The pope & the president.

I have to agree with you, it does play on the lack of education of people. But not just Muslims. I've heard Americans that say that all Muslims are bad and we should essentially crusade against them. Such broad views cannot be effectively held up by such narrow foundations.

There are a lot more good, wise Muslims than the fanatics of the ultra-conservative, fundementalist Muslims. Theya ctually make up about 13% of the total Muslim population of the world.

It's a shame that the popular media only reports the negative stories It is hard to get a truly balanced view of current events without a lot of research on your own

Unfortunately, we have to admit to the truth. Truth is Mohammed did call on Muslims to spread Islam by the sword, by Jihad. Truth is Mohammed did say that anyone who does not believe in Allah is an infidel. Truth is most Muslims support Jihad.

The Catholic Church has made earth shaking changes in the past 50 years. Why can't we expect Muslims to do likewise if they want our respect?

As presently stands, we cannot accept their latest push to convert the entire world to Islam. To stop them we will have to go to war against them as we did before several times.

Best regards, Ben
Author "Leading People to be Highly Motivated and Committed"

Ben, you're right again.

Mary, I heard someone on TV say the other day that people in New York don't complain about the Mafia because of probable repercussions to their families, and the speaker implied that it was the same reason why moderate Moslems don't speak out against the radicals. I can understand it.

Ben, I can't say that the Catholic Church has earned my respect with the "changes" its made either (certainly not earth shaking). Religion is a stubborn entity. Change is slow and small, at best. It's pretty obvious that the faithful of any religion have more direct and meaningful impact than any religious organization. After all, if moderate Muslims really felt that the rest of us really ought to be killed, we'd have a pretty impressive civil war on our hands right now. They make clear their choice by leaving the nutjobs behind.

Obviously none of you have read the Old Testament, one of the most violent books you could possibly read. Fundamentalist Christians of course choose to accept this as truth and believe every word in it despite it's violence. Pat Robertson and his kind get away with the sort of things he should be locked up for and yet he gets away with it.

Gee, Brian, I must live somewhere different than you do. Nobody around here has 300 wives or 700 concubines.... And none of the fundamentalist Christians I know go out and torture and kill civilians nor fly commercial aircraft into occupied buildings. Maybe I'm just not paying close attention....

So many of you are missing the point. It's not Muslims in general that are the problem. If it weren't for the fact that a few (say maybe hundreds out of millions) of Muslims do actively commit murder on 'infidels', I'd say statistically Muslims are harmless. The problem is not the religion, but the way tyrants use the religion to manipulate those who have little else to hang on to. Our own goverment is guilty for contributing to it by contributing to war in Afghanistan, a country that was once quite moderate. Now, it's a place where those who once had freedoms (such as women) now have no freedom at all (how's that for spreading Democracy?). In those situations, hope is gone. People with no hope and little education can only believe what those in power tell them to do. Those in power gain more power by using and twisting what little these people have--faith. See David Koresh. While what happened to the Branch Davidians was wrong, you can't deny that David Koresh used Christianity, the people he led and their hopelessness to lead them towards their deaths. Who knows, with the weaponry that the Davidian complex had, whether they'd have tried to kill non-believers as well.

Wow Fletcher, I had forgotten that acts of terror began with 9/11 and that Christians have never did anything bad since its foundation. Maybe you should read about the Crusades, the Spanish conquest of South America, the imperialist expansion by nominally Christian countries: Portugal, Spain, the Netherlands, Britain from the 17th to the 19th century. Oh and dont forget that Christian countries initiated the First and Second World Wars. Oh and there have been plenty of "terrorist" groups who have been Christians but were not defined by their religion. The pro-lifers who bomb abortion clinics and kill doctors, are their actions not acts of terrorism? Are they not nominally Christians?

Heres something for you to read:

http://www.muhajabah.com/otherscondemn.php

This is from one of the articles:

STATEMENT REJECTING TERRORISM

As American Muslims and scholars of Islam, we wish to restate our conviction that peace and justice constitute the basic principles of the Muslim faith. We wish again to state unequivocally that neither the al-Qaeda organization nor Usama bin Laden represents Islam or reflects Muslim beliefs and practice. Rather, groups like al-Qaeda have misused and abused Islam in order to fit their own radical and indeed anti-Islamic agenda. Usama bin Laden and al-Qaeda's actions are criminal, misguided and counter to the true teachings of Islam. We call on people of all faiths not to judge Islam by the actions of a few.

No, Brian, you and I both know that terrorism didn't begin with 9/11. But my own personal terrorism awareness only stretches back a generation or so to include the Munich Olympics. Since that time, I know of nothing my fundamentalist friends and neighbors have done that would compare.

Well if you want to narrow it down to your fundamentalist friends neighbours, its pretty difficulty for me to comment. As for the global condemnation of Islam, thats just offensive.

I'm with you, Brian. Such broad generalizations (e.g., all Muslims are bad) are indicative of a small mind.

We're agreed on blanket condemnations.