The small church in Florida, the Dove World Outreach Center in Gainesville, pastored by Rev. Terry Jones has created a fire storm (pun intended) of controversy surrounding the recent decision to burn copies of the Qur'an on the anniversary of the World Trade Center attacks on September 11, 2001. I do not think the uproar is for whether or not Rev. Jones has the right, but is it right.
I think there are a few things to be said for this planned protest. First, this is a terrible witness for the cause of Christianity. With the way the media and already skeptical critics of Christianity portray the religion, to them this church is representative of Christians as a whole. Whether this is a true representation of Christians and Christianity is irrelevant. With the microscope on Christians to paint them as bigoted and narrow minded at every opportunity, this only makes the perception worse.
Second, I actually do believe this will serve as a learning experience for the world. Remember how Muslims reacted over the Danish cartoonist who drew a comic of Mohammad? The comic was met with much violence around the world. So we can only assume this act of Qur'an burnings will be met with the same violence. Unfortunately, following all the violence, will be national apologies and prostration of the United States to the Muslim world, and somehow after all the killings and bombings by Muslims, they will be viewed as the victims in this whole debacle.
As much as there is to learn about Islam's violent reactions to real or perceived insults, through this protest I do not think the aftermath and body count is worth it. This pastor ought to know better and have the where-with-all to protest in a more appropriate venue.
2 comments:
I belive that he will be making a terrible mistake if he does in fact go through with his "plan". As a pastor and therefore a leader, of a church that claims to follow the Christian teachings, he should realize that this will,as you pointed out, be a terrible witness of the Christian faith.
Also there WILL be terrorist attacks in response to this action. These attacks will be, as usual, against innocent men women and children.
I think what is the most intolrable (sp?) aspect of this is this pastor KNOWS that lives will be lost and destroyed and he STILL plans on going through with this.
I understand about his right to do this, however would'nt this fall under some part of national security?
Luckily, the pastor has decided to indeed back off his protest, and rightly so. There are better ways to protest Islam and terrorism. I do however think there is an amount of damage already done. In the end I was not so much concerned for the troops since it's their job unfortunately to be in harms way, I was more concerned for Americans in foriegn countries visiting for one reason or another, they will be caught by suprise by the violence which will befall them. The troops more or less are ready for and expect attacks and are better suited to defend themselves.
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