"...BECAUSE THEY BELIEVE IN FREEDOM"

For the most part, I was pleased with the response I got for the last blog post on the proposed mosque in New York City. I wish more of you had let me know your views on the subject. However, there are enough differing views in the media and on the Internet to serve anyone's particular tastes and beliefs.

When I received a video via email titled “Three Things About Islam”, my first thought was this would be some kind of conspiracy theory. The friend who sent it sent no commentary regarding it. I have to thank him, as watching this video started me on a journey that I have not as yet completed, but intend to continue in my search for the “truth”.

I have spent hours searching the Internet. First, I have tried to no avail to find out who produced this video. They slyly did so under the name “White Roses”, after a student resistance group in Nazi Germany during World War II whose members were executed for distributing information revealing the “truth” about Hitler's brand of Nazism. I guess we are to believe that this new group of “White Roses” shares the same intentions as the WWII heroes, therefore, we will believe anything they say. That did not set well with me! Most of what I believe or write about comes from my “feelings” – not my expertise, education, or even personal knowledge of a subject. I go with the feelings from my heart or from my gut! My gut tells me there is something very, very wrong with this video. It seems to be just another form of bigotry and intolerance in disguise. Meant to spread fear under the guise of "informing" the American public. For all I know, it could have been produced by Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Newt Gingrich, Pat Robertson, or even Sarah Palin! Any one of them could possibly benefit either financially or politically by arousing more anti-Islamic feelings in this country. And though I could not find the originators of the video, I found it on many conservative, right wing, and Republican websites.

I forwarded the video to a friend of mine from my high school years, June Curry, who was raised in the small-town church that I also attended. We both have grown a lot spiritually since our younger days, but June is much more knowledgeable about different religions than I am. Having spent time working for the Tulsa B'nai Emunah Synagogue as an Assistant to the Education Director, she said the position taught her “much about religious diversity and loving and being loved by people of the Jewish faith unconditionally.” June is often my mentor that I turn to when I am struggling with some spiritual dilemma. This was her reply:

“I don't know where this group came from, but I do know from attending the Islam Mosque with my Sunday School Group in Tulsa that the Muslims at that Mosque deny all accusations of the Qur'an advocating violence. It is their claim and their teachings that The Qur'an is a book of tolerance and peace toward other religions. I don't think the crazies among Islam represent them anymore than the KKK represent our Christian beliefs, even though they claim to.

I just think these types of emails perpetrate so much fear among people for a religion that they don't trust or want to understand at all. And fear causes many other things, including hatred and war and evil in all forms.

But it is truly very scary to think these things are going around on the internet and will be believed by so many people (some of my relatives among them).

We live in very uncertain times. But God hasn't changed a bit and is still able to take care of us in every situation. That's where we have to put our trust and hope.”

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Another reason for being thankful I received the video is that it created the desire in me to learn more about Islam. This will be an ongoing and lengthy journey, as I still am faithfully struggling through the Old Testament. Until I started researching it, all I knew was that Islam is the second largest religion in the world, Christianity being the largest, with the majority of Muslims belonging to two denominations, Sunni and Shi'a.

The only order of Islam that I had a familiarity with is Sufism. I have two books by the 13^th century poet/mystic/Sufi Saint Rumi. The Sufis, considered the “inner, mystical dimension” of Islam are also divided into differing orders. A few years back I had a brief experience at my church of learning about the Sufi dances. I had heard of the “whirling dervishes”, but didn't know much about them. I still don't, but I'm learning from my research. At one of the classes at Unity, we all participated in doing a simple Sufi dance (not the whirling). All I remember is that it was based on “turning swords into plowshares”, and that the dance was very moving and prayerful. That doesn't sound very militaristic, does it? In fact, Sufism is all about Love... and Unity.

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I will put more of what I am learning in future blogs. In the meantime, I have learned a little more about the group wishing to build the mosque/center in Manhattan. I laughed at the name of the blog this came from, HorsesAss.org. The founder and “blogger in chief” is David Goldstein, and it has become a well-known political blog, starting out in Washington state as a satire on local politics. You can bet I bookmarked this site! The following was posted on his blog August the 10^th, titled “It's Because They Believe in Freedom”:

“Like many New Yorkers, the people in charge of Park 51, a married couple, are from somewhere else—he from Kuwait, she from Kashmir. Feisal Abdul Rauf is a Columbia grad. He has been the imam of a mosque in Tribeca (a neighborhood in lower Manhattan) for close to thirty years. He is the author of a book called “What’s Right with Islam Is What’s Right with America.” He is a vice-chair of the Interfaith Center of New York. 'My colleagues and I are the anti-terrorists,' he wrote recently—in the Daily News, no less. He denounces terrorism in general and the 9/11 attacks in particular, often and at length. The F.B.I. tapped him to conduct 'sensitivity training' for agents and cops. His wife, Daisy Khan, runs the American Society for Muslim Advancement, which she co-founded with him. It promotes 'cultural and religious harmony through interfaith collaboration, youth and women’s empowerment, and arts and cultural exchange.'”

These are the people trying to build the mosque/center in NYC.

The writer goes on to say, “As someone who often trolls the right-wing blogs, this proposed center (which sounds a lot like the Jewish Community Center where I used to go to day camp when I was 6) is seen by many as some kind of threat. Coincidentally, these are the same people who talk about how Obama is going to take away their 'freedom' and how much they care about the Constitution. Every day that goes by and every issue that comes up just lifts the veil on that charade. America’s right wing is motivated primarily by one thing – an irrational fear of our multicultural society. Everything else is just talk. "

There were many comments to his blog, but one that stood out to me was written by “Alki Area”:

“Once again irony (and emotion) rules the universe. I’ve heard from the right for ages 'why don’t more Muslims come out against terrorism and extremism'. Ok. So here’s the folks that DO just that. The folks who DON’T want to kill all non-believers and in fact run an 'interfaith' group (you know, other religions). This is EXACTLY the type of pro-American anti-terrorist Muslims the folks on the right have said they wanted to hear from all along. So what’s the problem?

Granted putting this .. near ground zero is emotional, but nearly all of lower Manhattan ('downtown' NYC - my note) is ‘near’ ground zero. I sincerely don’t think they planned this as a spit in the face to anyone, but perhaps because of the emotional impact, it could be put in mid-town. I try to imagine if a splinter group of Catholics bombed a holy Hindu site in India, then a Methodist church tried to open up a center near the site. It would probably be met with much of the same emotion, even though you could explain that the original attack was a minority splinter group, and that these Christians (Methodists) aren’t even the same denomination as the group that did the original attack…none of that would matter would it?

And by the way, out of (over) a billion people (Muslims) you only need a tiny percentage, say 1/1000th to be radical nuts to still have a million nutballs to contend with. We’re only dealing with, and hear about, the craziest folks. You don’t HEAR about the 998,231,361 Muslims who just go to work and raise their families and aren’t terrorists…you just hear about the most angry/crazy percentage. Muslims are just as diverse as Christians (Catholics, Baptists, Mormon, Amish, Unitarians). It’s not one big magical block. So I suppose we could start with not talking about them as if they’re all the same people with the same ideas and philosophy.”

I hope the folks at HorsesAss.org don't mind my using so much of their writing. Perhaps it will direct more readers their way.

I am reminded of the time during the height of the Civil Rights movement when I got into a terrible argument with my dad at a dinner party he and his second wife had invited us to attend in Midland, Texas. The talk was extremely biased against integration, and got downright ugly at times. I finally had enough and reminded my dad – in front of everyone, and for their benefit – that his current wife had enough Indian blood in her to qualify for government money and land on a reservation. I brought up the fact that in my maternal grandmother's youth, Indians were thought of as “savages”, and her father threatened to beat any of his 11 children who dared to mention to an outsider that they had Cherokee blood! The room became quiet, and that ended the discussion about the Civil Rights movement.

My wish is that the next generation of Americans will move beyond the religious intolerance currently running rampant in our society. Then maybe we will be able to move beyond all our prejudices. And that, my friends, comes from my heart and my gut!

Peace and love,

Marilyn