Ben Stein
Read Ben Stein and you will see what I mean.
Something Is Wrong
Source: American Spectator
Don’t look now, but Islam is becoming the MSM’s official religion of America.
Now, it’s not just that no one bats an eye at the amazing truth that the United States is beaming TV ads all over Pakistan apologizing for a derogatory Internet trailer for a nonexistent movie demeaning the being that Muslims call “The Prophet Mohammed.” No one in the MSM even slightly hints that doing the kowtow in the same country that sheltered Osama bin Laden to a group that reveled in, delighted in the terrorism against American civilians and still provides the framework for the terrorist Haqqani network, might be humiliating and an insult to the memory of the great Americans who were murdered just last week in Libya.
No, we just take it in stride that our President and our Secretary of State will apologize to the people who hate us and want us dead. That’s not what I am referring to.
I am referring to something worse: Have you noticed that in the past few years, and especially in the past few weeks since the murder of the Ambassador and his guards and colleague in Benghazi (a city that Erwin Rommel loved and whose inhabitants he praised), whenever the New York Times refers to Mohammed, they always call him, without quotation marks, The Prophet Mohammed, as if everyone with any sense understands that OF COURSE Mohammed is The One True Prophet and that it’s just understood that Mohammed is The Prophet.
I see this in other news outlets and on TV, too. Sober-looking newsmen and newswomen mention Mohammed as The Prophet Mohammed. No ifs, ands or buts. I hear it on the BBC World Service, too.
Now, if Muslims want to believe that Mohammed is The Prophet, God bless them. Fine and dandy. If anyone wants to believe that, good luck to him or her. But why does our mainstream media here in the USA, an overwhelmingly Christian country, refer to Islam’s prophet as “The Prophet”?
Have you ever seen any major newspaper here in the USA refer to Jesus Christ as “The Son of God, God Incarnate, The Lord Jesus Christ”? Can you imagine the New York Times running a story about a crucifix resting in urine at an “art gallery” as an offense against “The Lord Jesus, Son of God”? Can you imagine any large newspaper in this country running a story about the Pope and referring to him as “The Holy Father, The Bridge Between Heaven and Earth”? Or about Mary, as “Holy Mary, Mother of God”? It would never happen.
But somehow, probably because the people writing the articles and editing them or the producers on TV news shows fear being beheaded — and who doesn’t? — we have adopted in our media the Muslim assertion that Mohammed is The Prophet while giving other religious figures the back of our media hand.
This is frightening. We are not supposed to be doing obeisance to a religious group that has many adherents who want us dead. We are not, as journalists, supposed to be labeling anyone as “The” Prophet. But somehow, it’s happening. The MSM has become a voice for Islam.
Hitler saw it long ago. Terror and fear of violence can bring about amazing changes in people’s behavior. So can a misguided political correctness and self-loathing for the greatest nation on earth.
I overheard a conversation between two women at a dining table just yesterday. One said, “I don’t care what anyone says, Obama is a Muslim” (she has said it before) and the other said, “He’s not a Muslim. He’s just stupid.”
I didn’t say anything to them. I am just telling you, these do not feel like normal days. They feel like latter days.
There is just a feeling in the air, a look in the sky at dusk, a look on people’s faces. Fear is everywhere. Mr. Obama cannot lose this election unless enough people believe it’s within their power to stop the ticking of the clock, and I do not feel that groundswell. Not at all. When the American media turns its back on our own religions of tolerance and adores a religion of intolerance, times are upside down. The MSM says it’s all fine, trust The Prince of Grant Park, Chicago. But I have always preferred the admonition, “Put not your trust in princes.” Something is wrong.
Our Metropolitan in still active. Unfortunately, I got too late notice of the event to be able to attend
Dear Brothers & Sisters,
Tonight’s Vigil will be served by His Beatitude Metropolitan Jonah. The Vigil for the. Feast, one of the most moving and impressive services of the year, contains several distinguishing features. Before vespers the cross, decorated with flowers and sweet-smelling herbs, is placed upon, the altar. Following the Gospel reading in Matins, the faithful sing “Having beheld the Resurrection of Christ…” usually sung only during Saturday night vigils. At the end of the Great Doxology, to the slow singing of the Trisagion–“Holy God, Holy Mighty, Holy Immortal, have mercy on us”–the priest, carrying the Cross on his head, brings it out from the altar and places it on an analogion in the center of the church. He censes the cross on all four sides, and everyone prostrates before it to the singing of the hymn: “Before Thy Cross, we bow down, O Master, and Thy holy Resurrection we glorify.” Then the faithful, following the celebrants, venerate the cross in turn, making three full prostrations, and receive anointing. The cross remains in the center of the church until the Apodosis or “leave-taking” of the Feast on September 21.
In cathedrals and monasteries the adoration is preceded by the ceremony of exalting the cross. After the cross is brought out from the altar, the bishop or archimandrite takes it up in his hands and raises it on high. Then, as the people chant “Lord have mercy” a hundred times, he slowly lowers the cross nearly to the ground and just as slowly raises it. This is done five times as the celebrant faces first east, then west, south, north and east again, signifying that “the Cross is the guardian of the whole world” and through it “the world is sanctified.” In some churches the cross has rose water poured over it during these exaltations. The rose water is caught in a basin of flowers held by the acolytes, and the flowers are distributed to the faithful at the end of the service.
Although it is one of the major Church Feasts, the Exaltation is always kept as a fast day, because together with the joy of the finding of the Cross, this great “weapon of peace and sign of victory,” we are also reminded of the sufferings which our Lord endured in being crucified.
Hope to see you all tonight.
In XC,
Fr. Victor
I wonder how the people that produce MSM, etc., would like or accept their children and grandchildren living under Sharia?
Otec Diakon,
I do not know what you mean by MSM. As for earthly ideological religious challenges, I liked this ending quotation by Father Victor Potopov
We already celebrated this feast with the calendar that all countries of the world now use. So, what exactly is the reason for using an old, archaic calendar? Is it theological?
It’s the unconciliarity of how it was forced down the throats of the Greek-speaking churches. And the evil, ecumenist intent behind it. Is the Gregorian Calendar more accurate? Yes. But good ends do not justify evil means.
You got that right. Btw Helga is right. Old and New exist in the Orthodox Church.
Phil, that which you deride as an “archaic” calendar is still used by the vast majority of the Orthodox Church. I’d rather be on that calendar for the sake of my brothers and sisters who find it important, than to make some ridiculous stand for the new calendar as if it were important.
Absolutely, Helga,
And why should we rush to accept a calendar as outdated and archaic as the Gregorian. We should, utilizing whatever resources we can, inside and outside the Church, devise a new Orthodox religious calendar and from it, make the basis for a civil calendar that would be astrologically as acurate as possible, have no need for leap years, and gain us good press worldwide for our efforts.
Once the religious calendar is redone, we, gaving relied on Orthodox worldwide for their expertise, immediately begin using one calendar. On Pascha, one Nativity, one Church
Christ said, “Render unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s.” One of the powers of a sovereign state is the authority to determine units of measurement. That is why we use miles in the US instead of Kilometers like the rest of the world. Time is a unit of measurement. In our country our government has determined, or to put it more accurate our government inherited the decision made by the British government during colonial times, that we should determine the date according to the Gregorian Calendar. According to the calender that I use as an American, tomorrow is September 28. I looked at my Menaion this evening for September 28 and read Vespers for the Prophet Baruch. Tomorrow is September 29, tomorrow evening, I will look at my Menaion and read Vespers for the Saint of Feast for September 29.
I do not care if someone wants to use the Old Calendar, any more than I care if a priest who follows another tradition of Orthodoxy wears red vestments on a feast when I would wear gold vestments according to my Antiochian tradition. I have noticed that sometimes the Russian Menaion commemorates a Saint on a different day than the Greek style Menaion that I use. It does not make any difference. I do not think that the Russians are heretics because their Menaion differs slightly from the Menaion that I use. The whole calendar issue is not worth a fight. It is certainly not worth a schism.
Many comments here go off the subject, so I will do like wise.I have something to say. 3 major relationships, God to man, man to man, and man’s spiritual nature to his physical nature. These are the totality of all men. They are kept whole, Holy, by not tempting God, man to man is kept Holy ,by loving God and serving Him alone, man’s 2 fold nature is made Holy by living by the Word of God and by bread. These 3 are made desolate by 3 abominations, starting with the mother of harlots and abominations of the earth. This process ends in the abomination of desolation. The great whore, beast and dragon make desolate all 3 relationships, thus there is nothing left to destroy and is the worst thing that can happen to a man. The Holy Place is where the Holy Fire is received. Carnal physicality remains in the desolate and it is upon these, who have received the mark of the beast that God’ wrath is poured out upon. This is what The Christ and Daniel were referring to, and it is accurate and the correct definition of these symbols in the Revelation, in Divine simplicity.Jet the reader understand.
Well we can thank the Evangelical Protestants for “personalizing” Christ. They have been really good at putting up a saccharin front, when it comes to Christianity. It’s no wonder the media doesn’t’ take it seriously.
Please explain.
Unfortunately Protestantism is the face of Christianity in the West. One merely has to look at how some Protestants have feminized Christ while others treat him like a personal friend. They have completely lost perspective as to who Christ is and it is no surprise that they no longer worship him in truth. With these conflicting and silly images it is no wonder the media does not take Christianity seriously. The Muslims, on the other hand project a seriousness that cannot be ignored.
One other point. I think Stein is making too much of this. Mohammed is a very common name, consider for example the current Egyptian president, so if a Mohammed is being insulted there is a certain amount of potential ambiguity.
The problem with Protestantism, especially the feel good Evangelicalism of “What a friend we have in Jesus…” is that they lack Orthodox Christology. Most of them are really Nestorians who do not understand or emphasize the Incarnation. This is partialy due to Calvin, who despite his profession of allegiance to Chalcedon, was really a Nestorian because he denied the deification of the human nature of Christ. This is also partially do to the Protestant legalistic view of salvation that sees salvation as basically forgiveness of sins because Christ died on the Cross to appease an angry God so that they can get into heaven. Because of their Romaphobia they are offended by the doctrine that Mary is the Theotokos. For that reason, they do not understand the importance of the belief that from the moment of His conception Christ is God who became man, or the concept outlined by St. Athanasius that God became man so that man could become God. They do not have the Holy Fathers and the Ecumenical Councils to explain the meaning of the Incarnation to them. Unfortunately, because of their weak Christology they do not understand that there is much more to salvation than the forgiveness of sins, there is theosis. After all, most Evangelicals believe that all they have to do to be saved is come forward while they sing another verse of “Just as I am…” After that they have their ticket to heaven and think that is all they need.
That is a very interesting analysis of Evangelicalism, Fr John.
You have surely made a valid point about Calvin’s Christology.
But still I think you lack some charity in your final judgment. Many Evangelicals are fine Christians within the limits of their understanding,despite not being Orthodox; “ticket to heaven” or “easy believism” hardly defines their religiosity.The small but significant number who have made their way to Orthodoxy in spite of the many obstacles we have placed in their way surely confirms this. There is surely an important difference to be noted between heresiarchs and their unwitting, relatively innocent devotees, no?
My comments were about the theology of Evangelicalism not the commitment to Christ of individual Evangelicals. I know that there are many Evangelicals who are serving Christ to the best of their ability and are sincere dedicated Christians. However, the shallow theology of Evangelicalism has also produced such harmful beliefs as the Baptist doctrine of once saved always saved which comes from Calvinism’s perseverance of the saints. This has produced has millions of nominal Christians who sincerely believe that because they went forward once during a revival that their salvation is assured no matter how they live their life.
Or, tormented because one was not sure that one had been saved enough so it was back to the Altar Call over, and over again. It was painful to watch in my Protestant days as that happened to my friend.
hmm! You leave me kind of baffled about this” personal friend” bit. It seems that all through the Biblical story God has been pretty personal, one on one, starting with Adam and Eve. God got pretty personal with Abraham, Sarah, David, Joseph, the judges, all the prophets and I am just hopping and skipping. We have a personal God calling Mary, the disciples and etc. And the famous verse in Revelation, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hear my voice and open the door, I will come into him and dine with him, and he with me. Rev 3:16.
History seems to reveal to me a God who is personally interested in his creation and interacts with it. Yes, he allows us to do some pretty awful things to each other but given the opportunity he always redeems these situations.
For a long time I believed in an impersonal God, and then one night all that changed.
Try spending some time with so called “Evengelicals” in your area. Take a trip to their “Bible Bookstors” and you will see what I mean. If you still don’t see it then I suggest studying the Faith and reading the Church Fathers.
Jeff, communing with a God who is person and because of that we are persons is quite different than believing in Jesus as just another guy down the street separating Jesus from the Holy Trinity in the process, weakening the impact of the Incarnation and making salvation essentially meaningless.
Mr. Stein forgot to mention the ubiquitous reference to the “holy month of Ramadan.” And let us not forget to refer to the holy cities of Mecca and Medina . . .
American elites have become spineless, unprincipled cowards, and the American people have let them, showing themselves to be the same. Such is true of the West in general. The sons of Greece, of Rome, of the Celts and of the Germanic tribes — they have become ugly, weak geldings. We deserve our fate. The shame!
For those historically knowledgeable, did a nation ever choose dhimmitude before Mohammedan conquest? When it was still stronger than the invaders?
I don’t think it is entirely a matter of fear. Islam is essentially facist as is the American Political and journalistic elite. They don’t note that if Islam and Sharia law rule, they will be the first one’s beheaded while sincere and faithful Christians will at least be tolerated for a while as we remain dhimmi.
Unfortunately,Joseph,I have to agree with you.
Fr. Andrei: Elsewhere (I can’t locate it just now!) you asked if I were the former Fr. Alexey you met back in the 80’s, and the answer is, yes, I am, and would be very happy to have contact with you again. My dear matushka died 16 years ago, and 12 years ago I entered monastic life. –Fr. A
Persia. Though it could be argued that they gave up because the Byzantine Empire had already taken all the fight out of them.
The early Islamic conquests were aided and abetted by Orthodox Chrisitans and Oriental Orthodox who so disliked the Constantioplian rule that they thought they’d be better off under Islam. For a while, they were.
quite right! Even the taxes occasioned by being in the bogeyman state of “dhimmitude” ( main buzzword of every bigot ever born who read Bernard Lewis’s stuff) were in many cases less than the taxes of “Christian, that is, often heretical, Constantinople. The newly empowered nomads were desperate for a support network of civil servants, financiers, bankers, doctors, lawyers, etc., and the Orthodox and the Melkites and the Jacobites and the Nestorians and the Armenians and the Jews and the Copts all rushed to provide those services. When Napoleon invaded Egypt he found every money-making enterprise there in the hands of Copts, Greeks, Melkites and Jews. The Turks too, originally drafted all kinds of Christians and Jews into the civil service and th financial/commercial sector. And, of course, the Jewish community in Iran is thousands of years old and they prosper even in the Islamic Republic of Iran, as do the 300+ Armenian, Assyrian, Nestorian communitiess in that land. Tehran has thirteen synagogues with Hebrew schools attached, as well as kosher rsstaurants where wine made by Jews or Armenians may be imbibed. They have official representation in parliament (the Majles) as do the Christians.
Still, your Grace, is it not true that the restrictions put on Chrisitans under Islamic have been like a loose noose that has gradually strangled the Church? Call it what you will, even in America we still feel the effects of it, IMO.
No, not really, Michael. The Orthodox Church in the Middle East didn’t really begin to be strangled until the fall of the (Islamic) Turkish Sultanate and its replacement by various european client states and the atheist Turkish republic, which resulted in a great diminishing of the power and size of the Orthodox population and the closing of churches monasteries, and a seminary that had been around practically since the conquest of Constantinople. Even today, you may find rather nostalgic remarks about the days of the Sultanate in Greek periodicals, such as that of the Archons. It was not MOSLIMS that closed the seminary at Halki, but non-Muslims, who also prohibit clergy training schools for mullahs in Turkey.
The poverty of today’s Greek Orthodox presence in the Middle East may, to a certain extent, be traced to the fall of the Ottoman empire. While the post of Patriarch was a dangerous one, it was also incredibly remunerative, even MORE than it is today. The more dictatorial control the Patriarchs could exert over their millet, the more favored they were. “Phanariote” even today, has a very pejorative connotation amongst the Orthodox but not Greek denizens of the Balkan lands, because they were the rigid and fierce tax-collectors for the Sultan, who came from the Phanar.
Of course you’re correct, Your Grace. However the picture is not a very flattering one. It seems that we Chrsitians have only two choices in the Islamic world: extinction or phyletism.
Your Grace:
I have a parish filled with people whose ancestors would not agree with you. Their ancestors came to America around 1900 long before Ataturk to get away from Muslim and Turkish persecution.
“Filled with people” whose ancestors, etc?
So you have mostly 3rd generation Arab-Americans in your parish? Any room for converts, or do they stand outside when your church is “filled” with the “natural” Orthodox? Without documentation though, or the assurance from you that you have verified this announcement with all those people whose ancestors came to America around 1900, I’ll have to treat your claim with extreme skepticism. I’d be willing to be that a lot left the territories of the Ottoman Empire because they heard there were great ECONOMIC opportunities in the U.S.A. But I’m keeping an open mind and will rely on your verifiable statistics when I get them.
Your Grace, I’d say that in the main you’re correct, that growing economic hopes made it easier for indigenous Orthodox Christians to leave the Levant, but one cannot forget that there was always tension between the Christians and their Muslim overlords. This very often spilled over into bloodshed.
Your Grace:
We have many converts as well as Russians, and Greeks in my parish. The persecution of Orthodox Christians in the Middle East did not begin with Ataturk, besides after the end of the First World War, the Turks no longer ruled Lebanon, therefore Ataturk had no impact on the Orthodox Christians in Lebanon and Syria. The Greeks suffered from the Turkish nationalism of Ataturk, such as the massacre of the Greeks in Smyrna. Christians in the Ottoman Empire were indeed persecuted by the Muslim Turks. Have you ever heard of the Janissary Corps? it was the elite branch of the Turkish army which was made up exclusively of the sons of Christians who had been taken by force from their families. The Young Turks persecuted non Turks, including Arabic speaking Orthodox Christians long before Ataturk. Before Ataturk, thousands of Christians in Lebanon starved to death during the First World War because the Turks took food from the Christians to feed their troops. In 1860 thousands of Christians were killed including St. Joseph of Damascus during anti-Christian riots by Druze and Muslims in Lebanon and Syria. A Christian in the Ottoman Empire had to pay the jizya the tribute tax paid by Christians to their Muslim overlord and live under a form of Sheria law. Christians lived on the edge, never knowing if some unintended insult could result in a Muslim anti-Chrisitan riot. Despite political correctness, Islam is a religion of violance and hatred towards non-Muslims.
I’m glad that Archpriest John W. Morris has dropped those claims about his parishioners. Now he gives us the wisdom of the day. No one denied that “the Greeks suffered from the Turkish nationalism of Ataturk, such as the massacre of Greeks at Smyrna. There was a war of Greek Independence, remember? No one denies the existence of Janissaries or their origin. I’m glad he dropped his stories about the pre-Ataturk ancestors of his parishioners with which his church is “filled’, throwing up a smoke-screen to get past them.
Morris writes: “Before Ataturk, thousands of Christians in Lebanon starved to death during the First World War because the Turks took food from the Christians to feed their troops. In 1860 thousands of Christians were killed including St. Joseph of Damascus during anti-Christian riots by Druze and Muslims in Lebanon and Syria.”
Yes, the Ottomans stopped the rioting of the Druzes, who ARE Muslims, against the rich, DOMINANT and DOMINATING Maronites and others. The Law of 1861 required the Ottoman Sultan to appoint a Christian governor of Lebanon as a result, and the “dhimmi” Maronites, Melkites, and less significant Greek Orthodox, continued to prosper until the outbreak of WWI, resulting in suffering by ALL the peoples of Lebanon who had to provide provisions for the Turkish Army which was defending the land against Europeans. The Muslims alllowed the Christians to prosper BECAUSE of the tax: the more they made, the more the Sultan got. That’s how so many Armenian, Maronite, Melkite, Coptic and Greek Orthodox fortunes were accumulated, in Egypt, the Levant, Mesopotamia and Turkey.. It’s why the Ottoman Sultan invited the Jews, fleeing the Christians of Spain, to settle all over his Empire. Fleeing the contemporary equivalent of the Holocaust, those Sephardic Jews were INVITED under Islamic protection. No one gave any Sultan an opportunity to invite ANYONE after WWII-the spiritual European descendants of the Christians of Spain simply used a kind of “eminent domain” to create Lebensraum for the Jews of Europe on the lands of the Arabs, without any regard WHATSOEVER to their being Muslim or Christian. The martyrdom of St. Joseph was an act against the Shariah and against the Sultanate.
Your Grace:
One reason that the Lebanese came to America for economic opportunity was due to their status as subject people (Dhimmi) under Muslim domination in the Ottoman Empire. Some Lebanese might have done well, but many did not and were impoverished by the Muslim domination that treated them as subject people with few civil rights. The Lebanese were never under Ataturk because the French took over Lebanon and Syria after the First World War. The Greeks Revolution was in 1821. Ask the Greeks about how they suffered under Ottoman domination.
The British got was was then called Transjordan and helped create the mess in the Middle East by their mismanagement of Palestine that allowed the Zionists to eventually establish the state of Israel.
The main economic reason for emigrating here was the huge growth before WWI, almost an explosion, in the size of the Christian communities in Lebanon (and Syria and elsewhere).
I believe that “dhimmi” means protected people, rather than “subject” people, although they were subjects of the Sultan, Caliph or other Muslim ruler. As protected people, they were subject to a special tax. They were the main people with ANY cash in the early days of Islamic expansion. To have taxed the Muslims would have required them to completely change their way of life. As for the conquered Christians on the territories formerly Byzantine, the taxes compared favorably with those they’d had to pay the Byzantines, and if they were heretics, this was no longer a cause for special persecution or hardship under Islam.
Mr. Stein forgot to mention the ubiquitous reference to the “holy month of Ramadan.” And let us not forget to refer to the holy cities of Mecca and Medina . . .
American elites have become spineless, unprincipled cowards, and the American people have let them, showing themselves to be the same. Such is true of the West in general. The sons of Greece, of Rome, of the Celts and of the Germanic tribes — they have become ugly, weak geldings. We deserve our fate. The shame!
For those historically knowledgeable, did a nation ever choose dhimmitude before Mohammedan conquest? When it was still stronger than the invaders?
I don’t know how to answer you question, but I am reading Sinclair Lewis It Can’t Happen Here. I tried to read it as a teenager, but didn’t appreciate it. Now at 69 and watching what is happening to our country, because of the spinelessness, etc., I get it. It is both prophetic and very scary. Hope you can find a copy. Everyone needs to face this monster. If we don’t, our fate is assured.
Joseph A. says (September 26, 2012 at 11:35 pm):
Mr. Stein forgot to mention the ubiquitous reference to the “holy month of Ramadan.” And let us not forget to refer to the holy cities of Mecca and Medina . . .
American elites have become spineless, unprincipled cowards, and the American people have let them, showing themselves to be the same. Such is true of the West in general. The sons of Greece, of Rome, of the Celts and of the Germanic tribes — they have become ugly, weak geldings. We deserve our fate. The shame!
For those historically knowledgeable, did a nation ever choose dhimmitude before Mohammedan conquest? When it was still stronger than the invaders?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
While not picking on this correspondent in particular, I’m left with the impression that Ben Stein and many of us, too, are overreacting. Main-stream media (MSM) are notoriously ignorant of the niceties and details of religious expression, so it might be better to write a letter to the editor/producer rather than just barnstorm the whole industry.
I admit that it would be nice for the name of ‘Jesus Christ’ to appear with some respectful titles. A few Hindu guys I worked with before entering the monastery (this was in the mid 1970s) would occasionally ask me questions about my faith. They always spoke of ‘the Lord Jesus Christ’, which I deeply appreciated. They spoke this way not out of their faith, but out of respect for mine.
There are many places in our own scriptures where ‘Jesus’ appears with no more formality than ‘Mary’ or ‘Peter’, and no one thinks that this is disrespectful.
It’s also true, though, that christian boys are not named ‘Jesus’. What appears to be ‘Jesus’ in Spanish is actually ‘Joshuah’; this is true in many other languages as well. But Muslims are very fond of naming boys ‘Muhammad’.
As a result, in any given muslim-related context, the name may occur several times, and adding the designation ‘prophet’ doesn’t imply anything about the faith of the writer or speaker; it may be merely a clarification. Muslim sources, though, are much more likely to add ‘Peace be upon him!’ after mentioning their prophet’s name.
I’m still impressed by the courtesy of my hindu colleagues, and I recommend that we follow their example, remaining faithful to Christ but not insulting the faith of other people who haven’t been as blessed as we, poor sinners that we are, to know Him and His love for all mankind.
Hey, Joseph A!! He also forgot to mention the Holy See, in Rome and Etchmiadzin! And Holy Lhasa (sp?) , and the frequent mention in the press of His Holiness, the Dalai Lama!
Much ado about NOTHING! But it does give encouragement to the friends of the President that his opponents have to reach that FAR for a lifeline!
This is rich! It’s like the complaint that the President wears a ring with the basic confession of faith of Islam on it, which must be read via an electronic microscope!
But no one has actually checked Mitt Romney’s ‘temple garment” (mandatory Mormon longjohns) to see if he has the correct Mormon symbols sewn into it and not some cultic or heretical alternatives. Perhaps he should show it, in order to prove he’s not a member of a deviant mormon group with a three-pointed compass or the like!
No NATION ever chose that bogeyman “dhimmitude”. And no one at all chose it until it became a possibility, that is, until militant Islam showed a way to get out from under the Byzantine taxes and persecution of heretics.
Many media people have read Bernard Lewis’s orientalist writings and like to wield the word ‘dhimmitude” like some kind of talisman indicating some deep understanding of islam and the Middle East. Dhimmitude, literally the state of being a protected minority, was welcomed by many Syrians, Egyptians and other non-Greek people under the Byzantine thumb. Some villages, in this, resembled the Ukrainian villages that welcomed the invading German armies when German attacked the USSR.
Many of those peoples today are unclear about America’s intentions in their homelands. Many think we are making war on Islam… They scare their children with the word “crusade’ just like some us use the word “dhimmitude.” They point at iraq and say, ‘See that? Those Iraqis and Afghans said, “It can’t happen here!”
Joseph A. wrote this: “American elites have become spineless, unprincipled cowards, and the American people have let them, showing themselves to be the same.”
Who wrote that originally, Benjamin Netanyahu? Some hack belonging to AIPAC?
No, Joseph, the American people have NOT shown themselves to be spineless unprincipled cowards. You are sadly mistaken, or perhaps viciously lying.
We are not spineless, unprincipled cowards, although those, as foreigners, who urinated on the corpses of the dead young soldiers of a land which we invaded, and took pictures, might be considered to be such.
Your Grace, what does Netanyahu have to do with that? Americans by and large have become spineless cowards. We’ve given away our freedoms left and right for decades now.
I’m sorry, but I do not agree that Americans are spineless cowards. I’m a life member of the Association of the U.S. Army, of the Reserve Officers Association, the American Legion, and the Democratic Party. Every issue of the Army Times for years has carried postage-stamp-size photos of our servicemen who have perished in occupied Iraq and occupied Afghanistan.
In my opinion, for what it’s worth, you are just defecating, ala Westbro Baptists all over them.
Go tell the Taliban that we are spineless cowards! Go tell our men and women in uniform that they and their families and friends have given away our freedoms “left and right for decades now!”
For every cowardly George W. Bush who wriggled his way out of being put in harm’s way, even though he was a cheerleader at Amherst, there are tens of thousands of Americans willing to lay down their lives for this land AS IT IS (and not for some comic-book nostalgia for the mythical republic of the ‘Founding Fathers’). That’s it. I quit. I don’t see Vladyka Dmitri agreeing with you on that either.
By the way, Metropolitan Jonah RESIGNED. I assume he is a man. I assume his yea is yea, and his nay is nay. I do not assume he is a weak reed, blown back and forth by the wind. Metropolitan Jonah resigned, and he did little or nothing to correct what the PEOPLE who voted for him but did not elect him expected him to do. It’s not that he hasn’t said so many of the right things to the right people—he HAS. But it’s like they used to say about Metropolitan Theodosius: just change the name, like this “A long, EMPTY limo pulled up to the curb, the door opened, and Metropolitan Jonah got out.” The fact that he was treated like a dog by what appeared to be ethical morons does not alter that.
Your Grace, like my late father-in-law, you are a member of the Greatest Generation. We Boomers unfortunately, are not made of sterner stuff.
George, credit only where credit is due.
Since he is the same age as myself, I know that BT did not reach military draft/enlistment eligibility age until the very early 50s.
That means that neither of us are part of the Greatest Generation.
But it also means we are not Baby Boomers.
I don’t know about BT, but I, because of the time of my active military service, consider myself to be part of what is called the Forgotten [Korean War] Generation.
And the TV show “Mash” owes us a great apology.
Indeed it does. I’m a Boomer and I say that with no great deal of accomplishment.
Mr. Stein forgot to mention the AWFUL references to the “HOLY Rollers” throughout modern American history, in text books, fiction, and the media!!!! How COULD they? Now we see that this kind of weakness and cowardice is the ONLY reason that America is not backing Israel as much as it should! If only we weren’t so weak and cowardly, say the backers of the AIPAC, WE would CRUSH Iran with our military might and ask Israel to join us in crushing those vermin! Yes, Mr. Stein and Associates, you’ve just got to show America that if we do not support poor, noble, Israel more, militarily and diplomatically and commercially, it is because Americans are weak and cowardly. Right.
This reminds of of Robert Ferrigno’s novels, the “Assassin” series, a slightly paranoid Islamotopic-future trilogy set in a future America divided between an Islamic Republic (Blue States) and “The Belt”… I think there is a taint in our culture which has always thought of Islam as ‘cool’ – cooler by far than gushy Jesus stuff. I kid not. This tendency to project Islam as ‘reasonable’ and ‘rational’ goes back at least as far a Gibbons. It has nothing to do with the current president. Bush was a sucker for Islam, they all are these days. It is indeed spooky that people are responding to the bully mullah by cringing. It’s not supposed to work this way – not without an actual cudgel – whereas we Americans and Europeans are in no way palpably threatened by the tiny minority of muslims in our midst. I think this putative acquiescence is an artifact of media addiction. I just can’t see New Yawkers and Angelenos kowtowing. Sorry.
Pere, excellent analysis. There is indeed somethig “cool” about Islam for deracinated former Protestants who have no ethnic identity or religion. I hope you’re right in that last sentence. I think we’re too far gone though, especially on the Coasts. Last month Rahm Emanuel said that the black neighborhoods of Chicago were so bad that they were going to have be turned over to the Nation of Islam. And Chicago is Midwest. Hizzoner is rolling in his grave.
I’d hardly call Cat Stevens a “deracinated former Protestant who has no ethnic identity or religion!!!!” Neither are Black Muslims without ethnic identity.
Nope -he’s Greek.
For another dystopian fascist novel, see Philip Dick’s “The Man in the High Tower”.
MOVIE TIME!
Father Victor Potopov sent a nice link:
Dear Brothers & Sisters,
I greet you all with the glorious feast of the Exaltation of the Cross!
Attached, in four parts, is a wonderful Russian film on St. John of Kronstadt with English subtitles. Enjoy this gift for the feast.
In XC,
Fr. Victor
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GQ4k-_yF70s&feature=relmfu
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6V939Fhsoc&feature=relmfu
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LEAgVAapv_4&feature=relmfu
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hPBxK8RDKxY&feature=plcp
English subtitles? Great! I’ll be posting this to my FB group as well (for those who are deaf/hoh).
Dear Lola,
I think all films should have multiple subtitling. For people learning new languages or reinforcing them it is useful, text could potentially be rendered into robotic voice so that the limited in sight and sightless could enjoy movies in other languages in addition to voice overs and, of course, limited hearing is enhanced with it. Sometimes, the distractibility of sound to the autistic makes viewing easier with subtitling as well. I’ve though that for foreign film, having more squarish television with the ability to layer two languages of subtitles at a time would also be useful. In fact, for limited sight, widescreen TVs and computer monitors are a real difficulty.
Jesus Christ (the Anointed One) is a title. If they referred to him as Jesus of Nazareth, that would be different.
I’m a Ben Stein fan, but I’ll need a little more evidence before I believe his premise. The MSM appears far more obeisant to Zionism than Islam.
I also am offended by the way the press bends over backwards to avoid saying anything that might offend a Muslim, especially referring to Mohammad as “The Prophet Mohammad.” However, the media has no such respect for Christians and traditional Christian teachings. The media does not hesitate to attack Christians who believe in traditional Christian morality, especially those who have not embraced gay liberation or women’s ordination as narrow minded bigots living according to the values of the Dark Ages. The media never loses an opportunity to belittle Christians. Look at all the publicity given to a professor at Harvard who has found a small piece of parchment written at least 300 years after Christ that could be interpreted to imply that Christ was married. If this fragment is authentic it only proves that at least one person, the writer, writing at least 300 years after Christ, believed that Christ was married and nothing more.
Unhappy Muslims – Totally Brilliant!
Totally Brilliant, how come they don’t see
this? What can be done about it?
I have to admit, this is brilliant…never
heard it put this way…so succinct and to the
point…plain and simple!!!
THE MUSLIMS ARE NOT HAPPY!
They’re not happy in Gaza ..
They’re not happy in Egypt ..
They’re not happy in Libya ..
They’re not happy in Morocco ..
They’re not happy in Iran ..
They’re not happy in Iraq ..
They’re not happy in Yemen ..
They’re not happy in Afghanistan ..
They’re not happy in Pakistan ..
They’re not happy in Syria ..
They’re not happy in Lebanon ..
SO, WHERE ARE THEY HAPPY?
They’re happy in Australia .
They’re happy in Canada .
They’re happy in England ..
They’re happy in France ..
They’re happy in Italy ..
They’re happy in Germany ..
They’re happy in Sweden ..
They’re happy in the USA ..
They’re happy in Norway ..
They’re happy in Holland .
They’re happy in Denmark .
Basically, they’re happy in every country that
is not Muslim and unhappy in every country that is!
AND WHO DO THEY BLAME?
Not Islam.
Not their leadership.
Not themselves.
THEY BLAME THE COUNTRIES THEY ARE HAPPY IN!
AND THEN; They want to change those countries
to be like….
THE COUNTRY THEY CAME FROM WHERE THEY WERE
UNHAPPY!
Excuse me, but I can’t help wondering…
How dumb can you get?
Yes, children are happy everywhere. A lot of Americans are depressed and/or hedonistic. Sufi Muslims are happy wherever they are. Some Muslims who migrated to the West are happy, some are not. A human being is more likely to be arrested and imprisoned in American than almost any other country in the world, including the Muslim countries.
You say Muslims are happy n the U.S., etc., but “blame” the U.S. What do they blame them for, unhappiness?
The I.Q. of that post is not very high.
True, even Eusebius church history doesn’t refer to Jesus being married. Its probably one of the Gnostic writings True, the modern left thinking would complain about Byzantines cutting noses for committing adultery but Muslims stoning someone for adultery that’s a religious and culture thing.
Well, Evangelicals are weak on arguments since they refer to the bible only too much. A conservative Roman Catholic is much better. I read a Roman Catholic argument on abortion and they even use Philo and Josephus that even Jews in the first century thought abortion was wrong,never heard of that before.
The article below adds a second warning shot to Ben’s Stein’s.
From Radical Islam.org’s Ryan Mauro:
The United Muslim Christian Forum, a friendly-sounding “interfaith” group issued a press release on September 18 demanding the prosecution of the makers of the low-quality Innocence of Muslims film that appeared on YouTube. The Islamist agenda of the group is in written form but if the past is any indication, that won’t stop elected officials and Christian leaders from embracing it in order to prove their tolerance.
The United Muslim Christian Forum (UMCF) is an entity of the Muslims of the Americas, whose members follow a cleric in Pakistan named Sheikh Mubarak Ali Gilani that refers to Osama Bin Laden as a “Saudi activist.” The group says it has 22 “villages” across the country, such as “Islamberg” in Hanock, N.Y. and “Islamville” in York County, S.C.
Gilani also leads Jamaat ul-Fuqra, a group that the State Department said in 1998 is an “Islamic sect that seeks to purify Islam through violence.” In 2009, I obtained a video of Muslim women receiving guerilla warfare training, complete in military fatigue, at “Islamberg.” This should raise questions about the purpose of Islamberg’s 24th Annual Ladies Summer Camp in July 2011.
The UMCF press release claims that the film is part of a conspiracy involving “media terrorism” to cause war between Muslims and Christians and its content should not be protected as free speech. It quotes an unidentified citizen as saying it is “barbarous treason.”
“Therefore we demand immediate action by the appropriate government agencies to stop this film and bring its perpetrators to justice for this malicious hate speech,” it says.
Anti-Semitism is at the core of UMCF’s drive to forge a Muslim-Christian coalition. Its website states that the 9/11 attacks were “Stage One of getting the Western World, on behalf of the Jews, to go to war with the Arab world.” Gilani says “Jews are an example of human Satans” and that he’s never encountered an honest Jew.
A number of officials and Christian leaders have embraced the UMCF even though this extremism can be easily found with a simple Google search or review of the group’s website. A photo of Binghamton Mayor Matthew T. Ryan standing with the UMCF sign is on the home page of the website to this day.
The most recent event held by the UMCF was on April 21 at Winthrop University in Rock Hill, S.C. The two Christian speakers were Reverend Sam McGregor of Allison Creek Church and a missionary named Ryan Peters. The UMCF’s main speaker was Khalifa Hussein Adams and the text of his speech is online.
“[Jesus] is a role model for the Sufis, as opposed to the Jews who deprived him of the honor of being born to a Blessed virgin mother. They also conspired to take his life. He was called the son of an illegitimate birth while his mother was termed a woman of ill repute. Perhaps you are well aware of the fact that the Jews brought false allegations of sedition and rebellion against Jesus son of Mary to their Roman masters. Because of this, they say he was crucified,” Adams said.
Adams claims that UMCF’s goal isn’t to convert Christians to Islam, but the text of his speech tells a different story. He says that anyone who believes that Jesus was crucified “must also believe that these Roman and priests were more powerful than God…[and] be prepared to disbelieve in Almighty God, His power and Jesus son of Mary.”
He also made the unbelievable statement that “no Muslim, which you may refer to as an orthodox Muslim, has ever been charged with any act of terrorism within or outside of the United States of America.” He condemned the Muslim Brotherhood and said all terrorist acts are done at the hands of Wahhabists and Shiites who aren’t real Muslims. He said that the members of Muslims of the Americas are the only ones that truly follow Islam.
I heard a similar theme when I attended a UMCF event on April 16, 2011 in Owego, N.Y. One of the speakers was the city’s mayor at that time, Edward Arrington, who is also the chairman of the Deacon Board at the First Baptist Church of Owego. Father Timothy Taugher of Blessed Sacrament Church in Johnson City and Professor Diane O’Heron of Brome Community College, a UMCF board member, also spoke.
The keynote speaker was Muhammad Ali Qadiri, the “mayor” of the Muslims of the Americas site in Red House, V.A. He preached that the U.S. may be destroyed by Allah over Pastor Terry Jones’ burning of the Quran. When I confronted him about his group’s anti-Semitism, he said, “We are trying not to get into the bashing business anymore” but they stand by their statements. His reaction to Gilani’s anti-Semitism was, “it is what it is.” His answer to a question about gunfire being heard at his group’s “villages” was, “What is wrong with shooting your gun in the United States of America?”
The UMCF also held a parade in Binghamton to honor Jesus Christ. According to a local news report, 700 Muslims and Christians attended, with Muslims of the Americas members traveling from as far away as Canada and the Caribbean. An advertisement for the event told attendees not to wear “military-style clothing.”
Advocacy for blasphemy laws and anti-Semitism isn’t what a genuine “interfaith” group is about. The UMCF was created for the sole purpose of making over the image of Muslims of the Americas. The press release and speech at Winthrop University show that the goal is unchanged: To promote the anti-Semitic Islamist ideology of Muslims of the Americas and Sheikh Gilani.
Well,I know one group that peferred islam over the byzantines,the paulicans and they fought a lot for the caliphates. That still doesn’t reflect modern Islamic states.
Where the Byzantines tax land that’s why taxation was higher but it also depended upon the emperor granting arrears some like Tiberius 2nd did and others didn’t that much. Tiberius the 2nd that ruled in the century before Islam is kind of a George W Bush lower taxes but heavily miltitary expeditures.
Well, I Disagee with you George, a lot of older babyboomers served in Vietnam which was more unpopular than wwii and korea. The silent generation is more conserative than the greatest generation they are the Korean Vets.The babyboomers in Vietman were not treated like heros like World War when they came home. Korean vets were ignored until recently.