Here is part four, covering some of the other things I heard about this project to build a Mosque

The next kernel of information I heard about was pushing of the Islamic Da’wah. Most folks I spoke to do not really even know what that means. It usually denotes the preaching of Islam. Da‘wah means literally "issuing a summons" or "making an invitation", being the active participle of a verb meaning variously "to summon, to invite." Those words sounded to me like what my friend and his wife are doing in their religion since joining the International Mission Board in the different non-Christian parts of the world they have been assigned. I looked at their mission statement and found this - Our mission is to make disciples of all peoples in fulfillment of the Great Commission. And their vision statement is - Our vision is a multitude from every language, people, tribe and nation knowing and worshipping our Lord Jesus Christ. And after reading their core values they and the Da’wah sound eerily the same – bring as many folks into their religion as they can by converting them.

I am not educated enough to know for sure if they are identical but I am tenacious enough to find that a Islamic Da’wah and an Islamic fatwa are NOT the same thing. A fatwā is more like a ruling from the Pope about the rules of the religion. A fatwā is not equated with any form of capital punishment, as that is considered offensive by Muslims, we are not talking about the radial extremists here, just normal everyday Muslims. Fatwās are usually pronounced by distinguished scholars to provide guidance to other scholars, judges and citizens on how subtle points of Islamic law should be understood, interpreted or applied. And that is not unlike our supreme court, WHAT you might say? We have to remember, to a Muslim religion comes before government so we must understand that their culture and customs are WAY different than the western world we live in. The Pope also has a similar system of issuing rules or orders of the Catholic religion, he even said “Abortion is a crime of aggression not only against the unborn, but also against society” Sounds like he holds that opinion rather tightly and has some pretty strong held beliefs about it.

Another scary word I heard was something about Shariah, some Sacred Law that seems like the boogey man reincarnated if we are to believe the media. Muslims believe all Shariah is derived from two primary sources, the divine revelations set forth in the Quran and the actual sayings and examples set by the Islamic Prophet Muhammad. Sounds a little biblical doesn’t it? Are we as Christians not taught that same thing, maybe with different words but at its simplest we are taught to read the bible to gather the revelations of its players and in the new testament are we not given the examples of Jesus. That is a very simplified explanation of Shariah but maybe that is what we need, a simple explanation.

We, “us” and “them” also both have a set of rules, does not the bible have some commandments? So too does the Quran have a similar set of rules. Commandments One, Two and Three: God says in the Bible -- I am your Lord, the one true God and you shall take no God before me. You shall not make idols or images of God and you shall not take the Lord's name in vain. And God says in the Quran -- And your God is one god and he is most Compassionate and Merciful (Quran 2:163), Do not take other Gods other than Allah; Indeed idolatry is a great sin (Quran 31:13) and do not swear by Allah in vain (Quran 2:224). Commandment Four: Remember the day of Sabbath. The Quran informs us that the Sabbath was ordained for Jews only (Quran 16: 124) but God ordered Muslims to observe the Friday as a holy day of remembrance, prayer and thanks giving (Quran 62:9). Thus Muslims observe Friday, Jews Saturday and Christians Sunday, making it a long holy weekend.

Commandment Five: Thou shall honor thy father and thy mother. Islam is very serious about respect, honor and obedience for parents. The Prophet Muhammed (pbuh) said that gateway to heaven was under the feet of one's mother and the Quran orders Muslims to honor and speak in noble terms and not even utter the word "uff" to them out of disrespect (Quran 17:23). Commandments Six, Seven and Eight: Thou shall not commit murder, thou shall not commit adultery and thou shall not steal. Just as in the Bible, these are serious crimes according to the Quran. Quran forbids the taking of life except as justice for crimes (Quran 17:33), it forbids stealing and punishes it with amputation (Quran 5:38) and Islam forbids unlawful sexual intercourse as evil (Quran 17:32

The crimes get severe corporal punishment in Shariah law, but these punishments often described as barbaric in the West have their origins in the Bible too, such as stoning for adultery. But the Quran always keeps the door for forgiveness open and all who repent are forgiven. The message is unequivocal - "But whoever repents after his wrongdoing and reforms, Allah will turn to him in forgiveness. Indeed, Allah is Forgiving and Merciful." (Quran 5:39). It seems crazy to me that Conservatives in the West advocate for the Ten Commandments and campaign against the Shariah law at the same time, the two are one and the same and the hypocrisy, to me, is very clear.

The Buddha once said “violence leads to more violence, to the slayer comes a slayer and to the conqueror comes a conqueror he who plunders is plundered in turn”. Sounds similar to an eye for eye from Leviticus 24, starting at verse 13. 13 Then the LORD said to Moses: 14 "Take the blasphemer outside the camp. All those who heard him are to lay their hands on his head, and the entire assembly is to stone him. 15 Say to the Israelites: 'If anyone curses his God, he will be held responsible; 16 anyone who blasphemes the name of the LORD must be put to death. The entire assembly must stone him. Whether an alien or native-born, when he blasphemes the Name, he must be put to death. 17: 'If anyone takes the life of a human being, he must be put to death. 18 Anyone who takes the life of someone's animal must make restitution—life for life. 19 If anyone injures his neighbor, whatever he has done must be done to him: 20 fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth. As he has injured the other, so he is to be injured. 21 Whoever kills an animal must make restitution, but whoever kills a man must be put to death. 22 You are to have the same law for the alien and the native-born. I am the LORD your God.  23 Then Moses spoke to the Israelites, and they took the blasphemer outside the camp and stoned him. The Israelites did as the LORD commanded Moses. Pretty old testament and biblical sounding huh? That is all right out of the Good Book

A couple of more points and I am done with this topic. I do want to clarify a point I heard, the families of the victims are against the building of this Mosque. Some are but not all of them. The September Eleventh Families for Peaceful Tomorrows, which contains more than 250 families of the victims strongly supports the project. Funny how you never heard about that, ain’t it.

The last thing I want to remind everyone of is this. And this is the bottom line, stripped of all the propaganda, the controversy, the hatred and the xenophobia. This is about a private citizen, yes he is a naturalized US citizen, trying to build a place of worship on privately owned property in Manhattan and that my friends is it. Some will say it is more complicated but if we were to simply follow the axiom of Occam's razor we would see, it is just that damn simple. Occam's razor: one should not increase, beyond what is necessary, the number of entities required to explain anything.

So open up your heart, God fearing or not, and let the poisonous bile of hatred, fear and mistrust out, for surely if you don’t, it will erode your soul and is detrimental to our democracy. And stop listening to only the knuckleheads on your TV, find the truth, it is out there!!!

the quote, "When good men do nothing, evil triumphs." comes to mind in this case - scary times when we deny religious freedoms.

And as Forrest Gump would say, “that is all I have to say about that”, for now.