Sibby Online

The anti-American Drive-By media

From Melanie Morgan:

I promised myself that this week's column would have nothing to do with the war, or our troops or the outrages that pass for news in this country. But, that was before I picked up this morning's newspaper and saw another egregious example of the liberal media trying to twist public opinion to their liking.

The latest outrage that's got me madder than a cat on a hot tin roof and sent my blood pressure sky-high was this headline: "U.S. Deaths in Iraq Exceed 9-11 Count."

The Associated Press proudly proclaimed the banner news on Dec. 26, not even trying to disguise their glee.

"The U.S. military death toll in Iraq has reached 2,974, one more than the number of deaths in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the United States, according to an Associated Press count on Tuesday."

Excuse me! What a pitiable excuse for journalistic judgment. If I weren't so used to this slanted, biased, out-of-context information about the war in Iraq, I might laugh. But nothing about this countless recitation of so-called information is even remotely funny when American lives are at stake.

Nor does this article do anything to illuminate the public about the war, why we are fighting it and why we are winning it. Yep. I said WINNING IT.

I did a cursory Internet search after that damnable wire story crossed, and allow me to be a bit presumptuous and rewrite today's repackaged propaganda that emanates from the dirty, cramped cubicles that most media occupy.

The headline should have read: "50,000 Iraqi Insurgents Dead, Caught"

That didn't take much work on my part. No, I didn't really even crack a sweat. It is an ACTUAL headline from the Washington Times dated July 26, 2005. The numbers now are undoubtedly higher. That works out to about a 17-to-1 kill ratio for our side. The side most Americans want to actually win this war.

Tony Dean, socialist and primitive man

A while back, Tony Dean wrote a column for the Argus Leader titled, "The power of prairie dog politics". Here is the introduction:

In recent days, the SD Stockgrowers Association has opposed the expansion of a national park in South Dakota, while other ranchers have opposed the creation of the nation's first prairie wilderness on a national grasslands in western South Dakota. They claim the wilderness proposal lacks support, ignoring that the three largest grazing permit-holders, favor the designation.

They claim to hate public lands but don't take advantage of the cheap grazing fees that are, by any description, a subsidy. And they resent sharing those lands, whether they be Forest Service, BLM or state school and public lands, with the public. They get by with these attitudes because theirs is a powerful lobby.

Gee, I wonder how much rent Tony Dean pays when he films his fishing programs on public waters? Anyway, I found this column by Ilana Mercer that points out environmentalists like Tony Dean are primitive:

Primitive man worshipped nature and imbued inanimate things with human qualities. So do environmentalists.

She then describes how environmentalists like Tony Dean are socialists:

Environmentalism is socialism revived; the Greens are the Reds incarnated.

In his seminal work, "Capitalism," Reisman elaborates on the philosophical affinity between these maniacal movements: The Reds argued that "the individual could not be left free because the result would be such things as 'exploitation,' 'monopoly' and depressions. The Greens claimed that the individual could not be left free because the result would be such things as the destruction of the ozone layer, acid rain and global warming. Both claim that centralized government control over economic activity is essential. The Reds wanted it for the alleged sake of achieving human prosperity"; the Greens for the alleged sake of avoiding environmental damage."

Tony Dean shows his "Reds" by attacking those stand up to government intrusion:

The SD Lockout is a good example of how they play the game of prairie dog politics. Some don't like the idea that a Game, Fish & Parks conservation officer can come on their land to check for violations, licenses, etc. Because the Game, Fish & Parks Department didn't back off on their use of the Open Fields doctrine, the affected ranchers did what they always seem to do. They closed their land to hunting, and though they've never published a list of participating landowners, they claim to have shut down hunting on over 4 million acres of land in western South Dakota. This is one case where Gov. Mike Rounds deserves a pat on the back for backing Cooper on his insistence of maintaining the Open Fields doctrine to assure that game laws are followed.

As my previous post points out, the Argus Leader seems to think that pheasants are more important than America’s freedoms. And now they seem to have given ink to Tony Dean, an anti-gun sportsman and promoter of socialism, who obviously believes pheasants are more important than America's freedoms. His primitive ideas certainly date back to times prior to the founding of America.

Misplaced priorities

As the Argus Leader has placed top priority on the issue of telling America who hunts pheasants with Governor Rounds, the Drive-By media neglect to inform Americans about this:

More amazing details of former National Security Adviser Sandy Berger's theft and deliberate concealment of classified documents emerged last week – just before the Christmas holiday, at a time few Americans were watching the news.

In a report by National Archives Inspector General Paul Brachfeld, we learn, more than three years after the crime against the American people and the laws of the land, that Berger hid some of the documents under a construction trailer.

We also learn that at first no law enforcement agencies were even notified of suspicions about the crime.

We learn that his first "cover story" was that he might have inadvertently thrown the papers in the trash.

We learn he admitted retrieving the documents he stashed under the construction trailer and brought them to his office.

We learn the reason he was not confronted earlier – and that law enforcement authorities were not notified – was because of Berger's high-level position in the Clinton White House.

And let's remember what Sandy Burglar was doing rummaging through classified materials in the National Archives. He was on assignment for former President Clinton, to help prepare him for upcoming testimony before the 9/11 commission as well as to prepare himself for impending testimony before the Senate and House intelligence committees.

Specifically, he was reviewing National Security Council documents about Osama bin Laden, al-Qaida and Sudan. Now, as you might recall, if you have a very good memory, the Clinton administration was offered bin Laden's head on a platter by the Sudanese government – an offer spurned by the White House.

As you also might recall, the 9/11 commission was investigating the mistakes that led to the biggest attack on American soil in history.

What was not learned from the latest report is as interesting as what was learned:

• Which documents did Berger take?
• What was the nature of those documents?
• Were all of them eventually returned?
• What procedures have changed, if any, at the National Archives to ensure that big shots like Berger are not permitted to steal national security secrets in the future?
• Why, after all we have learned about the startling details of this high-profile security breach by a former high-level official, was the punishment so minimal?

Again, in case you forgot, which could easily be the case with meager media coverage of this astonishing betrayal, Berger plea-bargained a criminal sentence on the charge of unlawfully removing and retaining classified documents. He got no prison time, was fined $50,000, was ordered to perform 100 hours of community service and was barred from access to classified material for three years.

Berger commands speaking fees of about $50,000. So, if he indeed paid his own fine, which we don't know for certain, he could do so with one speech. In fact, his speaking fee may have gone up as a direct result of the controversy.

The American people don't even know the nature of the "community service" he performed or is scheduled to perform.

And the restriction on his access to classified material ends in 2009 – making him eligible to be back in a sensitive position should his party win the White House in 2008.

The whole story is so breathtaking – from beginning to end. It demonstrates so clearly that there are two standards of justice in America – one for the average American citizen and the other for the political elites.

If anything, you would think that political elites would be held to a higher standard of accountability and justice than average Americans. But that is clearly not the case. The message sent by the handling of the matter by President Bush's Justice Department is that you can get away with anything if you are well-connected in America.

If you doubt what I'm saying, just try lifting some classified documents from the National Archives yourself and, when you are caught, ask for the Sandy Berger sentence. Somehow, I don't think you'll be lucky enough to get it.

Islamic fascism and Cultural Marxism

First read this column by Linda Kimbal on Cultural Marxism and then read this report on how Hamas is using Cultural Marxism to prevent airport officials from reacting to suspicious behavior and to infiltrate America's security systems. Excerpt:

As WND reported previously, last June a senior Department of Homeland Security official from Washington personally guided CAIR officials on a behind-the-scenes tour of Customs screening operations at O'Hare International Airport in response to CAIR complaints that Muslim travelers were being unfairly delayed as they entered the U.S. from abroad.

However, CAIR itself is a controversial organization. It is a spin-off of the Islamic Association for Palestine, identified by two former FBI counterterrorism chiefs as a "front group" for the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas. Moreover, several CAIR leaders have been convicted on terror-related charges.

During the June airport tour, CAIR was taken on a walk through the point-of-entry, Customs stations, secondary screening and interview rooms. In addition, U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agents were asked to describe for CAIR representatives various features of the high-risk passenger lookout system. Brian Humphrey, Customs and Border Patrol's executive director of field operations, assured CAIR officials that agents do not single out Muslim passengers for special screening and that they must undergo a mandatory course in Muslim sensitivity training. The course teaches agents that Muslims believe jihad is an "internal struggle against sin" and not holy warfare.

Customs agents involved in the CAIR tour at O'Hare told WorldNetDaily they were outraged that headquarters would reveal sensitive counterterrorism procedures to an organization that has seen several of its own officials convicted of terror-related charges since 9-11.

CAIR says the June tour allayed its concerns about profiling and that it "looks forward to continuing the relationship with U.S. Customs and Border Protection offices in the region, and to furthering understanding between the organizations as well as facilitating future communication in order to eliminate problems for Muslim travelers before they even arise."

As WND reported, the Department of Homeland Security invites CAIR itself to conduct sensitivity training for Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers and supervisors (CBP's counterparts) in Chicago. The course is taught by local CAIR officials Christina Abraham and Mariyam Hussain. More than 30 ICE staffers have gone through the CAIR awareness program so far.

CAIR – which is bankrolled by the Saudis and the United Arab Emirates, two countries that formally recognized the Taliban – also offers religious and cultural sensitivity training about Islam and Muslims to the military. In June, for example, CAIR trained more than 300 military personnel at the Marine Corps Air Station in Yuma, Ariz.

Also in June, CAIR was invited by the Pentagon to a ceremony dedicating the first Islamic center in Marine Corps history at Quantico headquarters outside of Washington.

Washington-based CAIR also has regular meetings with the FBI and Justice Department. In fact, FBI case agents complain the bureau rarely can make a move in the Muslim community without first consulting with CAIR, which sits on its advisory board. CAIR in the past has cried racism and bigotry when the bureau has moved unilaterally with investigations and raids in the community.

CAIR has also been dogged by the statements of Omar Ahmad, as reported by a California newspaper, that "Islam isn't in America to be equal to any other faith, but to become dominant," and, "The Koran, the Muslim book of scripture, should be the highest authority in America, and Islam the only accepted religion on Earth." Although the newspaper's publisher and the reporter stand by the quotes, Ahmad and CAIR dispute their accuracy.

The second Amendment in action

From WorldNetDaily:

Three men who broke into homes in the Albuquerque, N.M., area in the last month were shot dead by homeowners, and police say they hope would-be robbers take the hint.

The latest incident involved Raymond Gabaldon, 40, a repeat offender, who, police say, stole a car and then tried to break into a home in southwest Albuquerque.

"Hopefully this is going to send a message to people who are breaking into homes," Albuquerque police spokeswoman Trish Hoffman told the Albuquerque Tribune. "They're engaging in very dangerous behavior, not only to the people they're robbing, but to themselves."

None of the three homeowners involved in the shootings has been charged, though the cases are still under review by law enforcement.

An armed homeowner in Charlotte, N.C., also foiled a break-in Tuesday, police there report.

A man told police he was preparing to take out the trash at his home when he realized an intruder was in his house.

The resident told police he went to get a handgun and as he turned around, the attacker struck him in the back of the head. That triggered a fight between the attacker and the resident of the house. During the scuffle, the victim said, he fired his gun once, with the bullet striking the refrigerator.

The assailant then fled on foot.

In Kingsport, Tenn., an armed convenience store clerk yesterday pulled a handgun on a knife-wielding robber, fired once and drove him off with one shot.

And, in Seattle, an armed homeowner fatally shot an intruder Tuesday, according to a police report.

The homeowner was roused from sleep by an intruder. The 31-year-old homeowner grabbed his shotgun and killed Justin Hercyk. That case is still under investigation.

Hollywood exploiting teach-student sex epidemic

From WorldNetDaily:

The classroom sexpidemic of women teachers raping underage boys is not going ignored by Hollywood, which has just released its latest offering on the subject, "Notes on a Scandal."

The film stars Cate Blanchett as an attractive art teacher at a state-run secondary school in London, and features Andrew Simpson as her 15-year-old Irish student. The plot has the teen-ager coming on strong to the married woman with lines like, "You don't know how beautiful you are." He also tries to stop her from ending their illegal and adulterous relationship.

The movie goes much deeper than just being ripped from today's headlines, as Blanchett's fellow teacher – played by Judi Dench – is apparently a latent lesbian obsessed with the art instructor. She discovers the illicit affair Blanchett's character is having with the teen, and uses it to her advantage.

Moderates are bullied by the far-left

I found this column by Linda Kimball that does a great job of explaining the Marxist element that the far-left secular humanists are using to perpetuate the anti-God, anti-family, and anti-American agenda of the far-left. Here is the introduction:

There are two misconceptions held by many Americans. The first is that communism ceased to be a threat when the Soviet Union imploded. The second is that the New Left of the Sixties collapsed and disappeared as well. "The Sixties are dead," wrote columnist George Will (Slamming the Doors, Newsweek, Mar. 25, 1991)

Because the New Left lacked cohesion it fell apart as a political movement. However, its revolutionaries reorganized themselves into a multitude of single issue groups. Thus we now have for example, radical feminists, black extremists, anti-war ‘peace’ activists, animal rights groups, radical environmentalists, and ‘gay’ rights groups. All of these groups pursue their piece of the radical agenda through a complex network of subversive organizations such as the Gay Straight Lesbian Educators Network (GSLEN), the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), People for the American Way, United for Peace and Justice, Planned Parenthood, Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States (SIECUS), and Code Pink for Peace.

Both communism and the New Left are alive and thriving here in America. Code words by which they can be recognized are: tolerance, social justice, economic justice, peace, reproductive rights, sex education and safe sex, safe schools, inclusion, diversity, and sensitivity. All together, this is Cultural Marxism disguised as multiculturalism.

Kimball then points out that Christianity was what stood in the way of the communist movement:

By the end of WWI, socialists realized that something was amiss, for the world’s proletariat had not heeded Marx’s call to rise up in opposition to evil capitalism and to embrace communism instead. They wondered what had gone wrong.

Separately, two Marxist theorists—Antonio Gramsci of Italy and Georg Lukacs of Hungary—concluded that the Christianized West was the obstacle standing in the way of a communist new world order. The West would have to be conquered first.

So the assault first targeted the traditional family:

The new battleground, reasoned Gramsci, must become the culture, starting with the traditional family and completely engulfing churches, schools, media, entertainment, civic organizations, literature, science, and history. All of these things must be radically transformed and the social and cultural order gradually turned upside-down with the new proletariat placed in power at the top.

Kimball then explains how the Frankfurt School developed a Cultural Marxism that used Political Correctness to attack Christianity, America’s traditional family, and America’s capitalism:

In 1923, the Frankfurt School—a Marxist think-tank—was founded in Weimar Germany. Among its founders were Georg Lukacs, Herbert Marcuse, and Theodor Adorno. The school was a multidisciplinary effort which included sociologists, sexologists, and psychologists.

The primary goal of the Frankfurt School was to translate Marxism from economic terms into cultural terms. Toward this end, Marcuse—who favored polymorphous perversion—expanded the ranks of Gramsci’s new proletariat by including homosexuals, lesbians, and transsexuals. Into this was spliced Lukacs radical sex education and cultural terrorism tactics. Gramsci’s ‘long march’ was added to the mix, and then all of this was wedded to Freudian psychoanalysis and psychological conditioning techniques. The end product was Cultural Marxism, known in the West as multiculturalism.

In 1950, the Frankfurt School augmented Cultural Marxism with Theodor Adorno’s idea of the ‘authoritarian personality.’ This concept is premised on the notion that Christianity, capitalism, and the traditional family create a character prone to racism and fascism. Thus, anyone who upholds America’s traditional moral values and institutions is both racist and fascist. Children raised by traditional values parents, we are told to believe, will almost certainly become racists and fascists. By extension, if fascism and racism are endemic to America’s traditional culture, then everyone raised in the traditions of God, family, patriotism, gun ownership, or free markets is in need of psychological help.

The pernicious influence of Adorno’s ‘authoritarian personality’ idea can be clearly seen in the following quote: "In Aug., 2003, the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) and the National Science Foundation (NSF) announced the results of their $1.2 million tax-payer funded study. It stated, essentially, that traditionalists are mentally disturbed. Scholars from the Universities of Maryland, California at Berkeley, and Stanford had determined that social conservatives…suffer from ‘mental rigidity,’ ‘dogmatism,’ and ‘uncertainty avoidance,’ together with associated indicators for mental illness." (www.edwatch.org ‘Social and Emotional Learning" Jan. 26, 2005) From this Orwellian quote we can see just how successful has been Gramsci’s ‘long march through the culture.’

The corresponding and diabolically crafted corrective idea is political correctness. The strong suggestion here is that in order for one not to be thought of as racist or fascist, then one must not only be nonjudgmental but must also embrace the ‘new’ moral absolutes: diversity, choice, sensitivity, sexual orientation, and tolerance. Political correctness is a Machiavellian psychological ‘command and control’ device. Its purpose is the imposition of uniformity in thought, speech, and behavior.

And the Political Correct movement’s success can be found in what the Drive-By media calls moderates, who have been bullied to agree with the far-left:

Both political correctness and Critical Theory are in essence, psychological bullying. They are the psycho political battering rams by which Frankfurt School disciples such as the ACLU are forcing Americans to submit to and to obey the will and the way of the Left. These devious devices are but psychological versions of Georg Lukacs and Laventi Beria’s ‘cultural terrorism’ tactics. In the words of Beria, "Obedience is the result of force…Force is the antithesis of humanizing actions. It is so synonymous in the human mind with savageness, lawlessness, brutality, and barbarism, that it is only necessary to display an inhuman attitude toward people to be granted by those people the possessions of force." (The Russian Manual on Psychopolitics: Obedience, by Laventi Beria, head of Soviet Secret Police and Stalin’s right-hand man)

Double-thinking ‘fence-sitters’, otherwise known as moderates, centrists, and RINOs are an obvious result of these psychological ‘obedience’ techniques. These people—afraid of incurring the wrath of name-calling obedience trainers--- have opted to straddle the fence lest they be found guilty of possessing an opinion, one way or another. At the merest hint of displeasure from the obedience-trainers, up goes the yellow flag of surrender upon which it is boldly written: "I believe in nothing and am tolerant of everything!"

{Emphasis Kimball’s]

Next Kimball explains who many have argued that Marxism has it roots tied to secular humanism:

The linchpin of Cultural Marxism is cultural determinism, the parent of identity politics and group solidarity. In its turn, cultural determinism was birthed by the Darwinian idea that man is but a soulless animal and therefore his identity is determined by for example, his skin color or his sexual and/or erotic preferences. This proposition rejects the concepts of the human spirit, individuality, free will, and morally informed conscience (paired with personal accountability and responsibility) because it emphatically denies the existence of the God of the Bible. Consequently, and by extension, it also rejects the first principles of our liberty enumerated in the Declaration of Independence. These are our "unalienable rights, among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." Cultural Marxism must reject these because these principles of liberty "are endowed by our Creator," who made man in His image.

Kimball then ends with what I consider the essence of this web site and the search for truth:

It is said that courage is the first of the virtues because without it fear will paralyze man, thus keeping him from acting upon his moral convictions and speaking truth. Thus bringing about a general state of paralyzing fear, apathy, and submission—the chains of tyranny—is the purpose behind psychopolitical cultural terrorism, for the communist Left’s revolutionary agenda must, at all costs, be clothed in darkness.

The antidote is courage and the light of truth. If we are to win this cultural war and reclaim and rebuild America so our children and their children’s children can live in a ‘Shining City on the Hill’ where liberty, families, opportunity, free markets, and decency flourish, we must muster the courage to fearlessly expose the communist Left’s revolutionary agenda to the Light of Truth. Truth and the courage to speak it will set us free.

I could not have said it better myself.

Rick Warren, false prophet?

Fox News has been running Rick Warren’s Christmas message and his P.E.A.C.E. Plan. As Joseph Farah takes on Warren for his comments in Syria, Paul Proctor takes Warren on for being a humanist. Here is the introduction:

I suppose I should rename this column "The Warren Report," since so much of my writing time these days seems to be spent rebuking much of the spiritual whiskey he pours his patrons in the name of Christ, rendering them drunk, delusional and unable to distinguish right from wrong, good from evil and sacred from sacrilegious.

Like alcoholics, the more his regulars drink, the thirstier they get; the thirstier they get, the more they drink, until they all begin sounding brilliant to each other and yet silly to the sober souls around them that fear God. Oblivious to His Word and the consequences of their carelessness, most end up laughing, crying, hugging and high-fiving each other while bragging about all of the great things they’re going to do for God, which frankly turns my stomach.

There are, of course many parachurch organizations and movements that have evolved over the years, some new and some not so new, from the Alpha Course, to the Promise Keepers to the Willow Creekers to the Purpose Driven to the Mosaics to the Emerging Church; each with their own set of false prophets and demonic doctrines steadily steering their respective groups into the coming one world religion of tolerance, diversity and unity, having forsaken the Word of God for the seductive will of men in an ancient occult effort to undo the confusion and separation the Lord inflicted upon the world under the rule of Nimrod. Though they are many and varied, they are all related in some way or another and are empowered by the same spirit that the Bible says will emerge in the latter days to make war with God.

There are numerous books, web sites and writers today that address these men and their movements; but for now I will continue to focus on the one that is currently deceiving the greatest number from among my own denomination, Southern Baptist.

On his church’s 25th anniversary, Rick Warren launched what he calls his Global P.E.A.C.E. Plan to "eradicate five giant problems that oppress billions of people" around the world with "five smooth stones of (P) - Planting Churches, (E) - Equipping Leaders, (A) - Assisting the Poor, (G) - Caring for the Sick and (E) - Educating the Next Generation."

Here is what Proctor finds fault with Warren:

In typical Saddleback style, Warren twists the biblical account of David and Goliath ("five giants and five smooth stones") into a useful tool of deceit that stirs emotions while teaching the exact opposite of what the Lord intended us to learn; proclaiming that the answer to the world’s "giants" is a "church network," even though it was a "network" of faithless Israelites who cowed before the great warrior Goliath.

Rather than empowering King Saul and his trembling "network" to bring down the giant, the Lord raised up one small shepherd boy named David, who couldn’t even wear the armor of the king and took no sword with him but only five rocks and something to throw them with as accessories to his fearless faith. The lesson here is, of course, when you go into battle for a righteous cause, it doesn’t matter what weapons you carry or how many of you there are or how trained you are; the only thing that really matters is your faith in God. He and He alone will deliver you in time of need.

So, what is Warren teaching his followers by invoking selective parts of the David and Goliath story to sell his Global P.E.A.C.E. Plan? Here are a few revealing quotes Berit Kjos found in some of Warren’s 40 Days materials that she included in a recent article of hers entitled: Creating Community (Part 2). They will illustrate quite clearly how he uses socialist slogans to teach Laodocian lies.

Warren: "We is more powerful than me."

Warren: "There is power in partnership.... Evangelism is always a team effort."

Warren: "There's no such thing as a lone ranger Christian.... We're better together and we belong together."

Warren: "The Bible says we're better together. We were created for community."

He's Teaching that bigger is better, more is mightier and you can’t win by going it alone using, of all things, the story of a small shepherd boy who single-handedly whipped the Philistines while the Israelites watched in amazement from a nearby hill.

If it hasn’t dawned on you yet, he’s using the Bible to teach humanism or, to put it another way; he’s using truth to frame lies.

Proctor then goes beyond just accusations of humanism:

So, if you bring good news, train leaders, help the poor, care for the sick and teach children, you are fulfilling the Great Commission? Isn’t that what the U.S. is doing right now overseas, bringing good news, training leaders, helping the poor, caring for the sick and teaching children? Isn’t this also what the United Nations and many of its non-governmental organizations say they’re all about? Isn’t it what liberals, socialists, communists, Marxists, Fascists and every other corrupt leader, regime and revolution throughout history claim they were all about, as well? I’ll bet even Fidel Castro believes he accomplished all these things and more down in Cuba when he took over.

If that’s the case, then what’s the difference between the church and the world? Could it be that something else is being taught amid all the pomp and circumstance of Warren’s grand coming out party? Could it be he is suggesting, ever so subtly, that when it comes right down to it, there really isn’t much difference between the church and the world; that his Global P.E.A.C.E. Plan is just another upgraded form of humanism and socialism, better packaged, better managed and better marketed with better people and better technology all wrapped up in Christmas paper to be presented as his glorious gift to the world?

Of course the Bible does warn us about false prophets. And I did point to other suspects in my Christmas Eve post.

Muhammad and Jesus

On this Christmas day, I would hope we can lay down the sword and instead of arguing over our differences, we look to what we have in common. I found this link at WorldNetDaily that talks about Muhammad and Jesus. I have decided to make it my Christmas message this year. Here is the introduction:

In 632, after five years of fearful warfare, the city of Mecca in the Arabian Hijaz voluntarily opened its gates to the Muslim army. No blood was shed and nobody was forced to convert to Islam, but the Prophet Muhammad ordered the destruction of all idols and icons of the Divine. There were a number of frescoes painted on the inner walls of the Kabah, the ancient granite shrine in the centre of Mecca, and one of them, it is said, depicted Mary and the infant Jesus. Immediately Muhammad covered it reverently with his cloak, ordering all the other pictures to be destroyed except that one.

This story may surprise people in the west, who have regarded Islam as the implacable enemy of Christianity ever since the crusades, but it is salutary to recall it during the Christmas season when we are surrounded by similar images of the Virgin and Child. It reminds us that the so-called clash of civilisations was by no means inevitable. For centuries Muslims cherished the figure of Jesus, who is honoured in the Qur'an as one of the greatest of the prophets and, in the formative years of Islam, became a constituent part of the emergent Muslim identity.

There are important lessons here for both Christians and Muslims - especially, perhaps, at Christmas. The Qur'an does not believe that Jesus is divine but it devotes more space to the story of his virginal conception and birth than does the New Testament, presenting it as richly symbolic of the birth of the Spirit in all human beings (Qur'an 19:17-29; 21:91). Like the great prophets, Mary receives this Spirit and bears Jesus, who will, in his turn, become an ayah, a revelation of peace, gentleness and compassion to the world.

The Qur'an is horrified by Christian claims that Jesus was the "son of God", and depicts Jesus ardently denying his divinity in an attempt to "cleanse" himself of these blasphemous projections. Time and again the Qur'an insists that, like Muhammad himself, Jesus was a perfectly ordinary human being and that the Christians have entirely misunderstood their own scriptures. But it concedes that the most learned and faithful Christians - especially monks and priests - did not believe that Jesus was divine; of all God's worshippers, they were closest to the Muslims (5:85-86).

Here is where the piece describes similarities between Muhammad and Jesus:

Jesus, it was felt, had an affinity with Muhammad, and had predicted his coming (61:6), just as the Hebrew prophets were believed by Christians to have foretold the coming of Christ. The Qur'an, possibly influenced by Docetic Christianity, denied that Jesus had been crucified, but saw his ascension into heaven as the triumphant affirmation of his prophethood. In a similar way, Muhammad had once mystically ascended to the Throne of God. Jesus would also play a prominent role beside Muhammad in the eschatological drama of the last days.

During the first three centuries of Islam, Muslims came into close contact with Christians in Iraq, Syria, Palestine and Egypt, and began to amass a collection of hundreds of stories and sayings attributed to Jesus; there is nothing comparable in any other non-Christian religion. Some of these teachings were clearly derived from the gospel - the Sermon on the Mount was particularly popular - but were given a distinctively Muslim flavour. Jesus is depicted making the hajj, reading the Qur'an, and prostrating himself in prayer.

In other stories, Jesus articulated specifically Muslim concerns. He was a great model for Muslim ascetics, preaching poverty, humility and patience. Sometimes he took sides in a political or theological dispute: aligning himself with those who advocated free will in the debate about predestination; praising Muslims who retired on principle from politics ("Just as kings have left wisdom to you, so you should leave the world to them"); or condemning scholars who prostituted their learning for political advancement ("Do not make your living from the Book of God").

Jesus was becoming internalised by Muslims as an exemplar and inspiration in their own spiritual quest. Shias felt that there was a strong connection between Jesus and their inspired imams, who had also had miraculous births and inherited prophetic knowledge from their mothers. The Sufis were especially devoted to Jesus and called him the prophet of love. The 12th-century mystic Ibn al-Arabi called him "the seal of the saints" - deliberately pairing him with Muhammad, the "seal of the prophets". Some Sufis went so far as to alter the shahadah, the Muslim profession of faith, so that it became: "I bear witness that there is no God but Allah, and that Jesus [not Muhammad] is his prophet."

And now the conclusion:

The Muslim devotion to Jesus is a remarkable example of the way in which one tradition can be enriched by another. It cannot be said that Christians returned the compliment. While the Muslims were amassing their Jesus-traditions, Christian scholars in Europe were denouncing Muhammad as a lecher and charlatan, viciously addicted to violence. But today both Muslims and Christians are guilty of this kind of bigotry and often seem eager to see only the worst in each other.

The Muslim devotion to Jesus shows that this was not always the case. In the past, before the political dislocations of modernity, Muslims were always able to engage in fruitful and stringent self-criticism. This year, on the birthday of the Prophet Jesus, they might ask themselves how they can revive their long tradition of pluralism and appreciation of other religions. For their part, meditating on the affinity that Muslims once felt for their faith, Christians might look into their own past and consider what they might have done to forfeit this respect.

Karen Armstrong is the author of Muhammad: A Prophet for Our Time.

It is too bad that we all don’t realize that we are all sons of God, and we should treat each other as brothers and sisters. I wonder if Karen Armstrong can get that message to the minds of those who fly airplanes full of their brothers and sisters into skyscrapers full of their brothers and sisters. Ironically those are driven by the idea of having many virgins instead of the teachings of the man who was born of a Virgin.

I think the key is that all of us have more to learn and need to further our spiritual growth. May God bless us with the wherewithal to do that as we search for the truth.

The culture war defined

I just sent this comment to Mount Blogmore regarding this thread. It seems appropiate to discuss the enemies to Christianity on Christmas Eve:

Fleming and Emerick seem to disagree with the courts regarding non-theistic religions. They are also in disagreement with their fellow humanists. Here is what I found on a Unitarian Universalists web site:

I explained to my neighbor that there are many kinds of humanism and that some are theistic, whereas religious humanism and its cousin, secular humanism, are nontheistic.

The author proposes yet another form of humanism:

I espouse a nontheistic faith, a perspective that I call humanistic religious naturalism. Like traditional religious humanism, it rejects the supernatural and maintains that there is only one reality, the natural universe. Traditional humanism, however, has historically been too anthropocentric, whereas for humanistic religious naturalism it is nature rather than humankind that is ultimate.

He goes on to say the religion is a "liberal" religion (which helps to support Ann Coulter and her book, "Godless: The Church of Liberalism"):

This rejection of supernaturalism distinguishes liberal religion from other forms of Western religion.

Emerick wants to distinguish between secular humanism and Enlightenment, but this link seems to refute that position:

This is why the Council for Secular Humanism is ushering in its next 25 years with a conference which will explore the foundations of the Enlightenment that created western liberalism and look to a roadmap for a New Enlightenment. We hope you join us in this exciting project.

And I found this interesting position regarding liberal religion and judaism that also points to not much difference between religious humanism and secular humanism:

The line between my brand of religious humanism and secular humanism is a fine one. Indeed, I used to wish that religion would just go away. It is, however, 300 years since the Enlightenment, and religion has not gone away: it has, to the contrary, grown considerably in influence in the last generation or so, especially in the United States. Like antibiotic-resistant bacteria, religion has resisted the assault of rationalists and maybe even embraced literalism as a direct response. We may have to learn to live with religion as with the antibiotic-resistant bacteria we once thought were on the road to extinction.

Rationalists are thus mistaken if we think that we are just a few generations ahead of our time and can influence people to toss out religion entirely. What we can do, however, is to encourage liberal religion and religious humanism, in contrast to dogmatic religion and religious (or antireligious) intolerance.

In my own case, I used to be a nonpracticing Jew; now I am a sort-of-practicing Reform Jew.

And when you see the word "Reform", you can suspect a belief that rejects traditional principles so that humanism can take its place. And when Emerick says "We Jews", he is trying to give the humanist worldview religious credibility. The uninformed do not understand that there is a difference between traditional Jewish beliefs and the more humanist so-called Reformist Jewish beliefs. That is why I refer to Emerick as an "dishonest" secular humanist. The traditional Jewish faith rejects abortion, but Emerick does not as humanists are abortion supporters. In fact abortion is specifically promoted in the Humanist Manifest II.

And the same happens in Christianity. Remember that among the abortion supporters were those that called themselves Pastors for Moral Choice. This was a front group for the Washington DC organization called Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice. If you go to the American Humanist Association list of coalitions, you will find RCRC. The RCRC says this about their issues:

Our rational, healing perspective looks beyond the bitter abortion debate to seek solutions to pressing problems such as unintended pregnancy, the spread of HIV/AIDS, inadequate health care and health insurance, and the severe reduction in reproductive health care services. We support access to sex education, family planning and contraception, affordable child care and health care, and adoption services as well as safe, legal, abortion services, regardless of income. We work for public policies that ensure the medical, economic, and educational resources necessary for healthy families and communities that are equipped to nurture children in peace and love.

There is no mention of God, and their position comes right out of the book of humanism. And the list of members include Conservative, Reformist, Reconstructionist, and Humainst Judaism. These are not traditional Jews. The member list also includes the previous mentioned Unitarian Universalists and also what many uninformed would consider Christian organizations including Methodists, Lutherans, Episcopals, Presbyterians, and United Church of Christ.

And in American we have a culture war. I have just exposed the enemies to traditional Americans who are referred to as conservatives. And in war it is important to know your enemy. And in this culture war, most don’t know who the enemy are…they are humanists in disguise. And the Drive-By media attacks the conservatives as they give these far-left anti-God, anti-Christian, anti-family, and anti-American supporters a pass.