This article raises a question as to why the Somalis allowed their version of Islam to be hijacked by fundamentalists.

Do the 99% of Muslims claiming to be ‘moderates’ fear the 1%?

Fear seems to play a significant role in Islam. Muslims don’t seem to fear their perceived enemy, the West. This lack of fear has been witnessed in illegal immigrants: their attacks against officials, arson committed on detention centres, the hijacking of Tampa, to name a few.

What they do seem to fear, even those who came here legally and others who were born here, are the Qu’ran, which they are reportedly not permitted to interpret, and the imams. They fear their own religion and its leaders.

They give cursory support to anti-terrorist laws, and then quickly attempt to take the heat off their real enemies by bringing up the old red herring about mythical mobs of non-Muslims who will attack them just because they are Muslims.

And, they cannot answer the really hard questions because this means interpreting and criticizing the Qu’ran, which is offensive to Allah.

Christians went through a period of ignorance, fear and superstition, and overcame it with education and democracy which tore them from the clutches of illiterate priests and firebrands and myths. Unfortunately, it seems that Islam and its adherents have a millennia or two of catching up to do.

Nice? story but that is not today's dismal,dark,dreary,suicide-loving, misygnonistic pagan islam.
A religion which has a terrorist training handbook called the koran. A religion where the adherents are told it is ok to lie to unbelievers - that's all non moslems.
A religion which is told through it's tragic 'comic book' that it's ok to kill unbelievers and that there is a reward for doing so.
A religion which has an X-rated "paradise?"[for males only of course though the females can look] that includes perpetual female virgins and untouched lovely boys for all the dirty male perverts.
A religion in which the clownish, uneducated,scarcely sane followers commit murderous siucide to attain entrance to this simple, unproved paradise.
Nice story but before the islamics entered we had a far better, fairer and more united nation here in Australia. numbat

Bashir

Thank you for your article. I really enjoyed reading it and I found it very interesting. I almost felt as if I was there. Your demonstrated love for your Son was quite overwhleming. I do hope he reads it.

Robert, I really enjoyed your reply to Bashir.

Bashir, since last Thursday I have been visiting the islamicSydney web site searching for my niece. The assistance I have recieved from posters to that site has been outstanding. One of your fellow Muslims found her on a web site. I am very grateful.

Cheers
Kay

A muslim waxes lyrical about a simpler time. the joy and enjoyment of life, before the advent of fanaticism, racism and xenophobes. Some posters ask why the majority is held in sway, or hijacked by the minority.

it appears however that the remainder have taken yet another opportunity to demonstrate their own fanaticism, racism and xenophobia. Perhaps it is not just the muslims with the problem.

Numbat
So according to you moslems are all dreary, women-hating, suicide-loving, lying, terrorists, perverts & clowns. If I were to say that all Anglo-saxons are like this I would be a racist. If I were to say that women are all like that I would be a sexist. So what is the difference between a bigot saying this sort of tripe about a group he or she hates & your serving Hmmm?
I'd like to ask a question. Nothing complicated just a passing query. How many moslems do you actually know? Since you're saying that ALL Moslems are liars, etc, then it follows that you've met every single one or at least the majority in order to make such a sweeping statement. Either that or those statements are merely an example of prejudice. Your choice numbat. I await your answer.

Bashir,
what you described could easily have been my own extended family 'tribal' childhood around Christmas time. Its a truly hearwarming and beautiful time.
As I was reading I thought I'd died and gone to paradise... then reality jerked me back.

A couple of points.

Ask yourself this. If one of the young men, had been away at Uni and returned to announce "Mum dad.. tribe.. I know this is going to be difficult to hear, but ...I've become Christian" Now, would that same 'harmony' be happening ? or.. if some missionaries arrived and requested to be allowed to share the Gospel of Christ, and the elders/chief agreed 'once only' and then, a few of the hearers decided to embrace Christ as Savior and Lord. Would the same happiness and harmony exist ?

Now, try to put yourself in our cultural situation here. And apply those things in reverse, asking the same questions.

But back to Somalia. If one accepted the picture you painted as universal over there, a rude shock would await. I'm wondering how you relate your childhood joy to the clan warfare, the taking of slaves and territory, the brutality of some clans towards those of 'lower' esteem or perceived peck order....

Perhaps your tribe or clan were the 'victorious' or the 'majority' ones.. who didn't suffer at the hands of anyone. But knowing what I do about Somalia's ethnic make up, and history, I would shudder at the thought of living under such threats.

I tend to give some weight to Coach's point about 'bringing them back to the book' and cultural nominal Islam at the local village level.

Nevertheless, what you describe is truly a beautiful human situation, though not limited to Islamic traditions alone.

Hopefully more of us will re-capture that special sense of family, community and 'tribe' within our own rapidly decaying culture, and restore a level of Godliness across the board at the individual, family and communal level