainted. Yes, Qur'an 29:46 says "Our Allah and your Allah is One, and unto Him we surrender," but it is a one-way line of discourse, in a manner in which a non-Muslim would be prohibited under Islamic law from preaching to a Muslim.
An update on this story. "Malaysia court rules right to use the word 'Allah' ," from Agence France-Presse, December 31 (thanks to Twostellas):
KUALA LUMPUR - Malaysia's high court ruled Thursday that a Catholic paper had the right to use the word "Allah" after a long-running dispute between the government and the weekly in the Muslim-majority nation.
The ruling overturns the government's controversial threat to cancel The Herald's annual publishing permit.
"The applicant has the constitutional right to use the word 'Allah'," Judge Lau Bee Lan told a packed courtroom, declaring the government's ban on the paper's use of the word "illegal, null and void".
The weekly used the word "Allah" as a translation for "God" in its Malay-language section but the government argued "Allah" should be used only by Muslims.
Lau said the home ministry, which licenses all newspapers in the country, had taken into account "irrelevant considerations" when making the paper's publishing permit conditional on it not using the word.
She said it had shown no evidence that the use of the word by Christians was "a threat to national security".
The Herald's editor, Father Lawrence Andrew, said he was pleased with the decision and the paper would use the word 'Allah' in its upcoming Sunday edition.
"This also means that... the Christian faith can now continue to freely use the word 'Allah'... without any interference from the authorities," he added.
Government lawyers have not yet decided whether to appeal the ruling.
The Herald is printed in four languages, with a circulation of 14,000 copies a week in a country with about 850,000 Catholics.
The court case was among a string of religious disputes that have erupted in recent years, straining relations between Muslim Malays and minority ethnic Chinese and Indians who fear the country is being "Islamised". ....
I applaud the Malaysian Court for its rational application of constitutional law on an entirely irrational edict by its government.
It's too bad this can't happen more often in other Muslim countries.
This is just an opera or drama. The Malaysian government will appeal. The Appeal Court will make a ruling. Then finally it will go the the Federal Court where the judges will be hand-picked by the government. The Federal Court judges will over turn the High Court and even the Appeal Court.
Once the Federal Court has passed the judgment, that will be the final one and every one in Malaysia has to accept the judgment. The government will them claim that the judgment is fair.
Later after the Federal Court's judgment, the government will light the fire that to question the Federal Court is to insult the Malays and the Muslims because "Islam is such a beautiful religion and how noble is the teaching of Koran", and when Christians use the Arabic word, or rather the Aramaic word the the diety Allah, the Muslims in Malaysia will follow this Allah and become confuse and finally get themselves converted to Christianity.
The Muslims in Malaysia are so weak in their faith with such poor knowledge of their religion that they are easily confused. The government will turn Muslims into frenzy mob with the police leading them.
In Malaysia, the religion Islam comes first, follows by the race (again the Malays and the Malays are Muslims) and then thirdly the country. Their loyalty is not towards their country Malaysia but Islam. They blame everything on Zionism, the Jews and the US as they are taught from young.
So now they want to be more Arab than the Arabs and they want to PATENT the word Allah, the moon god, the moon that is seen on the national flag.
This is just an opera or drama. The Malaysian government will appeal. The Appeal Court will make a ruling. Then finally it will go the the Federal Court where the judges will be hand-picked by the government. The Federal Court judges will over turn the High Court and even the Appeal Court.
Once the Federal Court has passed the judgment, that will be the final one and every one in Malaysia has to accept the judgment. The government will them claim that the judgment is fair.
Later after the Federal Court's judgment, the government will light the fire that to question the Federal Court is to insult the Malays and the Muslims because "Islam is such a beautiful religion and how noble is the teaching of Koran", and when Christians use the Arabic word, or rather the Aramaic word the the deity Allah, the Muslims in Malaysia will follow this Allah and become confuse and finally get themselves converted to Christianity.
The Muslims in Malaysia are so weak in their faith with such poor knowledge of their religion that they are easily confused. The government will turn Muslims into frenzy mob with the police leading them.
In Malaysia, the religion Islam comes first, follows by the race (again the Malays and the Malays are Muslims) and then thirdly the country. Their loyalty is not towards their country Malaysia but Islam. They blame everything on Zionism, the Jews and the US as they are taught from young.
So now they want to be more Arab than the Arabs and they want to PATENT the word Allah, the moon god, the moon that is seen on the national flag.
Apart from the complex questions as to how confessional state governments should or should not support and uphold and defend the religious faith they're founded on in relation to religious minorities, Marisol, Jihad Watch seems fixated on this anti-intellectual bugagoo of something being 'supremacist'.
So please explain the apparent theological metaphysics at work here. Is JW claiming that every religion must recognize all other religions as equally true and valid? How can that be, without lapsing into intellectual incoherence, violation of the law of non-contradiction, and pure religious indifferentism? I fail to see on what basis JW seems to stand by apparently implicit demands that any religion must recognize all others as its complete equals in truth claims and theological modes of expression.
Then there is the question as to whether Islam alone is 'guilty' of such a thing. Catholic Christianity, the source and summit, font and foundation, of Western Civilization has a so-called supremacist basis as well. It does not view other religions as being equal in truth claims, and it certainly holds that Christ and the Church have fulfilled and rendered inoperative the Mosaic legal code of Old Testament Judaism. So is this alleged supremacism to be opposed as well?
Then there's the fact that apparently your director has direct ties and affiliation to this so-called supremacist religious entity of Catholicism. Dare I ask how JW justifies some already intellectually dubious campaign against so-called theological supremacism when its own director apparently is a member of such an entity?
If the issue is somehow meant to revolve around government's employment of civil authority on behalf of a singular religion, that, of course, is a staple of any number of religions, not just Islam. Normative orthodox Judaism is just as theocratic in its standard model of the relations between civil and religious authority, up to and including the possible execution of apostates, adulterers and Sabbath violators. Catholic Christianity authoritatively has held to the present day its theology regarding the Social Reign of Christ and the imperative that governments recognize, respect, and uphold the True Faith and True Church, a teaching that, contrary to some popular opinion, has not been altered or abrogated by Dignitatis Humanae.
By the way, Marisol, do you think the Hindus of Malaysia are worshipping the one true deity? If so, which one would that be - Vishnu, Shiva, Durga, Lakshmi, Hanuman or Kali?
Forceone:
While I have never been to Malaysia, though hope to do so in the not too distant future, it would seem that your comments are at least somewhat of an over-generalization regarding the nature of Malaysia Muslims.
They have featured a few incredibly prolific and interesting figures, such as Prof. Mohammed Hashem Kamali, who has written quite extensively on Islamic theology and the political situation in Southeast Asia, and is affiliated with International Islamic Univeristy-Malaysia, one of a number of institutions that seems to have strongly embraced a centrist-like Islam al Wasati interpretive approach.
Also, while developments in Kelantan and Terengganu during the 1990s could be seen as concerning, the drubbing that PAS took in the national 2004 elections, up to the point that the party leader himself lost his own seat, would seem to confound any claims that Malaysian Muslims are en masse on an undifferentiated one-way track toward some kind of supposed theological extremism.
Forceone:
While I have never been to Malaysia, though hope to do so in the not too distant future, it would seem that your comments are at least somewhat of an over-generalization regarding the nature of Malaysia Muslims.
They have featured a few incredibly prolific and interesting figures, such as Prof. Mohammed Hashem Kamali, who has written quite extensively on Islamic theology and the political situation in Southeast Asia, and is affiliated with International Islamic Univeristy-Malaysia, one of a number of institutions that seems to have strongly embraced a centrist-like Islam al Wasati interpretive approach.
Also, while developments in Kelantan and Terengganu during the 1990s could be seen as concerning, the drubbing that PAS took in the national 2004 elections, up to the point that the party leader himself lost his own seat, would seem to confound any claims that Malaysian Muslims are en masse on an undifferentiated one-way track toward some kind of supposed theological extremism.
fairuzfan : So please explain the apparent theological metaphysics at work here.
No one has to explain anything to you. Figure it out for yourself.
fairuzfan : Is JW claiming that every religion must recognize all other religions as equally true and valid?
That's not what I get from hanging out here every day for the past 5 years. All ideas on religion are shared and, as long as they don't insult, annoy or are clearly false, are treated equally.
fairuzfan : Then there's the fact that apparently your director has direct ties and affiliation to this so-called supremacist religious entity of Catholicism.
So Robert's a catholic, so what? He doesn't make that an issue here. I'm an Atheist and Robert nor any of his people have ever used religion as a trump card.
fairuzfan : Dare I ask how JW justifies some already intellectually dubious campaign against so-called theological supremacism when its own director apparently is a member of such an entity?
Have you even read the quran? There is no theistic doctrine that comes close to the quran for supremacist doctrine.
Did your NYE drinking start early this year?
Fairuzfan,
You admitted that you have never been to Malaysia. What you read is what you know.
Non-Muslims have been told that they are "second class citizen" and to demand equality for all Malaysians is to take away the special rights of the Malays,and the government will invoke the "noble" racial and Islamic "sensitivity" and accuse non-Muslims of insulting the supreme Malay race (Muslims, the few chosen people of Allah, the moon god and insulting Islam.
By the way, non-Muslims in Malaysia are not second class. A Chinese leader in the United Front (BN coalition of 14 political parties + the royalty + the judiciary + the police + the army + Malaysia Anti-Corruption Commission where a witness in the case of RM2400 or US$700 was found dead + Civil Servants etc) told the Chinese, "Don't think that you are second class citizen."
The first class citizens are the elites from the ruling party UMNO and the members of the other coalition parties are first class citizens class 2.
Actually the second class citizens are ordinary members of the ruling UMNO (Muslims), the third class citizens are the Muslim opposition members, the Chinese are the fourth class citizen, the East Malaysians of Sabah and Sarawak are the fifth class citizens and the Indians are the sixth class citizens and many of them are "found" dead in police custody and these deaths were mostly not reported in main stream newspaper.
To question the reasons of death in police custody is to question "Malay Institution" and the government will fan UMNO members with the police backing warning non-Muslims not to provoke the Malays and the Muslims.
Fairuzfan, if you ever come to Malaysia, do not believe what you read in the newspapers because they are all controlled by the government and the government can withdraw the license at any time. Only the Malay newspaper are free - free to incite the Malays, inciting them of the supremacy of the Malays being threatened and challanged and to condemn the non-Muslims with the backing of the government. Better to go to the net like malaysiakini or malaysiainsider and even better to go to malaysiatoday by our world famous Raja Petra Kamaruddin (RPK).
The Malaysian police and the immigrations do not know where he (RPK) is now or how he left the country. His "offense" was to publish his Statutory Declaration that the Prime Minister and his first lady were involved with the death of a Mongolian model, Altantuya sometime in 2006. When asked, the Prime Minister considered that as "frivolous" and that he did "not have time for rumor" and Malaysia has a PM who is stained with the blood of a Mongolian woman and the PM was also caught with a local singer in a local resort but Malaysia's laws do not touch the power elites.
Muslims all over the world tell lies and more lies in front of everybody without even blinking their eyelids and Malaysia, being a Muslim country, and so telling lies is being considered "birds of the same feathers flock together" and to ask his relationship with the dead Mongolian woman is considered as frivolous and finally by the way, the name Altantuya is banned in Malaysia and any mention of this name is considered as a "threat to the national security" and one is reliable to be arrested under Internal Security Act without trial for 2 years and this can be extended.
The Malaysian Court's decision is a victory for freedom of speech and freedom of religion. This decision should be applauded by all lovers of freedom.
It is sad that Malaysian Muslims are so easily confused. The Jews for thousands of years have had the word "Elohim" in their Bible to refer to the God of Israel as well as the gods of other religion. They never got confused. Arabic Christians have used the word "Allah" for 2000 years (600 years before Islam) and they don't get confused. Greek Christians have used the word Theos for 2000 years and although "theos" was the word for all the ancient Greek gods, the Greek Christians have never been confused etc. etc. So why is it that these Malaysian Muslims seem so easily confused that Muslim leaders fear they will convert to another faith? How weak their faith must be? Surely, if Malaysians love freedom then they too should let their own people choose their own faith because people who choose their own faith are not so easily shaken. Come on Malaysia, give you people freedom to choose!
Very well, Forceone, will take your points under advisement.
Ok, Fairuzfan:
Obviously, a religion professes what it will. I believe in the separation of religion and state precisely because I don't want government making those kinds of value judgments. Power corrupts, and that's all the more reason to render unto Caesar what is Caesar's, but keep Caesar's grimy mitts off of theological determinations.
The claim to truth and a supremacist policy are separable concepts; the latter aims to suppress, restrict, and subdue rival claimants rather than accept a free market of ideas. This is what Sharia law does, and why Jihad Watch opposes the encroachment of Sharia on what are, by Western standards, inalienable human rights.
As Thomas Jefferson once said, "it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods or no God. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg." The problem is, jihad does both, hence Jihad Watch. While I'm trotting out my favorite quotations, there's Oliver Wendell Holmes: "Your right to swing your fist around stops at the end of my nose."
To be continued.
Part 2, for Fairuzfan:
I suppose you're talking about the Catholic Church, of which I am also a practicing member. There is no comparison with Islamic law or the imperative to wage jihad in order to impose it. And you forget another thing: I'm Catholic, and I'm also an American citizen, duty bound to uphold the Constitution. I do not see the two as incompatible, because nothing impedes the full exercise of my faith... which, by the way, never commands me to kill or oppress a non-Catholic. There are two sayings of Jesus in the New Testament that make the Christian imperative to social justice across denominations radically different from Sharia. The first is, as mentioned above, "Render therefore unto Caesar what is Caesar's and to God what is God's." The second is "My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, then My servants would be fighting...."
You're conflating personal differences of opinion with the dictates of a state, which is what is at issue in the Malaysia case. I'm not an adherent of Hinduism, clearly. But I believe in the genuine pluralism of a liberal democracy, and the hallmarks of that are freedom of conscience and reciprocity -- the archenemies of Sharia.
But this is a non-sectarian site. This is not the place to hammer out transubstantiation, consubstantiation, monophysitism, miaphysitism, monism, atheism, agnosticism, pantheism, polytheism, etc., etc. What brings us together here is the common cause against jihad.
With all due respect, Marisol, I don't believe you have satisfactorily addressed the key matters that I have raised here.
Firstly, with regard to so-called supremacism. Jihad Watch does not appear to have treated this as purely a governmental matter.
As I recall, a recent posting/thread dealt with a Minneapolis billboard that invited people to the religion of Abraham, Moses, Jesus and Mohammed. This was described, rather critically I believe, by JW as a form of Islamic supremacism. This, of course, had nothing to do with government. By all appearances, this was an assertion that the mere claim to religious truth, and the claim that other faiths have key errors/deficiencies is a form of supremacism, preumably to be deplored and opposed.
Again, this is an example that has nothing to do with government. And, therefore, Jihad Watch is getting into the theological metaphysics of the matter when it starts to apparently talk about how religions are to view the theological claims of other faiths. Which pertains to coherence, non-contradiction, as well as the fact that Christianity makes very similar claims about being the sole fullness of religious truth. This type of criticism is intellectually incoherent, and, insofar as Christians are advocating these kinds of criticsms of Islam, it cannot be helped but be seen as hypocrisy.
Now, if we go on to include government here, you should be aware as a Catholic that authoritative Catholic teaching has NEVER held that separation of Church and State is an ideal, desirable situation from the Catholic perspective. This has been constantly restated, as I have cited in the past, by Pope Gregory XVI in Mirari Vos, Pope Pius IX in Quanta Cura, Pope Leo XIII in Immortale Dei and Libertas, Pope Pius X in Vehementer Nos, and Pope Pius XI in Quas Primas. And even Second Vatican Council's Dignitatis Humanae explicitly states that it "leaves untouched traditional Catholic doctrine on the moral duty of men and societies toward the true religion and toward the one Church of Christ."
Please note Marisol: not just duty of men as individuals, but the duty of societies, meaning governments. All of those popes explicity stated that Catholic Christianity was to be recognized, proclaimed, protected, and supported by civil authority in government as the True Faith. And it remains our [yes, I'm a Catholic, contrary to the claims of some of the mindless buffoons JW has as fans] authoritative teaching to this day.
Don't agree? Then please produce any authoritative magisterial teaching from Rome that has proclaimed separation of Church and State as the ideal, or has categorically rejected the basic, Catholic confessional state model.
While there are certainly key differences between Islam and Catholicism, the commonalities in these areas just cited by me are more than sufficient to call the fundamental honesty and integrity of JW into question here with respect to these particular matters. And, unfortunately, they are not the only matters at JW that can be called into question, either.
Fairuzfan,
What do the demands of the Catholic Church have to do with America? I can't remember when the last time was that I was concerned with what a priest or the Pope said, LMAO!!!!
We are Americans, you fool!
And since when was Jesus a muslim? Now THAT was an attempt at muslim supremacy!
I see what you're trying to do, Fairuz fan: set up supposed points of incompatibility between the Constitution and Catholicism so I would either (in your eyes) brand myself a heretic or unpatriotic.
Ain't gonna happen. The fact of the matter is that there's no comparison between the social teachings of the Church and the regressive tyranny of Sharia. The Vatican and the US Council of Catholic Bishops, for example, call on governments to act ethically all the time; they do not call for their overthrow or even for Catholics to vote for Catholics.
But this site, again, is 1.) non-sectarian, and 2.) not about me. Still, I must ask: if you believe such awful, sinister things about the Catholic Church, do you agree with them? If you don't agree with the agenda you ascribe to the Church, why are you still Catholic? And in any event, how does any of it make Sharia less detestable?
Christians do not worship "Allah" the pagan Arabian Moon God of Mohamed, they worship "Yahweh", the deity of Abraham, Isac,Moses Jacob,and Jesus.
It would be best if Christians used the name Yahweh when referring to their deity.
Mohamed did his best to appropriate the legacy of the Jews and Christians of his time.
Those people rightly rejected him and his invented ideology.
Heck even the Pagan Arabians laughed at the Quran and told Mohamed to try again, he couldn't even convert them.
In this instance, I am in agreement with the Muslims, nope Christians should NEVER refer to their deity as "Allah".
Fairuzfan,
In Malaysia all muslim are malay
But not all Malay are muslim....
All Indonesian called GOD ...Allah
All Indonesian called Jesus... Tuhan Jesus...(Lord Jesus)
Muslims are masters of the confused word, they have been practicing it for 1400 years...it is what they use to indoctrinate their children into continuing the march of Islam as it tries to conquer the world...what happens to Muslims who discover the truths of Islam and decide to leave? (death), What happens in those areas where Muslims have become strong enough to demand you to convert to Islam and you refuse? (death) What happens in those areas where Muslims have become strong enough to begin forced kidnappings of young girls to force them to convert and "marry" (against their will)Muslim men and you refuse? (death), What happens in those areas where Muslim have become strong and you send in aid workers to fight disease and to educate the poor? (death), What happens in those areas where Muslims have become strong and you wish to openly practice your religion of choice? (death), What happens in those areas where Muslims have become strong and you object to the increased violence and rapes the Muslims are bringing into your formerly quaint neighborhoods? (death), What happens in those areas where Muslims become strong and you continue to behave in a Modern way by wearing western styled fashions, haircuts, listen to your favorite music , and openly hug and kiss your spouse or girlfriend? (death)
As you look at yourself and recognize what pleases you, you must investigate Islam and you will discover that what pleases you displeases Islam and Islam is prepared to remove all that you enjoy....especially your freedom, you freedom of choice, your religion, your happiness, your land, your money, your job, your security.....
View the films Fitna, Obsession, Submission...go to youtube and view all the videos of Muslims preaching that you can find and there are many and listen to their words...and decide for yourself if you can live with Islam...
Go to youtube and view all the videos you can find where Baptist, Catholic, Buddist, Hindu, Protestant, Jewish or other Non Muslim preachers are preaching and listen to their words...See if you can see a difference from the Muslim ones...
go ahead make a decision...Islam?....feel the love.
Many have seen lists of things that offend Muslims, here is one..
http://amboytimes.typepad.com/the_amboy_times/2007/02/the_list_of_thi.html
"...[yes, I'm a Catholic, contrary to the claims of some of the mindless buffoons JW has as fans]..." - fairuzfan, 1:13 PM comment, 6th paragraph down.
Gotta throw the BS flag here. Fairuzfan has been posting here for quite some time, but his posts are larded with the kind of Islamic catch phrases we have learned only emanate from Muslims intent on defending the faith. Never have his posts been anything other than critical of Christianity and expressed anything other than great admiration for Islam. Therefore, I (being one of the "mindless buffoons" to whom he refers) challenge his claim to be a Catholic.
Sorry, fairuzfan, your prose may be polished, but when the references to encyclicals of long dead popes, with the implication that this somehow denotes scholarship, and other semantic pyrotechnics are stripped from your arguments the substance that remains could well be used as material in Friday sermons at the local mosque. You give every appearance of being a Muslim who has drunk the Kool-Aid and has set himself the task of trying to rationalize Islam at the intellectual level, without appearing to understand the real substance of Christianity of which you are so critical. I, for one, simply don't believe you when you say you are Catholic, and I would bet there are other "mindless buffoons" here at JW who would agree with me.
I don't know for sure how this fits in but... There is a litany in the Catholic Church called The Devine Praises. It starts with Blessed be God
Blesses be His Holy Name (Each phrase is repeated by the congregation after the priest.) Now maybe they will add Blessed be Allah.
Fullofflies:
Thanks.
Marisol,
Your last comments are a deep disappointment, as you are clearly evading the numerous points I have been making, and seem utterly incapable of admitting error. One can only assume that at some level you are aware of, or at least intuitively sense in some manner, the intellectual bankruptcy of what you have peddled here.
Let's try looking at the facts. I deal in facts. The question is can you?
I raised the Minneapolis billboard issue. That is a clear, utterly undeniable, example of JW making a supremacist charge against Islam that HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH GOVERNMENT. It has to do with Islam claiming to be the sole, fullness of religious truth and claiming that other religions having key errors and deficiences.
A serioius matter here. And one that you did not respond to in any way, shape, or form. And the fact is you have no response. At least not one that I won't be able to systemically rip to shreds as third-rate drivel. Catholicism claims to be the sole fullness of truth, just as Islam does. Either both are supremacist in that particular manner or neither one is. But you don't get to conveniently have it both ways just so you can vent animosities toward another religion.
As for government involvement, I have not said the two are identical, though they were actually quite close if we examine the Catholicism of 500-1,000 years ago. While there have been positive developments here in Catholic thought since then - yes, I think they're positive, and yes, I affirm and support the developments - the two faiths still have significant overlap in calling for governments to recognize uphold, protect, defend, and promote them as the True Faith.
Yes, I think Islam has some real problems in this area. But, no, that doesn't mean Catholicism and all other religions are Tinkerbell and Islam alone stands as Darth Vader.
That is authoritative Catholic teaching, even if you choose to desperately stick your head in the sand. I have provided you with a list of official Roman magesterial sources for this teaching, including the Second Vatican Council of the 1960s. Have you studied them? Do you even care? You might also try studying Thomas Aquinas in this area, instead of worshipping at the feet of James Madison. The basic teaching here is authoritative to this day. You provide nothing in response, other than some flimsy, airy claims that governments should be ethical. And is having a Catholic confessional state not ethical? There's nothing wrong with it, so long as we haven't developed an irrational fetish toward the U.S. Constitution as manna from heaven.
We can't 'overthrow' the government? Are you saying that serious Catholic Americans cannot use peaceful, licit, legal means available to move our society toward a Catholic confessional state model? Since when? When did Rome authoritatively say that? I don't believe it has. And for that matter, even the American system of government allows for it, via the peaceful legal use of constitutional amendments.
Perhaps you might spend more time as a Catholic reading what John Rao, Christopher Ferrara, Michael Matt, Brian McCall and the late Michael Davies and others have been writing at the Remnant Newspaper, and other venues regarding the intrinsic flaws in our AMerican system and the desirability of moving the West - including the USA - toward a Catholic confessional state. And they actually use authoritative Catholic teaching in support of their contentions. That might be a better use of time than desparately looking for the next batch of mud to fling at all things and persons Islamic.
Finally, I never said the Catholic church stands for awful or sinister things. Please show me where. Doesn't exist. I affirm what the Church teaches, including the desirability of having a Catholic confessional state. That is not 'sinister' or 'awful'. If you think it is, then you are the one at variance with the Church. Perhaps not with some milquetoast comments from some of our priests today, but certainly at variance with the magesterial teaching of the ages, that in is base form is still our authoritative teaching today.
Again, Marisol, you have been systemically refuted here and have been rather snuggly hoisted by your petard. If you insist that is somehow not the case, then please address my contentions here - especially the billboard issue first and foremost - based on facts and analystical reasoning, not your personal tastes and opinions.
Annie Oakley:
You have no idea what the demands of Catholicism have to do with the contemporary United States? Trying taking a hard look at what the Church teaches in relation to what has been going on in our society for the last half century. If you still don't understand, try reading some of the serious tradtionalist Catholic thought that is out there today. If you're still perplexed, then you're welcome to ask me for help, and I'll oblige, thought I would ask that you drop the 'fool' reference before asking for me assistance.
Muslims claiming that Jesus was a Muslim [however wrong that may be] is supremacist? Very well. Would you then agree that the Catholic/Christian claim that the Jewish Bible/Tanach is now the 'Old' Testament that has been fulfilled and rendered inoperative by Christ, and that all of the Jewish prophets point to Christ as their fulfillment - claims that Judaism categorically rejects with a vengence - is supremacist also?
If not, why not? If so, then why can't Islam be supremacist if Christianity is also supremacist?
Let's see you get out of that one.
Ah Eastview,
While others are rather unsound and amusing in their posts, yours here really stands out. Has anybody ever told you that you're a real piece of work?
So you know what I believe better than I do? I'm critical of Christianity? I don't understand Christianity's essence?
Are you for real? Seriously. Trust me, you don't know a 1/10 of what you apparently think you know, deeply ensconced in the feeble fantasyland of your 'mind'.
I have never been critical of Christianity in any significant, substantive way. Please show me where. You won't. You can't. You're a dingbat, remember?
I don't understand Christianity? Would you truly like to have a discussion/debate on Christianity with me? Seriously, do you think I won't whip your butt six ways from today?
And please don't make what appear to be dismissive comments about our deceased holy pontiffs. If you don't understand, respect, or appreciate them, then that simply shows the dearth of Christian truth at the heart of your beliefs.
And if you insist you know my beliefs better than I do, then, while I hate to be so critical, one must conclude that the average retard has greater cognitive functionality and the average juvenile delinquent has greater personal character than you do.
Fairuzfan:
You're moving the goalposts again, trying again to back me into point of contradiction whereby I appear either heretical or unpatriotic. Above, you were taking issue with the allegedly "supremacist" social teachings of the Church. I reiterate the difference between claiming the truth and using that claim to suppress those who disagree and deny their human rights.
Now, you're trying to catch me out from the other side of the issue, as if I would deny either 1.) the "social contract" form of government, or 2.) the imperative to hold government accountable and demand better than the status quo, because they serve us.
Again, ain't gonna happen. The fact that you have to dig back centuries to equate Christianity and Islam should tell you something, And yes, as you said, Islam has a serious problem there, to say the least, and it's affecting all of us. Hence Jihad Watch.
You can split hairs all you want; you can move the goalposts all you want. The bottom line is that there is no reasonable comparison between the social teachings of the Church or of the Gospels and the current state of Sharia law (across the mainline schools of jurisprudence) and of the Qur'an.
That's my story and I'm sticking to it.
See, you just can't resist boastful ad hominems, can you? These are the hallmarks of Muslims I alluded to.
"Has anybody ever told you that you're a real piece of work?
"Are you for real? Seriously. Trust me, you don't know a 1/10 of what you apparently think you know, deeply ensconced in the feeble fantasyland of your 'mind'.
"You're a dingbat, remember?
"Seriously, do you think I won't whip your butt six ways from today?
"...the average retard has greater cognitive functionality and the average juvenile delinquent has greater personal character than you do."
Look, I can't, and wouldn't presume to try to, debate you on the ins and outs of Church history or the subtleties of Catholic doctrine, in which you appear to be well versed. But my challenge was to your statement that you are a Catholic. If you are, then to allay the suspicions you have aroused by the tenor of your comments suggesting you are actually a well versed taqiyya artist, you shouldn't have any difficulty stating, clearly and without equivocation, what even ignorant Christian peasants have no difficulty doing, that you actually do believe in the divinity of Christ, and the doctrine of the Trinity, the Apostles Creed, and the other elements of Catholicism. Further, you will have no difficulty making a clear statement criticizing Mohammad for misunderstanding the essence of Christianity, as well as denouncing his claims to be the Perfect Man, etc.
If you can do these, clearly and in plain and convincing language without rhetorical razzle dazzle or clever attempts at deflection or changing the subject, or by criticizing anyone who would pose these questions, then I will withdraw my charge. Can you do this?
Woohoo, Marisol! ...fairuzfan has been successfully cornered and rendered speechless, ha ha ....