Regular readers of this column know that, at times, we look at the ways Muslim countries, those nations where Islam is the national religion and the foundation for their laws, are not like us (if you’ll excuse the grammar).  Egypt and Turkey are two examples.  Both have been in the news recently for their unabashed persecution of their Christian populations.

An official policy of the Obama administration is to keep happy our pigs and those who raise them by avoiding the term “swine flu” when describing the influenza virus that jumped from pigs to people.  It is not the swine flu, but rather the H1N1 virus, they tell us. 

The Egyptian government, however, uses swine flu as an excuse to launch another round of persecution against its minority Christian population.  Even though the World Health Organization reports no swine flu in any African nation as of this writing, the Egyptian government ordered the destruction of the entire pig population in a nation where only Christians raise pigs because Muslims consider pork unclean.

Earlier this week, according to various news organizations, about 1,000 Christian pig farmers armed with stones and bottles faced off against about 200 police officers armed with tear gas and accompanied by armored vehicles.  The Christians lost. 

Now, Egyptian health officials say the pig slaughter is part of a campaign against unsanitary conditions on pig farms, especially in Cairo slums where garbage collectors live.  And since all pig-raising garbage collectors are Christians, some observers believe this is another way to harm Christians in a nation where the law strongly discourages conversion to Christianity.

Or, someone serving at the wedding of a Muslim who converted to Christianity.  Father Mattaos Wahba received a five-year prison sentence last October after his conviction on charges he helped a Muslim woman obtain an ID card that falsely listed her religion as Christian.  The woman obtained the ID of a deceased Christian woman of about her age two years before she met her future husband, according to the organization Christian Copts of California.  The priest, according to the group, had no knowledge of the woman’s fake ID.  He, instead, is a victim of Egypt’s open violation of religious and human rights.  At least in the way we understand them. 

Even the U.S. State Department describes the Egyptian government as applying discriminatory religious laws and practices, and effectively shutting out Christians from senior positions in the government, military, and education.  And forget about building or repairing churches.  An 1856 law says non-Muslims must obtain a presidential decree to build or repair a place of worship.  A church in a Cairo suburb has been waiting for a construction permit for the past 50 years, according to the State Department. 

Turkey doesn’t need a swine-flu ruse to persecute its Christians.  That government is open in its de jure and de facto forms of discrimination, including the systematic removal of Eastern Orthodoxy from within its borders.  Turkey does not recognize the ecumenical role of the Patriarch of Constantinople, the spiritual leader of the world’s 200 million Eastern Orthodox Christians, whose patriarchate dates back to the fourth century. 

At one time, the patriarchate possessed holdings on par with those of the Vatican, but it is now a small, beleaguered enclave with most of its property seized by the government and its priests and patriarch victims of constant physical and political attacks.  For instance, the government must approve a new patriarch who must be a native Turk.  The government also closed all Christian schools and the Halki Seminary that trained Turkey’s priests and patriarchs. 

In 2007, the late Congressman Tom Lantos joined 50 members of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, which he chaired, in sending a letter to Turkey’s prime minister urging an end to all restrictions on the religious freedom of the patriarch.  President Obama made a similar statement in his April 6 remarks to Turkey’s parliament.

Mr. Obama, however, did not mention a case under deliberation by a Turkish judge.  The monks of the fourth-century Syriac Orthodox monastery of Mor Gabriel want the court to stop a group of state land surveyors and Muslim villagers from taking about sixty percent of its property.  The monks believe the taking of their land is another way to force non-Muslims to leave.

The case of Mor Gabriel may have profound political ramifications for Turkey, as pointed out by the Assyrian International News Agency.  Turkey wants to become a member of the European Union, and protection of minority and religious rights are conditions for entry.  But, history often shows us that political expediency often trumps religious rights, particularly when the religion is Christianity in a Muslim state.

Have you ever thought about the criteria that make a “holy city” holy?  And while you’re contemplating this, come up with the answer to the question of why western journalists believe Christianity doesn’t have holy cities. 

You would be hard-pressed to find news stories referring to the birthplace of Jesus Christ, THE SON OF GOD, as “the holy city of Bethlehem.”  Journalists would never describe as Christian holy cities the ancient patriarchates of Constantinople, Rome, Jerusalem, Antioch, and Alexandria.

Constantinople is now Istanbul, but at one time, it was the seat of the Byzantine Empire and the ecumenical center of the Christian world.  Rome, Jerusalem Antioch, and Alexandria are still around, but journalists and their editors back home go out of their way to avoid the hint of Judeo-Christian bias.

This is why you won’t read about the 22-year-old man arrested for swimming nekked in the “historic” Baraccia fountain in the holy city of Rome, as happened this week and reported by Reuters.

Nor will you read about responses from the holy city of Vatican City about a proposal for Roman Catholic pope Benedict XVI and Russian Orthodox patriarch Alexy II to chew the holy fat in Cyprus sometime during the year, as reported this week by the Associated Press.

Anglicans won’t read about controversial housing development plans accepted by the holy city of Canterbury’s city council this week, as reported in The Times of London.

Folks in Japan and China never see their capital cities referred to as holy cities or former holy cities, even though the emperors of both countries claimed divine status.  Maybe the lack of a recognized holy city led the Chinese to take control of Tibet, home to the holy city of Lhasa.

Latter-Day Saints never hear the Mormon mecca called the holy city of Salt Lake City.

Gays, however, can read the Agence France Presse story about an ultra-Orthodox Jew arrested last week for trying to blow up a Gay Pride parade route in the holy city of Jerusalem.  In case the reader starts feeling distressed about the use of the term, and experiences an overriding desire to apologize for religious insensitivity, the writer included the following disclaimer:  “Jerusalem (is) revered as a holy city by millions of Christians, Jews, and Muslims all over the world.”

Maybe the title of holy city doesn’t mean what it used to mean.  Think of a holy city and you may think of a peaceful place populated by people filled with some kind of holy spirit.  The Merriam-Webster online dictionary defines holy city as a city that is the center of religious worship and traditions.

These days, though, a holy city may find itself as the center of a story about a natural or political upheaval.  “Another quake jolts holy city of Qom in Iran,” read a Payvand News headline on the last day of spring.  Historians of the twentieth century know the Punjab holy city of Amritsar for the martyrdom of 206 Sikhs in 1984.  In February, officers from Saudi Arabia’s Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice set out to protect the rectitude of the holy city of Mecca by arresting more than 200 Saint Valentine’s Day observers from Bangladesh and Myanmar.

Even though western journalists try hard to play up the religion-of-peace aspect of Islam, they find themselves writing stories of gunmen killing six people riding a minibus near the holy city of Karbala, or of soldiers guarding the funeral of a police officer in the holy city of Najaf.

Samarra, also in Iraq, may not be a holy city, but it has a revered mosque bombed by al-Qaeda earlier this month.  (Please note that western journalists only use the word revered with Islamic places of worship.  God forbid, so to speak, that the reporter for an Irish newspaper describe the “ancient” Basilica of Saint John and Saint Paul in the [holy city] of Rome as revered, even though it is the administrative headquarters for the Passionist order to which the newly canonized Charles of Mount Argus belonged.)

Pity the poor United States.  We’re not old enough to have anything that’s ancient.  We reserve revered for really old actors or professors who just died.

But we do have Charleston, S.C., named after King Charles II of England, and a self-proclaimed Holy City, because of the abundances of places of worship.

Charleston also is the home to Sammie Smalls, the inspiration for the Porgy character in “Porgy and Bess” and a guy who used to ride around James Island on a goat cart.  Charleston will be a mecca this weekend for people attending the “Comin’ Home to Porgy” celebration, a Lowcountry version of a haj.

Others can have their holy cities and revered places.  We have our own holy city, complete with a revered goat cart rider.

We’re doomed.

 

 

 

 

The appearance on the Internet this week of a video showing the stoning to death of a teenage Kirdish girl in Iraq underscores this writer’s long-held contention that “they are not like us.”  

Here’s what happened as reported by London’s Daily Mail.  Hardline relious leaders and male family members of Du’a Khalil Aswad condemned the 17-year-old girl to death by stoning because of her relationship with a Sunni Muslim boy.  Aswad’s family belongs to Yezidi, a Kurdish religious group in Iraq.  The religious leaders and family members claimed she dishonored the family by failing to return home one night.  Other reports suggest the “honor killing” had a lot to do with her apparent conversion to Islam.

Regardless of the reason, on or about April 7 of this year, eight or nine men dragged the girl into the street and stoned her for half an hour until she died, as a large crowd stood around and watched in the predominately Kurdish town near Mosul.

Reports say the boyfriend is in hiding for fear he will meet the same cold, hard fate.

The British arm of Amnesty International condemned the murder and called for the arrest of those responsible (http://www.amnesty.org.uk/news_details.asp?NewsID=17351).

This is not the first time someone filmed or videotaped a stoning.  Below is an excerpt from a column from this writer carried by various online sites in June of 2003.

 + + +

The May 5 edition of New Zealand's Timaru Herald carried a story of the stoning to death of four ducks by four boys the previous weekend.  The newspaper quoted an unidentified man who said that when he tried to stop the boys, one of them responded, “But we're only killing them with rocks.”

These boys are not like the boys I knew while growing up in a small Illinois town where the worst thing one did with stones was to toss them through greenhouse windows or at streetlights . . .

Nigeria is one of seven countries, all Muslim, that either engages in state-sponsored stoning or allows it as part of shariah law.  The others include Afghanistan, Iran, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, and Sudan.  As late as February of this year, a 13-year-old Pakistani girl was mutilated and stoned for dancing at a wedding (www.pakistanlink.com/Opinion/2003/Jan/03/11.html).  

U.S. lawmakers agree that these people are not like us.  The House of Representatives in March, by a 416-0 vote, passed a resolution sponsored by Rep. Betty McCollum, D-Minn, that denounces stoning as a gross violation of human rights.  
 
This issue is not new to Capitol Hill.  On Feb. 25, 1998, Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Fla., and Rep. Gary Ackerman, D-NY, showed a smuggled video of a public stoning in Iran (www.house.gov/ackerman/press/iran2.html).  A copy of the 15-minute tape is online at www.apostatesofislam.com/media/stoning.htm.  It is a gruesome account, and should not be viewed by the merely curious or those easily sickened by terrifying images of torture.  

About five minutes into the tape we see a group of men carrying an individual in a sheet to the center of the plaza, and we watch as they transform the sheet into a death shroud.  They carefully place the mummy-like figure into a hole as if transplanting a tree in someone’s yard.  

At about seven minutes into the tape, handlers place a second person into another hole. This raw video shows us the backs of people as the photographer walks around looking for a clear view of the gruesome scene of death.  About 30 seconds later, hundreds of men, mostly members of Iran's Revolutionary Guard, crowd into a circle around the condemned.  Then the stoning begins, seemingly spontaneously.  

We watch the eerie site of two white figures writhing as stones hit them.  A man walks up to one shroud and pelts it with rocks.  The camera zooms in on the bloodied lump surrounded by stones.  The camera pans to the other individual.  The cover is knocked off, he is face down, his head is bathed in blood.  

The tape jumps to the scene of a third person brought in, shrouded.  He stands stock still as ghastly gardeners plant him in the hole.  

Dirt is shoveled into the hole around the fourth individual, who bends at the waist. Feet tamp the dirt around him, making sure all is snug.  

The circle of death reforms as the man with the shovel makes his final tamps.  The crowd chants in agitated anticipation.  

The stoning begins with lusty yells.  It is a frenzied scene devoid of humanity.  Scores of stones fly quickly and strike horribly.  The shroud around one head explodes into red.  The two ghostly figures totter.  One falls forward only to be pelted backward.  

The camera zooms in.  The man on the right writhes as his shroud comes loose.  We see his bloody torso struck by stones.  We see him struggle as the pile of stones grows around him. We see the circle contract slowly until fewer than five feet separate the murderous men from the objects of their execution.  

Stone throwers stand close enough to caress their victims.  But they do not.  Instead, they pick up more stones and fling them with all their might.  
 
The condemned continue to writhe, to fall over, to sit back up, to fall back over.  One goes suddenly still. The other rises, almost defiantly in the face of hard death.  

Now the crowd stands within inches.  Men pick up rocks as quickly as they can, in some macabre competition to see who will cast the last stone in the deliverance of Allah's justice.  

Both figures are still.  The crowd disperses.  I recall the New Zealand boys who justified their actions by saying they only killed them with rocks.  These Muslim men would appreciate the sentiments, because they are not like us.  

Mundus vult decipi

Several years ago, a fellow proclaimed in a best-selling book that he learned in kindergarten all there is to know about life. I wonder if he had daughters, because life with daughters can teach lessons much darker than any found in kindergarten.

The news out of Iraq over Thanksgiving reminded me of a column I’ve wanted to write for a few months. Sectarian violence there resulted in the fiery murders of more than 200 Shiite and Sunni Muslims. A radical legislator declared that the United States was to blame for the killings and called for the withdrawal of U.S. forces or the setting of a timetable for their withdrawal.

Never mind that Shiites and Sunnis have engaged in acts of barbarism against each other (and others) since Mohammed died and winged his way to heaven They will continue to slaughter each other until one group attains total domination over the other and over their religion of peace. These murderous Muslims, along with the chronically dissatisfied, the lower achievers, and all of the other whiners of the world, find convenience in blaming someone else for their ills and for their failures.

It is easy to point a finger than to engage in introspection, to take no responsibility for one’s situation. And there are those evil individuals who know the truth, but use the tools of victimization and scapegoating to fool and to recruit their feckless followers.

Back in the days of middle school and early years of high school, my younger daughter had a problem with girls. Or more correctly, girls had a problem with my daughter. As long as she had a steady boyfriend, girls her age treated her the way any teenage girl treats another human being. In other words, with minor disrespect and minimal cattiness. Whenever she was “in play”, (without a boyfriend), however, girls once friends turned into cruel and vicious enemies wary of her every laugh and possessive of every guy deemed boyfriend material.

Life was much better here at the ranch whenever my daughter was not in play. Here is what I mean. My daughter had spent one summer afternoon between seventh and eighth grades with friends, hanging around the neighborhood boat docks. At one point, some girls in the group chased her down the street. One of them punched her a few times.

I met my daughter at the home of the girl who threw the punches, and we went inside to discuss the situation with her mother and the other girls. The meeting was not confrontational; I wanted to find out everything that happened and about the events that led up to the attack. The girl admitted punching my daughter, and, incredibly, justified her actions by blaming my daughter for taking a cell phone call from a boy that one of the other girls liked.

All the girls agreed they did not appreciate their boyfriends, or boys they wanted as boyfriends, talking with my daughter. It upset them, and it wasn’t fair that my daughter should try to take them away.

My daughter told the group she didn’t have any interests in the boy who called, nor in any of their boyfriends. In fact, she didn’t want a boyfriend at the time. She was having too much fun not worrying about whether some guy was happy.

The mother was no help. She didn’t understand why I was there, particularly because she and her husband didn’t condone violence; therefore, she found it hard to believe her daughter’s confession. She also refused to admit that whoever threw the phantom punch was wrong in doing so. In her mind, and in the minds of the other girls, my daughter brought it upon herself for taking the phone call and talking with a boy that was not her boyfriend.

Pubescent female logic is not the exclusive domain of thirteen-year-old girls.

At the time of the incident, we thought we were moving to another state because of my wife’s job. I explained that to the group, and suggested the girls and the mother listen closely to what they were saying. “We’re not to blame. She’s to blame. It’s her fault that our boyfriends want to talk with her and not to us. She needed to be taught a lesson.”

At that point, I wrote a question on a napkin, folded it, and handed it to the mother, telling her to put it away until after we moved. Then, the next time the girls have problems with their boyfriends, she was to take out the napkin and answer the question I had written:

Who do you blame now?

Sometimes the most difficult problems distill to the most simple questions. U.S. forces will leave Iraq, but the kidnappings, the beheadings, the car bombs, and the sectarian insanity will not abate. When that happens, who then will they blame?

Mundus vult decipi