Dear Irfan,

To continue our dialogue.

You are right to say that I am not involved in interfaith activity – this should be no surprise to you. I know of no evangelical Christian who is. This doesn’t mean I have not known or conversed or worked with Muslims, indeed my wife and I for several years invited Indonesian students into our home for a meal, took them on trips, etc, and they invariable were Muslims.

As for interfaith activity, if Muslims care to involve themselves with liberal Christians and Jews and see advantage in so doing, that is their business. You just need to understand such church people are not representative of the great bulk of church going Christians. For evangelical Christians, interfaith worship is out of the question, for while you and I worship the one true God (unlike the self declared atheists who populate these threads), we have different conceptions of him, and different conceptions as to how we please him.

The only discussion I would desire would be between authentic Qur’an and aHadith affirming Muslims and authentic Bible affirming orthodox Christians who believe and practice fully as possible their respective faiths with, hopefully ,a genuine respect developing over time between both parties. Such contact and discussion could lead to an exploration of matters of mutual interest such as ethical issues. I could under the proper circumstances be a part of such a discussion.

By the way, I would like to see your answer to Kalweb’s question re Taher Taiba on Waleed’s thread, because this man’s views, if genuine, are a real worry and should be to the wider Muslim community.

Perhaps I might leave our discussion at this point, with right of reply to yourself, should you so choose, lest the matter become too personal. No doubt we will dialogue on other threads.

I wish you every blessing from the one true God, whom we, in our differing ways, seek to worship; before whom we can only bow in worship and adoration as penitents pleading his grace and mercy!

Christianity is primarily concerned with the character of God as revealed in human life and character, we were created to express Godlike qualities (Genesis 1: 26). Christianity is not a bunch of religious rules to obey; it is the personal freedom to live aspirant abundant lives above rules in spiritual union with God. It is not defined by strict adherence to National or Religious laws, or religious ritual and saying repitiously prayers. It is defined by recognising the presence of God in Jesus Christ, expressed in forgiveness and a forgiving spirit, positive lifestyle that blesses our fellow man, and responsible behaviour that manages and sustains human society and this planet.

A Christian view of Jesus is that he fully revealed the mind and heart of God by his character, acts of compassion and words of wisdom. His conception was natural from the line and seed of King David, but his spirit was the very expression of God to all men. Christians do not (should not) worship a human Jesus but the eternal spiritual character he revealed, i.e. very God. To understand this is to understand the teaching of Christ about being spiritually born of God.

The claim that God / Allah created a single sperm in the womb of Mary without a man is false and unsupported by Jesus’ teachings, the texts of NT doctrine or the writings of the apostle John or Jesus elder brother James (son of Joseph). The fact is the purpose of Zacharias was to raise a child in Judah to be a deliverer from Gentile Rule, a King to free the Jewish nation. In this concept Jesus was spiritually born of God for a specific purpose, similarly Mary and also John the Baptist (Zacharias own son from Elizabeth). Mary’s spiritual calling was to nurture and train the Saviour; John’s was to be the prophet to prepare the nation by repentance; and Jesus initial purpose was to be King (Isaiah 9). However the prophecy of Isaiah 600 years earlier stated he would be rejected by the nation and fulfil the text of Isaiah 53

People, let’s give this thread to the crackpots. Seems they are here enmasse now.

One last parting shot:
If you Christians represent the ‘best’ of your faith and explain Christianity as it should be – that is that everyone should turn to Christ, who will save you and lead you to love, happiness and good life – then I for one am happy to avoid that style of life.

My understanding of Christianity (from a Catholic upbringing and religious education for the first 15 years) is that God accepts you as you are. He/She judges you on your actions and the intent in your heart. He/She does not particularly care what Dogma you choose to express these things.

Now you Christians have written and referred to a mountain of ‘evidence’ to ‘prove’ why Islam is a bad choice for the soul. You have ‘explained’ why Christianity is better and in some cases ‘enlightened’ me with why human cultures can never mix, survive or work together. Wonderful discussion from the religion of peace, tolerance, understanding and acceptance. Just beautifully illustrated as to why your faith should be feared as much as any extremist/zealot. Your kind are really no better than a bomber – at least they stand up for their misguided beliefs and don’t hide behind insidious ‘logic’ and deceitful ‘kindness’. Just look back over your statements and tell me there is no hypocracy… forget it. You’d never see it!

You are fearful, paranoid and decidedly one-eyed. I wonder how your church led you there?

As I have stated a number of times – practice what you preach.

To the moderator: I’m not sure if this counts as flaming but I hope not. My apologies if so. If you have any guidelines..?

Reason,

I can appreciate your views about religion from your Catholic upbringing, what I don't quite get, is why you did not actually check out the scriptures yourself, and struggle to find if you were being fed the 'right milk'.

You demonstrated one of the most bigoted attitudes I've seen for some time, calling us 'Crackpots' :) bless you my son/daughter, but that is plain bigotry :)

Its all good.

Actually Reason, I think you have misunderstood the intent of those you claim are saying "Cultures cannot mix" etc etc...

Simply 'being' Christian is endorsing the ability of Jesus to bring people of diverse backgrounds TOGETHER. In terms of political alleigance of his disciples "Simon was an 'insurgent' (zealot) and Matthew was a TAX collector, Peter was a Fisherman etc."

Ethnicity 'blood' and culture are VERY thick, as shown by even the early church where we find "And they all had everything in common, no one was in need" in Acts 2 then a bit later we find

1 In those days when the number of disciples was increasing, the Grecian Jews among them complained against the Hebraic Jews because their widows were being overlooked in the daily distribution of food."

So.... human nature... revealed :)

This is similar to how legislation reflects the interests of one party over another, its 'what people do'. So, please don't complain when the 'aggrieved' party speaks up about an injustice done to it.
In this case, the denial of free speech and expression of opinion.

Reason

The extreme intolerance, racist and just 'general-anti-anything-except-them' expressed by the far right fundamentalist christians on this website are reflections of a conservative movement called "Christian Identity".

A website which can edify you on the aims and ideology of this relatively new movement can be found at:

http://www.religioustolerance.org/cr_ident.htm

The Christian Identity movement is a movement of many extremely conservative Christian churches and religious organizations, extreme right wing political groups and survival groups. Some are independent; others are loosely interconnected. According to Professor Michael Barkun, one of the leading experts in the Christian Identity movement, "This virulent racist and anti-Semitic theology, which is practiced by over 50,000 people in the United States alone, is prevalent among many right wing extremist groups and has been called the 'glue' of the racist right."

The posters here may well deny any affiliation (wouldn't you?) however the views they continually express on this and other threads concur with the narrow ideology of the Christian Identity.

Genuine, sincere Christians do not hold these extreme views. Please don't judge all Christians by these bad apples.

This is why I am suspicious of David Palmer's article. I believe in free speech but should we be free to vilify whomever, whenever as has been the case with many posters here who have posted demeaning and divisive statements about Islam.

Extreme religious views are hostile towards others whether they be from Christian, Hindu, Islamic or whoever.

Fortunately the majority of people are smart enough to see these intolerant extremists for what they really are and will always speak out against them as is happening here.

Xena, Just like Christian, denial, refusal to take responsibility for your own life and the constant attempts to justify what in fact is unjustifiable. You want to bring to this country what religion has brought to other countries of the world, death and violence. Religion is a disease, the facts don't support anything that the religious say regarding the reality of the world. Religions support brainwashing of children into fearing even their own religion. I have rarely met those that on a personal level are not good people. But I have yet to meet one religious person that can accept they may be wrong. When it comes to the non believer, you will find they are willing to look at all paths in life. The religious can't do that, all they do is recite over and over meaningless words that promote animosity and hate. They try and out do each other by making out that they are open, kind and understanding. Then they try to blind everyone with their interpretation of their religious works. When that doesn't work, they start subtle abuse and put downs of their opposition, then ridicule anyone that can't accept their fantasy. I just hope, and I won't hold my breath, that a cure can be found for this large mass of mentally ill people around the world, that are becoming sicker and sicker by the day. When this illness reaches its zenith, all the religious will have in their hearts, is hate and a desire for revenge no matter what the cost. Historically, if you look at the symptoms, you will see that they are re-creating themselves. This country, has one last opportunity to stop this disease from contaminating us all, but that can't happen, the disease has already infected the politicians, they are all acting under its influence and control. The introduction of religious vilification laws, that allow for non believers to be vilified, is just a sign of how repugnant this religious disease is to us all that have the sense to see what reality is.