ASH
we ....dont....hate...you ! :) got it ?
I have said NOTHING about hating muslims, I find it amazing that for Muslims and Lefties, to disagree with them is to them 'hate'. I would have you or Irfan over for some chow and a cuppa anytime.

Irfan alluded to malaysia, and my upcoming book. Sorry Irfan, its already been written by Syed kecik "The politics of federalism" about the Sabah election of around 1972 it was banned in Malaysia.

I could tell you stories of 'Islamic Evangelism' which would make your ears tingle. One classic under Tun Mustapha was when they called village 'A' to have a public meeting because a high ranking government member was coming. After they all gathered, they hoisted up a banner indicating it was an 'Islamic conversion ceremony', they photographed it with Polaroid cameras and went to other villages which had already been informed of the 'government member' coming and they tried to persuade them also to become Muslims "Look, village A all embraced Islam" etc etc. it just goes on and on.

But you will tell me 'Thats not Islam' :)

I take issue with "Islam" not with Muslims, don't misunderstand me. I know from the Quran AND the Hadith, AND the life of the prophet in various biographies, and about the Sword of Allah and the massacre of the Romans at Yarmuc (who, by the way were defending, not aggressing)
I know of the letter Mohammed sent to Hericlias etc etc.

When you say "you hate us, whyyyy" you are projecting 'your' about out feelings into us, and they are not there. This is 'issue' related.

You should not say that every labor member 'hates' every Liberal, even though they work very HARD and passionately for the other's defeat.

There is still, a malay(Muslim) village located behind the premises occcupied by our mission, there are many muslims in that village who owe their lives to the medical help given by the 'hateful Christians'

This, and the head Muslim of that area, was appointed to murder ALL missionaries during a revolution he sympathized with.

Garra
nice to know you have also experienced the 'nasi goreng' land.
"Rabid" ? thats a bit over the top mate.

'Muslim Country' ? You should know the racial mix there, and in the state I was in, it was about 26% Malay. Hardly a 'Muslim Country'.

In any case, our mission began work there before "Malaysia" existed in a state not related to 'malaya'.

You should also know that there is a very strong undercurrent of racial and religious tension. You should know about the 'New Economic Policy' and similar documents which are institutionalized discrimination against chinese who comprise almost half the population. Why so many malaysian chinese here for an education ? *think*.

I agree though, that there is a good degree of interacial harmony, now, on the surface. But in 1969 they were slaughtering each other in the streets.
The happy marraige of the rich chinese and the politically powerful malays seems to keep it all together, as long as you jail the occasional rival who might rock the boat. (Anwar)

Well done on your work with the Sengoi (Asli)
I'll bet there is one thing we can agree on, after the "KLIA+Fast Train" experience, Australia seems positively 3rd world.

Garra, you make the same mistake as Ash, you attibute 'hate' to those of differing opinion. Try to get over this will you. How would you like every Liberal to say to you 'you hate us' when u just disagree.

Fascinating. I make a comment about the differences in the tone and content of posts by Muslim and Christian correspondents to these forums and of course the rabid Christians prove my point with more of the same, while the Muslim correspondents continue to post polite, restrained comments in the face of godbotherer attacks.

I didn't notice any rude or insensitive posts in these forums from Muslims following the death of the Pope, for example.

While I'm no fan of either Islam or the Malaysian government, from the agnostic position where I stand it's very difficult to ascertain whether fundamentalist Islam is worse than fundamentalist Christianity, or whether the Malaysian government policies regarding their indigenous minorities are any worse than Australian treatment of Aborigines.

Unfortunately for the indigenous inhabitants of Australia, Sarawak, Sabah, West Papua etc, their lands were subject to the rapacious colonial interests of European invaders, and their continuing travails (including religious proselytising of one form or another) can arguably be directly traced to the failed colonial interests of the Brits and the Dutch.

For the European colonials, and the postcolonial nationalists who followed them, missionaries paved the way for the economic exploitation of the original residents of these resource-rich lands. In particular, the arrogance of Christian missionaries and evangelists in continuing their neocolonial project where they are clearly not wanted by legitimate governments is astonishing.

Boaz_David,

Thank you for your clarification.
My point was some people still hate us and just try and justify their hate with crimes committed by those who call themselves muslims. Muslims don’t do that…we do not wonder around accusing our Christian friends of horrible things because of a priest did the wrong thing to a child …we KNOW that bad people are just plain bad. And religion have nothing to do with it. When it comes to you however, you expect me to ‘prove’ to you why not all muslims are bad. I wonder what gave you this right?

The Qu’ran have great teachings for muslims on how to interact with other religions and how to respect Christians and Jews. Prophet Mohammed first wife “Khadija’ family were Christians (Her cousin was the famous Arabian Monk Waraka).

In modern Islamic states (and I can only talk about where I lived and grew up: Egypt) Christians and Jews are the back bone of day today lives and economy. Egyptian treasurer is a Christian, the wealthiest telecom tycoon is a Christian, Christmas is a public holiday in this muslim country. Jews were the owners of all retail stores (still called after their Jews of Egyptian decent: Cicurel, Sidnaoui) even when they left Egypt for Israel in the time of Nasser, it was President Sadat (another muslim leader) who reconciles with them and kept their synagogues opened and now they are coming back for visit and business.

To make it short: you will always find what you are looking for: bad examples or major good examples. Humans are unique in that we have always given a choice, even belief over disbelief (but that is another debate with an atheist!!:))

Salam - peace
Ash

I see that no position will change in this post. Not that I expected any too. As was previously said, this was a simple post to highlight the passing of a good man – regardless of his religion.

There have been plenty of questionable acts and persons in both Islamic and Christian history – both recent and past. Perhaps it is time the more zealous elements in this post took note of that.

I for one am finished here. I don’t want anyone to change but to accept and tolerate. Without those two virtues, you would be a hypocrite in any faith.

Best of luck and be patient, we’ll find out the Krishna’s were right at the end I suppose!

Peace,
JustDan

PS – All are welcome in my house. Just be nice and enjoy a game of scrabble!

JustDan,

if we are playing Scrabble, do we place the letters down left to right or vice versa?

Ash,

what we see demonstrated here is a clash of civilisations no less serious than the times of Queen Isabella or the Battle of Lepanto.

Unlike the 'West of Old' our (Christian) cultural situation is no longer dominant or united behind a single faith. Secularism rises as a common enemy, along with that longtime proponent of war - avarice.

It is difficult, from a historical and theological point of view, to reconcile the life of Jesus with that of the Islamic prophet, who, denying Jesus' divinity, is happy to appropriate the person of the Holy Spirit by assuming the role of being the Advocate that followed Jesus and yet,personally led people into battle.

Where less enlightened followers of Christ go wrong is when they see armed conflict as a means of evangelisation. Many more have been brought to the Faith by persecution, so oppressed Christians lead a more authentic faith. Hopefully, in these more enlightened times, armed conflict will not be the basis of reconciliation in Australia, however, like Isabella, many Australians feel threatened by a foreign culture taking over - an irony given our treatment of Indigenous cultures.

Now should we take a Saudi approach to immigrants from other cultures? Should we assume everyone born in Australia is a Christian, awaiting reconversion? Should we prohibit the building of Mosques?

Should we see Egyptian Christians living in Australia and marrying Islamic people from their old country forced into Islamic practices (under threat)once they have borne children? (I have several documented cases)

Countries like Egypt and Turkey are marginally better than Gulf countries, but, unless we can convince people (like JustDan and yourself) that the Christian west has values worth protecting and do something to redress our demographic decline - Moslem women having abortions is probably not a significant number, but western women see 1 in 3 pregnancies terminated - then victory to the Islamic Prophet is only a matter of time.