“If we’re going to have a real discussion about the place of public religion in our public spectacles, then let’s have one instead of some mushy, Wonder Bread platitudes about how great it is that Tim Tebow talks about Jesus and doesn’t get caught doing strippers two at a time in the hot tub. If religion comes into the public square, it is as vulnerable as any other human institution to be pelted with produce. Ignorance does not become wisdom just because you gussy it up with the Gospels. If we keep faith with those American values, then we might just let him off the hook enough to see if he simply can become a better quarterback than Andy Dalton.”
“There is always something a little nauseating in large spectacles of conspicuous public piety, but watching everyone on the field take a knee before the Penn State-Nebraska game, and listening to the commentary about how devoutly everybody was praying for the victims at Penn State, was enough to get me reaching for a bucket and a Bible all at once. It was as though the players and coaches had devised some sort of new training regimen to get past the awful reality of what had happened. Prayer as a new form of two-a-days. Jesus is my strength coach. Contrition in the context of a football game seemed almost obscene in its obvious vanity.”
“(There may) be occasions when Christians are mistaken on some point while nonbelievers get it right. Nevertheless, the overall systems of thought constructed by nonbelievers will be false—for if the system is not built on Biblical truth, then it will be built on some other ultimate principle.”
Nancy Pearcey, “Total Truth: Liberating Christianity from Its Cultural Captivity”
This quote, found in Ryan Lizza’s fascinating and frightening New Yorker profile of Michele Bachmann, is one of the most succinct explanations I’ve ever seen of why, despite all evidence to the contrary, many fundamentalists refuse to believe in evolution: it is based upon the wrong principle.
Perhaps an explanation that Darwin was a devout Catholic could help? Somehow I doubt it; it’s hard to see how anyone could penetrate such circular logic.
(via jron)Fareed Zakaria speaks with Sharif El-Gamal, the real estate developer who came up with the idea of the “Ground Zero mosque”:
Fareed Zakaria: When did you realize that this was turning into a controversy? What was the first inkling?
Sharif El-Gamal: Well, in May of last year, we voluntarily at that point when we finished our road trip with all the local elected officials, decided voluntarily to go into the community board. And we went into the community board voluntarily and shared with them this idea of building a community center. And on that first meeting, 16 people voted unanimously in favor of this project and these are all non-Muslim people, and they were excited that Muslims were going to build a community center in Lower Manhattan to serve all – all New Yorkers and all of Lower Manhattan, which was the intention behind this project.
We then followed that up with another full board meeting of 50. And when we went into that room, you know, at that next community board meeting, I invited my wife down to come. And I got there a few minutes after her and she was just in tears. And when I saw her in tears, I said what happened? And she goes, Sharif, you’re not going to believe what’s going on in that room. The people thought that I came here to protest against the Muslims, because they didn’t realize that she was a Muslim because we don’t fit whatever stereotype people have of Muslims. And when -
Fareed Zakaria: What was going on in that room?
Sharif El-Gamal: When I walked into that room, there was close to 700 people that were protesting what we were doing, and for the first time in my life – I – I had never seen, I’d never been discriminated against. I’d never seen that hate or that fear or that ignorance. I mean, I’ve never seen anything like that before in my life, and I was – I was scared.
And at that point, we made a commitment – you know, personally, I made a commitment that I would do whatever it took as a – as a businessman, as a human being to make this project a reality.
And, you know, this past year for me has really been about listening, has really been about listening and – and going back to basics and trying to understand that – that there’s so much work ahead of us, that there’s so much misconceptions about who we are as Muslims, what our faith, what our practice, what our belief system is. Criminals have stolen our identity almost in a way, and they’ve defaced our – our faith.
Fareed Zakaria: So you got out – get out of that room with the 700 angry people. And at that point, it just snowballs and it gets latched on to by all kinds of political figures. Were you – were you prepared for that kind of an onslaught?
Sharif El-Gamal: No, no. I’m a New Yorker. This is my city, and all we wanted to do was we wanted to build a facility that is based on who we are as Muslims, as Americans to give back to our city, to create jobs, to create hundreds of construction jobs, to create hundreds of full-time jobs once the facility is open, to create over 500 part-time jobs. We were thinking of a way of revitalizing our neighborhood, creating, stimulating our economy, and providing services to our neighbors.
“Imagine a libertarian Christianity, which urged individuals to give away as much of their property as possible to the poor, to forget about the sex lives of their neighbors and focus on their own, to pray more than politic and to forgive more than to judge. Imagine, in other words, Christianity, and remind yourself how alien Christianism is to it.”
