This is indeed an American problem. It goes like that "Freedom of religion" , "separation of state and religion" but friendly to religion. Muslims under this frame have a legitimate right to claim they are discriminated if they are not portrayed as a religion with similar rights to other religions.
That is why the future of real secularism is France, or at least the old proud France which hopefully will stand back and defend what it has to be defended which is a secular public sphere. Religions to the private sphere . Sharia courts??? Just a folklorist value. Their laws are not compelling according to the law of the land. A public sphere free from religious ostentous symbols. In short 'laicite de combate'
France is defective in a lot of fields as anyone else. In this one, France is right
5
On the contrary - Islam represents all too well what religion has been mostly about throughout history: control of individuals by a self-appointed elite, intolerance, bigotry, and untold human suffering. Islam represents that faithfully. Let us not forget that Christianity shared those characteristics until recently, and that Christofascism is alive and well in the USA.
12
Individual Muslims in America on the receiving end of prejudice and unfair treatment should be fully protected by our society and our laws. Still, the author needs to answer an important question.
U.S. society has within it Hindus, Buddhists, Jains, Sikhs, Shintoists, and others . Occasionally some ignorant and violent person or small group does harass or attack some of them , but there's not a single instance of any large and vocal American group or Christian or Jewish leader calling for putting restrictions on their beliefs and practices-- although they are not part of the monotheistic tradition to which Judaism, Christianity, and Islam belong. Instead, Islam is treated with suspicion and hostility far more widely. Why is that so? Isn't the answer self-evident?
All the other faiths I mentioned respectfully adjust to the secular laws of Western societies as indeed they do everywhere. Violent condemnations and assaults on not only non-Muslims but also on those Muslims who dare to deviate from prevailing Islamic orthodoxies in predominantly Muslim states are the order of the day. In many such countries, the state itself often officially practices such intolerance. See Iraq, see Pakistan, see Iran, see Saudi Arabia, see Afghanistan.Even Indonesia with its largest Muslim society in the world is beginning to lose its centuries-old ethos of tolerance. I could go on, but let this much suffice for now.
7
Again, Muslims demand rights but don't recognize the rights of others. When will there be a fatwah against killing innocent gays (Orlando) or beating your wife? Islam does not recognize the rights of gays or women; why should we fight for rights for Muslims? Until Muslims publicly denounce gay bashing and women bashing, they are being hypocrites.
10
Too many Americans would deny Muslims the religious liberty they insist upon for Christians and there is a good reason! We have to watch our backs!
4
Of course, Islam, which means submission, is a religion.
History is clear on this.
Seven centuries after the death of Jesus ,Mohammad in present day Saudi Arabia, announced his new faith part of which included the teaching that he was the final prophet and that all previous prophets ( Jesus, Moses, Abraham, etc.) were also Muslims.
He initially attempted to convert the local Jews who said, Thank you but no thank you.
He then wrote in the Koran, speaking of Jews, (Worse is he) whom Allah has cursed and brought His wrath upon, and of whom He made apes and swine, (5:60)
Or just a few verses before this:
[5.51] O you who believe! do not take the Jews and the Christians for friends.
The Jews were still not convinced of the truth of his message and 1300 years later we have yet to change our mind.
Historical chronology is clear: the Torah and the Jewish path came before the teachings of Jesus which, in turn, came before the rise of Islam.
However, the fastest growing religion in the world and in America, Islam, teaches otherwise.
For example, Islam teaches that Mohammad, who had never travelled to Israel, went to heaven on a white horse from the center of the spot in Judaism in Jerusalem, the Holy Temple.
When the Muslims later occupied this site they destroyed the Temple and built a mosque atop it.
Islam is here to stay.
It is up to us to begin to understand it and the beliefs of its adherents.
10
There are 50 plus Muslim majority countries in the world today.
Why would Muslims want to immigrate to Western, Christian majority ones? And if you are not happy here, leave. Go to one of those wonderful Islamic Theocracies instead.
11
If Ms. Uddin is shocked by that, imagine how shocked Jews are when told 1. Judaism is only a religion, not a national or ethnic group 1. the "real" Jews ceased to exist years ago; we are all descended from the Khazars who converted to Judaism over a thousand years ago-of course no historians can explain what happened to them, as they disappeared after some wars 3. only real Jews had any historical ties to the Holy Land, so today's Jews have no claim whatsoever to Israel 4. Jews are sub-human, a position held not only by Nazis, but by many Moslems, today.
I agree that of course Islam is first a religion, but it is also a political system, as is clearly evident in the Koran, and in its history. Almost all majority Muslim countries today are called Islamic, and Sharia law is applied to religious minorities, too. Often to their dismay and endangerment.
I also agree that the majority of Moslems in America would not want Sharia applied, especially to family law, like instant divorces. However, some do, and yes there are militant, and threatening, pockets of Muslims in this country. Which is sadly why there are American politicians who see a plot behind a religion.
What is the solution? That has to come from majority Muslim organizations in this country, who also need to denounce anti-Semitism, denounce slandering of Jews, denounce the lie that Jews have no claim to self determination in what is modern Israel. Believe it or not, this will help promote Islam in America.
10
"Submission"--the real meaning of Islam--today is about cultural Marxism linking with Islam to destroy Western democracies--the real crime against the citizens of U.S.
Free speech from over Sovietized media about how Islam is a cleric/imam-driven religion-political system based on Shariah--not happening, i.e., makes the case, makes the point--the truth.
Tocqueville was right--there is nothing compatible about American democracy and Islam.
11
Mohammade was a supposed "prophet" and a mass murdering warlord. How can Islam be anything but both a religion and a political system. It certainly has bern during the Islamization of the 57 now majority Muslim countries. Over and over again for 1,400 year as the Muslim population grows, Islamic law is put into place. Islam is political.
10
@Rob If you're interested in 'murdering warlords', read the first 12 books of the Bible
7
There is an absurdly enormous abundance of reasons to be wary of Islam. There's no way around this fact. Why not confront the myriad problems within Islam head on instead of constantly preeningly handwringing about "Islamophobia". The Times is not taking a bold stand by printing this. Quite the opposite. Printing this is completely cowardly. The left is too scared to be honest about Islam. The left has no other option but to deflect and point the finger at "Islamophobia". It's such a tired and old routine that helps no one, least of all the young Muslims who will continue to be indoctrinated into a belief system that tells them not to integrate into their wider society, that tells them to distrust all infidels, that tells them that the highest form of expression if their love for Allah is to die in the act of killing these infidels. This isn't Republican propaganda... it's the reality of what is forcefed in mosques and madrassas throughout the world. Confront it boldly once and for all. Islam needs to be reformed and modernized for god's sake!!!!!!
14
Those who are fundamentalist Muslims should immigrate to a theocratic Muslim majority nation. Why come here? Oil and water.
10
So Asma T. Uddin is "a lawyer and an expert on religious liberty", then she knows the truth about how Islam enslaves young women and how their fathers marry them off when they are teenagers. Nothing American democracy about that.
11
Muslims are disproportionately involved in terrorism in the name of religion around the world. Muslim majority countries have the worst record of treating minority religions and minority ethnic groups among all countries. Muslims should confront these realities before complaining of minor incidents in western countries.
14
A couple of years ago there were reports that there were prevalent sexual assaults committed by Middle Eastern refugees in Germany. The anti-immigration crowd and the Christian Right went nuts over how "Muslims don't respect women" so we can't allow refugees from the Syrian civil war into the country.
And now, multiple women have come forward stating a candidate for the US Supreme Court - a self-professed Christian - sexually assaulted them. The narrative coming from the same crowd is suddenly "boys will be boys" and "what teenager boy hasn't done that before?"
Yeah, I'm worried less about the Muslims and a lot more about "good Christians" like Brett Kavanaugh, Roy Moore, and all those other "good Christians" in the Senate who are saying sexual assault is no big deal.
5
Hypothetical. If our Founding Fathers has been Muslim, what would our Constitution look like?
4
I've done some research on Asma Uddin and she's quite slippery in her words and motives. Her primary goal seems to be to protect Sharia Law from criticism without having to confront the uglier aspects of Sharia. Knowing that there are plenty of Muslim countries in which homosexuality is punishable by death in accordance with Sharia, one should take her asides about Republican attacks on homosexuality with a large grain of salt. In a HuffPost article she defended the right of conservative Christians to call homosexuality a sin in public. This is a way for her to protect the ability of Muslim's to do the same without having to put them in the spotlight. She also attended a House Oversight Committee meeting to denounce Obama's birth control mandate on religious grounds. She is far more conservative than the NYTimes lets on. This shouldnt be surprising. Sharia Law is the most backwards extremely conservative set of beliefs out there. Did I mention that Homosexuality is punishable by death?
10
Today in my college classroom a student was upset to hear that the word "god" is not in the Constitution. He rolled his eyes, threw up his hands, leaned back, loudly exhaled and said, "I suppose it doesn't even matter how many people don't believe that" as though his belief trumped the facts and I was just another one of those "liberal professors" whose aim is to force liberal beliefs on students. Such stupidity in my classroom leaves me longing for an attack on all religions. They are the grim cudgels that beat back the light, each an ignorant abyss into which the "faithful" can leap along with every brain cell they never used.
4
Somehow when it comes to Islam, NYT online has its own "free-speech" bias, i.e., almost Shariah in its opposition to any debate that might challenge the notion that Islam is more than just a "religion".
The fact is it is not just a religion--it is a full-service social and political system that is cleric/imam-driven under Shariah sans any freedom of speech--try it sometime in Tehran or Riyadh.
It isn't clear why our Sovietized media is so reluctant to cover how Shariah affects local governments throughout the Western democracies, but, not to mention the problems the Swedes and Australians are having with Shariah, even now the British are struggling with local Shariah edicts affecting the marriage of teenaged Muslim girls.
Tocqueville warned many years ago that Islam and American democracy were not compatible. Unless there's a democratic Muslim 2.0 that is unique to the U.S., in its present form, it remains true today.
10
Of course Islam is a religion, protected by the Constitution, whether Muslims are anti-american or not. On the other hand the intolerance and discrimination against Christians in too many Muslim countries is a disgrace. Failure of the author to mention that makes her article hypocritical special pleading.
9
The article quotes Michael Flynn: “Islam is a political ideology”.
And evangelical Christianity isn’t?
It’s long-past time the human race moved on from religions, all religions.
5
The "root of the push to deny Islam is a religion" is not any misguided belief about anti-American Muslims. As Ayaan Hirsi Ali has convincingly demonstrated, the "root" is the Quran, which expresses a political ideology that can be used to promote violence by the preachers of dawa. Apparently, legislators in Denmark have also gotten her message, as they recently passed laws requiring all Muslim children living in ghettos to receive 25 hours of education in Danish culture. They are also forbidding parents to send their children abroad for "re-education." From recent trips to Sweden, I'd bet that Swedes will soon follow the Danish example.
4
"John Bennett, a Republican state legislator in Oklahoma, said in 2014, “Islam is not even a religion; it is a political system that uses a deity to advance its agenda of global conquest.”"
So Islam is Christianity?
6
I bet that many of those people saying that "Islam isn't a real religion" are also saying that evolution IS a religion.
To be sure, Christianity/the Catholic Church was the throne behind the throne, and the Church murdered hundreds of thousands of Jews, and many Muslims during the Crusades. And murdered plenty of its own, too. The reformation began the process of taking political power away from them. And, yes, missionaries in Africa, China, and elsewhere wielded too much power. But Islam has never had its reformation, an Enlightenment, or any real self-critical movement. Islam was also conceived as a political entity, the Umma.
Of course Islam is a religion, and I imagine some Moslems, especially women, would be aghast if Sharia ruled their lives while living in western countries. But Islam has earned, not totally unfairly, a bad reputation of persecution, murder, intra-religious wars, and being totally out of sync with modern ideas of, frankly, MYOB.
Want to establish a better reputation in the U.S.? Start being vocal about accepting Judaism as a valid faith, allow that Jews, too, have a right to self determination in Israel, and refute the ugly claims that Jews have no historical connection to the Holy Land. If Americans can see/hear a mindset of accepting, and validating, other religions by practicing Moslems, they will have a much easier time in being respected for their houses of worship, etc.
Easier said than done. I believe some would vocalize such liberal opinions, but they might be physically harmed as traitors.
6
All organized religgions are global political systems that promote their plan for world-wide dominence. And virtually all of them are male hierarchies that oppress women and treat children as property. Catholic. Evangelical. Judaism. ......They are all the same vestiges of the first false steps of supposed civilization. When the sages of Jamaica sang “kill all de popes” I understood what they meant.
4
@Chris Wrong. Women and children are lauded and extoled in Judiasm.
1
C'mon! No portrayal of people in art or Muhammed in cartoons? Get real! This religion orv whatever is so archaic and needs to join modern society. If it cannot assimilate it is not our problem nor our responsibility to accept them.
10
We have an amendment to guide us on the separation of Church and State that is slowly being eroded in a dangerous manner.
5
At my university in Taiwan, each student organization must have a faculty member as an advisor. Since we have no Muslim faculty, our International Muslim Student Association has asked me, an American, (very active) Christian woman, to serve in this capacity. How's that for tolerance! At one symposium on the Muslim family, I heard a Muslim father state that while one of his responsibilities is to provide adequate financial support for his family, this does not mean that he should devote himself to getting rich, as he has other duties that take precedence: caring for parents, teaching his children, and helping his wife with housework and childcare (!) This kind of family life, he said, brings much more content and happiness than being rich. (I would agree!) Another young Muslim man, after pointing out how the founder of Islam had forbidden the ancient practice of killing female newborns by burying them alive, went on to assert his belief that denying a woman the full use of her talents and abilities is the same as live burial and thus wrong. (This brought a lump to my throat.) Like all the world's major religions, Islam is not a simple entity but made up of many strands and traditions, which have debated each other through the centuries, often vehemently, sometimes violently. What is to be hoped is that we can hold our different beliefs with the humility born of knowing our limitations, while making a sincere effort to understand others before we pass judgment.
2
Claiming that Islam is not a religion *is* an absurd fringe argument; that it has gained traction in the US is unsurprising, given the power and influence that the absurdist fringe has gained over American politics over the last 30 years, including the radical Christian right.
The hypocrisy of these politicized Christians seemingly knows no bounds, given their political agenda to erase separation of church and state in order to enshrine their beliefs into American law. For them, religious freedom stops at their own; the only rights they care about defending are theirs.
But they do not speak for America; they will not make a mockery of the First Amendment, and American Muslims will *not* be deprived of the religious freedom that they are guaranteed under the Constitution.
1
Histrionic tribalism is alive & well in this country, and unfortunately is growing at an alarming rate. I have to wonder what the real motivation of some of these folks is. Is it real fear, or sheer ignorant bigotry?
Interesting to see the article portray the LDS church as equal in the eyes of evangelical christians to themselves and Jews. Nothing could be further from the truth. While they despise Islam more, many of them don't view Mormons as "christians", or even as part of a real religion.
BTW, I'm not religious in the least, and see most organized religions as causing more problems than they solve.
3
Of course there is a natural conflict between Islam and democracy, just as there is between Christianity and democracy.
Almost to a man, the Founding Fathers were militantly secular, God bless 'em (irony intended, and please don't whine about them all being men; that's who they were).
Any people who give their religion primacy over their country are enemies of democracy, no matter what their religion.
Dan Kravitz
3
The most important amendment in our Constitution is reference to a State religion, which the writers of the Constitution made clear, there would not be a State religion, this was broadened to the Separation of Church & State.In recent Supreme Court verdicts concerning religious beliefs, the decision went to Christianity.Based on our Constitution ,would our founding fathers approve of the Courts decisions, I think not.This makes thoses that voted in favor of religion, hypocrites & worst traitors to the Document they swore to up hold, which should be enough to impeach them.
1
Certainly Islam is a religion, but can we dispense with the whole 'Muslims are an oppressed minority' meme.' If the Muslim population of the US feels oppressed, perhaps they should work harder at building up the US, and spend less time on victimhood. I don't see any Muslim hospitals, I don't seen any Muslim civic engagement, except to declare themselves victims. I'm sorry that political opportunists are responding to actual Muslim extremists who operate overseas (I don't worry about Shariah law), but this is the only image we see, since the US Muslim community is too insular and does not engage except to declare themselves victims, or to criticize Israel.
8
It's a floor wax. No, it's a dessert topping. No, wait - you're both right.
Anyone who has read the Qu'ran and the Hadiths and studied Sharia law at all knows that all these documentations of The Prophet are both religious AND political in nature. As is the Bible, in both the Old and New Testaments.
It's time to call all religions out for what they really are: Fantasy, based on nothing but smoke and mirrors, and lies.
1
So the Crusades were strictly a political movement, with no relation to religion?
2
The Bible and the Talmud (commentaries) regulate every facet of life.
They command the farmer to leave the corners of the field for the poor. They prescribe the treatment of criminals, the thief, the murder. They prescribe what is to be done if a person's animals damage another's property. I could go on, but the idea is clear. Religion demands a code of conduct. We tend not to think of it that we because so much of Judeo-Christian law and morality is built into our legal system.
Muslim law - Shariah - incorporates similar concepts since it is based on Judeo-Christian law. It may seem harsh to some because it has not been modified and softened by contact with western culture, but it derives from the same sources, so it is difficult to comprehend the un American sentiments expressed by those opposed to Muslims.
But then again how many instances have we seen of Christians insisting on state support of religion - their particular ideology. Some in Alabama wants the Ten Commandments in public buildings. But which Ten Commandments? Oh, you didn't know that there are different versions? Just check and compare a Jewish bible to a Catholic bible to a Protestant bible. They are very different indeed!
4
Difference between other religions and Islam is,it preaches hate.hate.Any one who doesn't believe should watch this video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3WgVa3VRFb4
Is there one church in Saudi Arabia, what happened to afghan Buddha statues,when sharia law is the rule of land.
Below is the current situation in places where strict sharia law is practised, taken from Wiki
"Saudi Arabia allows Christians to enter the country as foreign workers for temporary work, but does not allow them to practice their faith openly. Because of that Christians generally only worship within private homes. Items and articles belonging to religions other than Islam are prohibited."
"Items and articles belonging to religions other than Islam, such as Bibles, crucifixes, statues, carvings, items with religious symbols, and others, are prohibited. Despite the legal restrictions, many sources claim that there is a secret underground church of Afghan Christians living in Afghanistan."
Other should first reform his/her own religion before whining
6
Islam is what it appears to be. What it appears to be, to many people, is an intransigent cult of personality--one committed to denying other religions or opinions the right to survive and exist when such a conflict arises and the result being a them (they) vs. us (we) mentality. No better example suggests this than the opinions and beliefs that arise out of and from the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, especially since most Palestinians ARE Muslim.
4
The author missed an opportunity to explain that Islam is no more political than Christianity or Judaism and that the political Islam of Al Qaeda and ISIS is thoroughly rejected by virtually all Muslims. Also, how can there be a plot to impose Sharia laws on Americans when Muslims themselves are not agreed on what Sharia is and many Muslims consider Sharia to be a collection of antiquated laws which need to be modernized.
2
Gee whiz, following the antics of people like Franklin Graham, I have reached the same conclusion about Fundamentalist Christianity in the United States.
2
"Idaho introduced an anti-Shariah bill." Hmm, Rep Idaho of the Idaho House of Representatives introduced an anti-Shariah bill? Or perhaps it was Senator Idaho?
Just asking.
1
It is astonishing that less than half of Americans say that "at least some American Muslims are anti-American". That seems an obviously true statement: we've seen acts of terror by some American Muslims, who most definitely were anti-American. Of course we've seen terrorist attacks by Christians and Jews, who also were obviously anti-American. I don't think it possible to name any religious or other subgroup of a million or more Americans which doesn't contain at least some members who are violently anti-American. In other words, this was a dumb polling question. It is a measure of unwillingness to answer in a way that an errant pollster can twist into evidence of Islamophobia that over half of those polled refused to say that "at least some American Muslims" were anti-American. Anybody want to guarantee me that there aren't at least some German Americans or Italian Americans, or members of the military, or members of Congress and state legislatures, or Americans of British or Hispanic decent aren't anti-American. I wouldn't bet on none for any of those groups. I'm an engineer. Am I going to stand up for my profession and claim that none of America's engineers are anti-American. Nope. Every group is diverse. Every group has mentally ill and corrupt or criminal individuals. I know that some engineers have been caught spying for China. I know that members of our military have been caught spying for Russia or leaking State Department secrets.
1
Islam is clearly a religion in the monotheistic tradition. Duh! However, it should be recognised that the Quran is regarded by Muslims as the literal words of God (unlike the sacred books of other religions). The Quran specifically ordains a State enforcement of 'submission' to Islam. Islam is a religion built upon a single state religion and which does not (without reform) recognise other systems of belef or behaviour (except inferior varieties of monotheism). This creates a modern religious reform task for Islam to come to terms with a pluralistic state (which it has not yet done). In these circumstances, it is important for the any pluralistic state to outlaw aspects of any religious belief that impinge up on other's rights (esp. Muslim women's or children's rights) whatever religion. In these cases the state has an obligation to interfere in religion. Ignore this dilemma of Islam and pretend it is the same as other religions is dangerous folly. On the other hand, to conduct a campaign, like that of the Christian Right, to deny Islam the status of religion simply makes matters worse. The Right's attempt to create an alternate 'Christian' state is horrible folly and even more stupid than trying to assert Islam is not a religion.
4
Islam is a great religion, no doubt. It is also fundamentally incompatible with the United States or Western Europe. Islam IS, besides a religion, a political force bent of conquest of infidel lands and peoples. It is in error for a Christian, Jew, or Buddhist to view Islam through the same religious prism we view our own religions. None espouses domination and religious law. Islam has been at war with everyone since its inception 1300 years ago. I respect the strong identity and sense of purpose the religion espouses. But not here. Not ever.
3
I think it is interesting that one can't discriminate on the basis of religion, but one can use their religion to discriminate. In the early days of America, when the white European settlers arrived, the Native Americans were the target of their superiority. The European settlers disregarded the wisdom of the Native American beliefs. The Native Americans were labeled "heathens" and herded into reservations. The white Europeans have also made it their mission to circle the globe in order to convert other peoples (more heathens) to their religion. Fast forward to today and we still have the smug superiority of the white Christian people in our face. They seem unable to understand that there are many paths to God, none of which are better than the other. There are factions in all religions that court extremists, not just the Muslims. I believe that before we start throwing stones at another religion, we should take a good long look at our own. BTW, I was born a Republican WASP, but have since seen the error of my ways and moved on to a more enlightened stance. Namaste!
2
I find this article, sadly incomplete. There should have been inputs from the major Islamic faiths and regions. Iran, Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan, Malaysia and Chechnya. Islam is a religion that provides a social architecture and legal guidance. It can be molded by it's practitioners and includes regional customs.
That said, Islam is not a good fit in the west, where government and religion are kept at arms length. And Islam will not be particularly well received for 1 or 2 more generations here, as 9/11 memories will last a long time. Most people, certainly me, find it a little rich, when religious zealots kill 3,000 Americans in 2 hours, then others demand the right to put up a mosque near ground zero.
Maybe I'm the crazy one, but until enough Muslims are zealous enough to stop murderers from within, such that Amish and Muslims are locked in a tie for "Most Peace Loving", I will remain vigilant.
4
Those who seek to restrict ideas they don't like are, essentially, cowards. If you believe you are right, you welcome dissent and disagreement as opportunities to teach, and you don't fear the risk that you might learn that you are wrong.
1
I think maybe Christianity also is not a religion but instead a political movement masquerading as a religion in order to impose its will on the rest of the world. For centuries Christianity has been trying to widen its influence around the world. You don't see Jews or Muslims sending missionaries all over the world trying to convert anyone.
White man's burden, anyone?
1
A lot of the responses here are predictable and really prove Ms. Uddin's point for her: "Muslims want to turn the United States into a caliphate but we can stop them but turning the country into a Christian caliphate!" Yeah, no thanks. Just apply the same laws to everybody. Considering there are only 3.1 million Muslims in the country and many of them are college-educated tech workers, engineers, and doctors who take their religion pretty mildly, I'm a lot less worried about them than the Roy Moore types.
3
An evangelical Christian academic colleague told me some thirty years ago that the ultimate goal of his church and others like it was to establish the sovereignty of Jesus Christ over the world in general and the United States in particular. To this latter end, the US Constitution would be abolished.
To be fair, I've heard this from Muslims as well, and presumably every other religion with an evangelical agenda feels the same. Apparently we humans are hard-wired to (1) massacre the next tribe down the river and (2) create complex theological structures to excuse our behavior.
4
I'm not religious either, but, criminey, as long as they're not cutting the heads off chickens, what's the worry? Some American religions hold the same views of women that certain groups of Islam do. And should we (the non not-religious, former Christians) get a free ride?
1
The particular strain of Christianity better known as Evangelical, can be defined exactly as the disgraced Flynn described. Political ideology posing as religion. Its the whole of their ideology, to turn the US into a theocracy, where legislation and social norms are sourced direct from their (un)holy book.
Geesh. I really cant tolerate the right wing, uber conservative, christian hypocrisy these days. Its a toxin that seeps into every crevice, tainting everything. Kinda like mold behind the walls...
3
the islamic takeover of america exists in the imagination of people who fiercely (and successfully) oppose any separation of religion and state.
2
"Islam is a political ideology” that “hides behind the notion of it being a religion."
I feel the exact same way about certain groups of evangelical Christianity. They do not separate church and state because they have become a political ideology hiding behind the notion of being Christian.
I recognize Christianity and Islam as genuine religions. However, in today's world both are being used by certain groups to advance political objectives that have nothing to do with the practice of their religious beliefs.
The Ku Klux Klan were Christians and employed terror and violence against black people, just as people are using Islam to justify terrorist acts today.
We probably do need a way of differentiating between religious beliefs and the promotion of violence.
For example, preventing "Shariah Law" from replacing the constitution is legitimate. However, American Muslims are not actually promoting such a view. The intention behind the law's promotion is to scare people (terrorize?) about Muslims, to mislead people into believing the constitution is under attack by American Muslims, to create an "us vs. them" mentality that only Christians are true Americans - which is a genuine attack on the constitution!
Such tactics of scaring people indirectly promote violence against non-Christians and are not part of mainstream Christian teachings. Should the people who promote such laws be given "Religious Liberty" and tax exemptions?
25
This is an ages old fight about Cultural dominance, masked by Religious freedom arguments.
In parallel to this fight, American Christians are fighting to erode rules separating Church and State. Doing this again with "Religious Freedom" lawsuits.
The fight against Islam is only about cultural, in this case religious culture, dominance.
This is why a purely secular Government is critical.
1
Every religion represents a political system. Religion is and has always been a means to gain control or at least organize societies, or groups within societies. So, if one takes the position that Islam is really a political system, then one must admit that all religions represent political systems. Religion is not about God (God is a mere pretense). Rather, religions are primarily the means by which power is acquired, maintained and expanded.
2
1: Defining "a religion" is an absurdity. Why would we feel the need to to that? A person is born into their religion and the variations of actual beliefs among individuals in a given religion is no doubt huge. So huge we best should think of people having "religious ideas." Those who need a rigid structure for their religious beliefs are unfortunately numerous and they tend to be intolerant. I'm often asked by a person I just met, "What church do you go to." When I t ell them, they often get very quiet and disappear.
2: I'm an atheist and that is a religious belief.
3. We all have religious beliefs and whatever we do with those beliefs is our business, as long as we do not break laws. It's that simple.
4. Therefore we should not be in the habit or think there is a legal need to "define a religion" as is done in this article. And sadly in courtrooms. We have all the religious liberty possible, as long as we do not break the law. If refusing to bake a cake for someone because of ones religious beliefs is against the law, then you would be breaking the law if you were a baker and refused. Yes, I'm very familiar with the recent court case.
5. Muslims are thus certainly protected by the First Amendment as long as they do not violate the law. I don't know anything about Muslim "sharia law" but if it breaks national or local laws, it is illegal.
1
And christianity doesn't have political elements? Many fundamentalist christians are more political than religious: anti-choice, the 10 commandments on public land, prayer in schools, ant-contraception, women can't be priests, priests can't marry, and on and on and on. Why don't these so-called conservatives say that christianity wants to take over the country?
1
Maybe because there aren’t 50 countries in the world that are governed according to the literal word of the Christian bible.
2
I think some Muslims are anti-American. I also think some Christians are anti-American. More importantly, I think some Americans are anti-American.
If people are concerned about a religion acting in its own beliefs over US law, consider what happens when that group changes the law in their favor, such as restricting access to abortion clinics through Christian-inspired legislation. It's not religious freedom we need to worry about, but religious lobbying within our government.
Islamists sneer at the religious freedom of the West. It is seen as weakness. as opportunity.
Islam was originally formulated and implemented, in fact, by its creator as a "corrective" to fill in the gaps and leverage the chaos resulting from the climate of persecution of various minor Christian sects by the orthodox Latin Catholic church which had become the state-enforced religion of the late Roman Empire especially in the East.
While Christ (according to the New Testament) taught his followers they could not serve both God and Caesar because their kingdom was in heaven, and Paul told the faithful that while they should respect the law of the land and obey it, they were mere ambassadors there for Christ, strangers in a strange land, and must be in the world but not of it, ready to die rather than fight, a hard thing to do.
But Christ tarried in his return, and within a generation or two of his death the difficult mysteries of his teachings and relentless persecution by the pagans led the church to enter into bondage with the Roman state during the emperorship of Constantine. Orthodoxy was enforced with the sword in violation of the Christian teachings, not in obedience to them as is the case in Islam.
Mohammed saw right through to the problem-- the freedom Christ had left his followers without a central human authority to enforce "oneness". So no teachings separate mosque and state in Islam. A Caliph is to rule over the Umma, where non-believers are taxed or worse.
3
Religion is not a condition of birth. Gender, skin color, disability, sexual orientation are all things we are born with.
People change religions as they change socks, with no apparent trauma.
Religion is a lifestyle choice made by americans that I do not wish to support any longer with tax dollars. Religion is at the core of many of our worst social ills.
It's time we left the cave and joined more advanced societies in the peaceful secularism they have found
3
Well, by that logic, Christianity, at least in the U.S., is not a religion either. Certainly the fringe evangelical right is doing its best to seize political power, and impose its narrow view of god on the rest of the country.
1
The author of this article is being very disingenuous . Every secular government in the Muslim world has either succumbed to Islamic tyranny or is under constant threat from it. Progressive societies like pre-Revolutionary Iran and pre-Erdogan Turkey have been replaced with stifling Islamic government that have curtailed the rights of women, LGBT and minorities. To say that Muslims do not seek to influence and force their beliefs on to the masses via the political process is contradicted by example after example.
4
But Islam is a faith tradition bent upon denying religious freedom to adherents of other faiths, especially when they have the critical mass. I am not persuaded that in this country its adherents, if ever in the position of having greater influence, will respect the religious freedom of non-Muslims. That has not been their tradition at all, so why think otherwise. Beyond that, it is a faith that is bent upon terrorizing the West. It has no commonality with Western values whatsoever.
5
The definition of religion is more elusive than people realize. The current Western understanding of it developed in Post-Reformation and Enlightenment Europe. Its Latin root, religio, connoted duties to the deity, which included one's entire culture. Culture is what people do to cultivate their humanity in function of some ultimate goal or god. The Enlightenment divorced religion from everyday life in a way unknown in the rest of the world. It relegated it to an optional spiritual realm. This split is unknown in other cultures. No other language even has an indigenous word that carries the same meaning as "religion" in the Post-Enlightenment West. The problem with people who say that Islam is not a religion because it encompasses all aspects of life and not is not limited to something spiritual is a failure to recognize the uniqueness, and the artificiality, of the Western divorce.
No religion should have the kinds of privileges many enjoy....tax exemption, exemptions form land use controls, relgious defenses from the violation or application of other laws. Whether it’s Christian, Catholic. Judaism, Islam or any other no relgious organization should be exempt. There is a big difference between excepting one’s beliefs and avoiding generally applicable laws like zoning!
No relgious group should be able to apply its own relgious law to things like divorce or child custody and yet that happens in New York! And I not talking about Islam.
Religious leaders should not be permitted to electioneer or lobby the government. The wall between church and state needs to be impenatrable. As a result, relgious privilege should end for all.
4
The author merely adduces a set of widely held beliefs about Islam and then dismisses those beliefs without any kind of argument, as if it is entirely obvious that they are without merit. Now, it may be absurd to argue that Islam is not a religion, but it is not at all absurd to argue that the relationship between secular and religious authority in Islamic societies is generally different than in the West. In fact, except for a handful of forcibly secularized societies, effectively no Muslim country in the world can be considered a proper liberal democracy. From the Persian Gulf to Indonesia, there is no proper religious equality for non-Muslims, apostasy is a crime, etc. So, yes, some beliefs held about Islam in America are unfortunate and extreme, but to pretend that they are entirely without merit is disingenuous at best.
4
Just like the UN audience, I just laugh out loud at evangelical foaming-at-the-mouth about sharia law actually being a real threat to the US. We the people of the 21st Century are doing a mighty job of resisting Christianity’s persistent and sustained threat to our freedoms; why in the world do they think we’d not do the same with Islam and Sharia law?
This country and enlightened humanity are moving AWAY from organized religious mythologies of any kind, not towards them. Besides, evangelical Christians themselves and their Iron Age ramblings are currently and for the foreseeable future the biggest threat to America’s future as a democracy for all, no matter the gender, race, orientation, and religion or lack thereof. Once again, they’re simply attempting to distract and divide the people with manufactured threats and fears.
1
Probably many of these same people are the ones who support cutting off refugees from Islamic countries. It could not be more ironic, as many refugees come here specifically for a secular life, where they can practice religion privately without government control.
2
This is the anti-Catholic hysteria of the 19th century Know-Nothings and their fellow travelers all over again. Evangelicals flipped their lids back in 1928 and claimed that Democratic candidate Al Smith would hand over the keys of the country to the pope. Similar, albeit subdued, concerns arose during JFK's campaign, and Kennedy deflected those concerns by promising he would not let his faith guide his leadership, after which he won the election by a hair (with generous help from urban political machines which were on their way out as institutions).
I wonder what the catalyst will be that will cause anti-Islamic fervor to be dampened? For anti-Catholic bias, it was Roe v. Wade and the rise of the moral majority that seemed to have done the trick, after which evangelicals put aside their hatred of the RCC in exchange for political gain and solidarity during the culture wars.
1
As an atheist, I wish all people would keep their religious beliefs and practices at home, quietly, and not demand that society, laws, politics, business, etc. force everyone else to dance to their tune. I don't hear your music. I do not believe it harms your soul if I take birth control pills, get an abortion, adopt refugee children, befriend a gay co-worker, believe all marriage is valid and love is not finite. So what gives you the right to think that my actions can harm your soul? If you think we all have souls, then leave mine alone (if you think I have one) and attend only to your own. The constitution SEPARATES the state from religious practices. This was plainly a reaction to having been a colony of a state (England) which had and still has a state religion of which the monarch is the religious head. That is all it is. That is all it means. It means the state cannot push one religion over another. But now the largest religious group in the US has decided that it is under attack and is being thwarted by laws that were enacted to protect me and everyone else not christian from being forced to be a "christian." This minority of US citizens has managed to infiltrate the government with sympathizers who are actively trying to christianize the US. Someone else said it here the other day: that these so-called "christians" are actually Phrarisees. I am quite sure that all the non-christians who wrote the Constitution are rolling in their graves.
3
I think the paranoia of a "Shariah agenda" comes from learning about the tens of millions of dollars pumped in each year by Saudi and other Gulf individuals and organizations to promote Islam, mosques, "Cultural Centers" and other such proselytizing attempts, coupled with the Jihadi rhetoric we have faced amidst the terror campaign by Al Qaeda and its offshoots. If someone were coming after you, or claimed to be, with their religious beliefs and determination to convert you, you would only be human to be concerned.
As for the reaction, and the insinuations that Islam is not a religion and other bizarre constructs - that comes from the above fear, compounded by a total ignorance or indifference of history. The US education system and the media have not been able to show the remarkable parallel between the awful acts committed by the Jihadis with those committed by Christians in the past. Galileo was not afraid of street crime, he was afraid of being burned at the stake by the Jihadis of the Catholic Church. Imam, Ayatollah, Cardinal, Archbishop, the names vary, but the close-mindedness and fanaticism are the same. And yes, among the good and noble, whatever the religion and symbolism, the nobility and virtue is the same.
Right now we have a Catholic/Evangelical Sharia being imposed on our nation, with Brett Kavanaugh being the latest Imam we are trying to put in charge of our laws. How many religious people actually think about and understand the "values" they impose on us?
1
Here we are, some 2000+ years after supposed events in Roman Judea set the world on a path strewn with violence, conquest, forced conversion, book burning and other horrors.
Not to be outdone, Islam soon followed suit. And while there were some bright spots in the history of both beliefs the distrust lingers as a result of deep scars that remain.
We need to step back and realize how absurd this all is, that we hate because of ancient literature, Bronze Age superstitions that can be dispelled through the rigorous application of reason.
The founders of this country were never more brilliant than when they provided us with freedom of religion and more importantly, freedom from religion.
3
Oddly enough, I came to the same conclusion when I was in Afghanistan, that Islam is not a religion but a political/philosophical movement created by a charismatic being upon whom a spotlight fell at the right time and the right place. I remain convinced of that.
BUT, then I got to thinking: How is this different from Christianity? (The current political thrust of Evangelicals certainly fuels this.) Is there any difference between a cult and a religion other than the number of adherents, which lends legitimacy? Is Scientology any more of a religion than Islam, or less so than Christianity?
And I can't help but why wonder why each religion proselytizes the certainty as to their exclusive knowledge of God and his intentions, historically often at the point of a sword if they the populace doesn't buy into their message of peace.
Name one religion that hasn't been the author of hideous atrocities in its name. Islam is a political movement just like the rest of them.
1
There can be argumemts about what is the best political system, but there certainly is a worst: a theocracy. And there have been attempts over the years to impose one here (ironically, perhaps, mostly fundamentalist Christian), starting with the Plymouth colony, where Quaker missionaries were routinely stripped, flogged (female ones with the most entusiasm) and expelled.
2
Religion is the root of all evil. Most Christian ones here in the US have long since become nothing but Political Action Committees. It is past time for us to start taxing them all. Why should I shoulder the tax burden for somebody else's fairy tales and intolerance? That would seem to be a policy Republicans and Libertarians would love.
1
It would seem that the author of this article is mirroring the tactics of those she cites as wanting to deny Islam protection under the First Amendment. Islam is most definitely a religion. But, it's also a political ideology, a legal system, and a financial system. And many of it's core and currently practiced beliefs do run counter to many aspects of Western democratic and secular government systems. So, you have one side that wants to try and pretend that Islam is not a religion and the other side that wants to pretend that it is not a much more wide ranging ideology.
One only has to look at the state of affairs in the Muslim world to realize that, like Christianity, Islam desperately needs to have it's own Renaissance.
3
It needs to be stated again, that the Supreme Court did not rule on religious liberty when it "decided in favor of a Christian baker who refused to make a custom wedding cake for a gay couple". In that case, the ruling solely pertained to the fact that the baker did not receive due process. The right of someone to refuse to serve someone in the name of religion remains legally unresolved.
The distinctions among religious thinking, totalitarianism, grifting, and political thought are often hard to make. Take the somewhat neutral case of Scientology, where many governments around the world have come to the conclusion that it is not a religion, but a violent business. We rightly outlaw female circumcision as mutilation although its adherents feel it is their civic and religious duty to perform. Any group can make up an imaginary deity whose laws fit their wants; that's religion but who wants it.
1
In normal times, it would be easy, and appropriate, to dismiss the Islamophobes cited as harmless nutcase cranks, all of them. But these are not normal times. When there is serious economic insecurity, brought on by labor-busting, globalization, automation and the general inequality-restoring New Gilded Age by the Reagan "Revolution," people are easily fearmongered by propaganda targeting minority religious groups, immigrants, etc. The Al Qaeda jihad, the spurring of which US foreign policy and agitation had much to do with, severely raised the stakes of Islam-directed fearmongering, which was the intent of the 911 and other attacks. Right now, the terrorists (and those who profit from a "terrorists!" bogeyman, let's not forget) are winning. We by our reactivity are aiding their victory.
It seems to me that there is not much difference among the fundamentalists of any Abrahamic religion. Islamic scripture mixes worship and governance; Christian fundamentalists want America to restrict the rights of non-believers to do legal business with bakers and to forbid women to control their own bodies. Judaism, in the few places where they have political influence, behave in a similar fashion. In America, Christian fundamentalists are opening a Pandora’s box of governance by religion.
1
Yes, Islam is a religion, but one that is different in some key respects from other world religions when it comes to how, or whether it can be separated from civic life. As other commenters have pointed out, Islam is functionally a political system that also has a religious component. This isn't a fringe view.
Shadi Hamid, author of Islamic Exceptionalism, has written about this extensively. A summarized version of his book can be found on The Atlantic Monthly's website:
https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2016/06/islam-politics...
https://www.amazon.com/Islamic-Exceptionalism-Struggle-Islam-Reshaping/d...
For all of those who are quick to compare Islam to Christianity or to Judaism, a key difference is that emulation of Mohammed means emulation of someone who was a military leader, and a governor of Medina. Groups like the Muslim Brotherhood, the Taliban and ISIS all base their ideas for an ideal society on mimicking as closely as possible Mohammed's first Muslim society. There is no parallel to this in Judaism, or in Christianity. What is more, there are no religious rules in Judaism or Christianity for how to govern those belonging to other religions. These rules do exist in Islam.
3
As an American-Muslim, a US citizen for the last 3 decades, I shape the minds of my students as a professor of mathematics at a college in Northern California. My goal is to help my students, spanning all religions and cultures, move on with their academic lives so they can reach their goals sooner rather than later. America is home to me and I do what most of my fellow-Americans do to the best of their abilities: Help America in any way I can so that we all have access to a happier, creative and productive life. And then I read in the media that some Americans believe I represent a group of people bent on undermining America, that unless my religion - Islam - is declared 'persona non grata' - America will not be safe. I am filled not with anger or frustration but sadness but I am also hopeful if it were to come down to it, a majority of my fellow-Americans will not accept the proposition that Islam is not a religion and that Muslims should be under scrutiny 24x7. My life as an American has taught me to believe in the fundamental values that make America, in spite of its flaws, a beacon of hope.
14
The head scarf issue is a good case in point. I have friends and neighbors who cover their heads for religious reasons. Some are Orthodox Jews, some are Amish or Mennonite. Two are nuns. I do not remember anyone questioning their religious freedom to do so. Some may consider their choice quaint or peculiar, but not their right to make such a choice.
The same people who argue for the broadest possible interpretation of the Second Amendment, and who scream that their free speech is being limited because they cannot post hate speech on social media are among the ones who claim that Islam is not a religion. If a mosque were not protected by freedom of religion, it would still qualify for 1st Amendment protection under the freedom of assembly clause.
Apparently these Ultra-Christian advocates are so convinced that theirs is the one true religion that they cannot stand the idea that Islam makes a similar claim. They have a right to their beliefs, but not to imposing their beliefs on others. America does not have Sharia law, but neither does it have the Inquisition.
23
Shame on those who have never truly studied the central faith of Christianity, Judaism, and Islam. All three "faiths" came into existence in the same speck of land that is today the Middle East. All three faiths believe in one God and the same God regardless of which name they use. All three share the same "Old Testament" regardless of what they call it. Semantics do not change faith or the faith's basis.
No matter these three basic approaches to faith, we are all brothers and sisters under the same God.
In a nation which purports to believe in religious freedom, it should be inconceivable that any, including atheism, should be persecuted for their beliefs or non-beliefs. History has proved the ruination of such persecution.
America needs to grow up to meet its promise.
11
Sorry, but "at the root" is actually just a large number of Americans who don't actually believe in freedom of religion. This process began with fundamentalists deriding the concept of separation of church and state. As I grew up I wondered how much Americans were really dedicated to the principles that founded the country and how much was just clannish parroting, particularly when talk about "the land of [economic] opportunity" was revered at least as much as basic democratic principles. I think I have my answer now, thank you.
@Boltarus: The Roe v. Wade ruling by the Supreme Court catalyzed the modern cancer of religious revanchism in the US. It has been used as a wedge issue ever since to open the door to theocracy in the US.
1
Ignorance is always dangerous - willful ignorance more so.
Tea Party bloggers have long blustered that Islam was not a religion, but rather "a whole way of life." Likewise, they frequently put forth the claim that Muslims want to take over the world for Islam.
These claims drip with irony which the claimants do not see. Their claimed religion, Christianity, is supposed to be "a whole way of life," a little fact that apparently escapes them. Their religion also exhorts them to "go out and teach all nations, baptizing them" (gospel of Matthew), i.e., take over the whole world for Jesus Christ.
The religious beliefs of Muslims differ from Christians, but they are no more dangerous that Christians would be if they actually practiced their faith fully.
2
@Anne-Marie Hislop: Projection is a serious mental illness with vast social consequences. Nobody is more blatant about it than the screaming mob backing Trump.
There is a simple solution to this problem: disestablish all religions.
While freedom of religion is guaranteed by the Constitution, that does not imply that religious organizations should enjoy tax privileges or exemptions from the law.
6
@gs Every law that lends any respect at all to religion is a clear violation of "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion". There are obviously many laws that violate this concise and explicit restriction on the powers of Congress already.
2
In an ideal world, it would be of great benefit if school children learned about world religions. Religion in general, after all, has in the past, and in the present, played and plays an enormous role in world history, culture and almost all aspects of human life.
In principle, many would agree. The question though is who would teach it, materials etc. Academic bent? A "religious" perspective in public school systems would be met with resistance. Fears of indoctrination.
I remember once in a university course on intellectual Jewish history asking the instructor why many outstanding scholars in Christianity and Islam, wrote such drivel when it came to the historic, academic study of Judaism (at least as a BA student understood it). The instructor (today a prominent emeritus professor of Jewish intellectual tradition) had no answer, at least none that I remember. There are always dangers in this type of instruction. So what.
So school children and students should study not only Islam, but as much of all religions that they can. This is not an issue of practice, just a call for knowledge. Knowledge might result in tolerance.
I have taught the geography of Early Christianity in Israel for decades. I should like to think that my Jewish (and occasionally Muslim!) students have benefited from this.
2
The writer complains about the very idea that there is "a natural conflict between Islam and democracy." What he fails to do is to refute that idea, which is not really surprising because in fact there is an irreconcilable conflict between Islam and democracy. There is not a single majority Islamic country in the world (and there are many) that is arguably "democratic." Islam and democracy cannot coexist because Islam includes a fixed legal system (Shariah) that does not allow democratic revision and criticism. Islam owes its allegiance to theocratic unverified certainties that trump evidence-based argument. I would add that it is perfectly fine to allow Islam to exist in the US (while Christianity and Judaism are essentially banned everywhere where Islam holds sway- no comment on that from the writer by the way) provided that Islam is kept absolutely separate from our civic culture, legislatures and judicial systems.
21
Indonesia and Malaysia, 2 very large and democratic nations
1
@Rabid Rabbit said "Christianity and Judaism are essentially banned everywhere where Islam holds sway- no comment on that from the writer by the way" That doesn't seem true. Egypt is full of Christians, some of them dating to the time of Christ. Likewise Syria, Iraq, Iran, etc, etc, etc. I don't question the idea that radical Islam wants competing religions adherents to pay for their apostasy. I question whether, as a practical matter throughout history, that has actually happened in such countries.
1
It is remarkably easy to assert that adherents of a belief system other than one's own are not "religious" and that their belief system is not "a religion." Very old Supreme Court law, never seriously challenged, says clearly that the government cannot decide on the "truth" of a religion. The First Amendment, said the Court, "It embraces the right to maintain theories of life and of death and of the hereafter which are rank heresy to followers of the orthodox faiths. Heresy trials are foreign to our Constitution. Men may believe what they cannot prove. They may not be put to the proof of their religious doctrines or beliefs. Religious experiences which are as real as life to some may be incomprehensible to others. Yet the fact that they may be beyond the ken of mortals does not mean that they can be made suspect before the law."
Apart from that, it seems to me that anyone, of any faith, who believes in a supreme and omnipotent god cannot, consistent with that belief, challenge the reality of anyone else's religion. If god exists and is omnipotent, the god may choose to present to Christians as the Trinity, to Jews as Jehovah, to Muslims as Allah, etc. No one can gainsay that; to do so is to assert that the speaker knows the mind of god. All religions are equally "valid." I am not a religious person, yet I can recognize the faiths of others and respect them. And the government must.
6
@WTig3ner
Most religions are seen by their adherents as "The One True Religion," and others as false, wrong or simply mistaken.
Islam is a religion, but it has a large lunatic fringe who want to take over the world in the name of Allah. Christianity is a religion, but it has its own lunatic fringe that is trying to force every American to believe as they. The Catholic Church has also had a great deal of influence on our laws.
Many churches in the United States not only own their houses of worship, but have many real estate and other business holdings. None of their income is taxed and it's about time they started paying their fair share. As far as I'm concerned, religions getting favors from the government goes against the first amendment.
I have no problem with moderate Muslims settling in this country. I'm too busy being worried about the far-right, gun toting Christian zealots.
31
Islam is a religion. No question about it.
Unlike Christianity, there is no separation between religion and state. Islam, as practiced in most of the world, is a theocracy. That is the rub in western secular societies.
The author knows this. He should distinguish between the Muslims who practice Islam in secular democracies and the Muslims who practice Islam in theocracies. If you look at the extremists in the Sunni Wahhabist or Salafist sects you understand the concerns of secular people when asked to understand Islam. When you consider that Saudi Arabia sent thousands of Wahhabist clerics to preach in secular lands, you have a better understanding of the distrust.
Sharia has no place in a secular society. None. Western civilization abhors theocracy. Just as Islamic theocracies abhor secular norms.
The issue should be defined as a Muslim's right to worship in his own way so long as the religion's rules apply only to spiritual matters. That is what the US Constitution protects and what reasonable thinking people support. Such politiians as those referenced by the author are dirtballs who stoke resentment and hatred in order to further their political agendas.
28
All religions are equally bad. As long as educated people believe in a magical being in the sky controlling their fate then there will be hatreds and divisions. Pray to whomever or whatever you want, just keep it out of my life. I'll take nature and the world as it is without supernatural help.
18
There is a difference between Islam here and that of Islam practiced in portions of the Middle East. Here the Mullahs are not paid by the state, there they are. That said, the Mullahs of that portion of the Middle East are employees of the State. Here they aren't
2
All religions are have "a natural conflict" with democracy. They are all absolutist and do allow for democratic compromise.
14
@Typical Ohio Liberal
I think you meant: "...and do NOT allow for democratic compromise." If not, my bad.
Such historical ignorance! emocracy and pluralism a rose in a religious context.
Sure it is a religion, but that does not mean it is evil.
3
Asma, are you for real?
Not all problems with Islam are imagined. The concerns about what is preached and practiced are not irrational. Not one Muslim refugee on the planet is confused; no displaced Muslim in five years has gone to an Islamic country. If Islamic countries are feared by Muslims, imagine the fear the rest of us have.
It is hard to ignore that the practice of Islam in the third world has produced nothing close to what the religion's western apologists suggest the religion can can produce. For instance, there are zero reports of virulent peace and brotherhood. But plenty of evidence related to sedition, violence, terrorism, crime, inhumanity, kidnapping, mutilation, slave trading. None of this is imagined.
The fear of Sharia is similarly not imaginary. In India, a democratic country with a free press, Muslim clerics are increasingly demanding Sharia to become law of the land, and demanding land to make it law. Should the world not learn from this? Because the funding for clerics in India, and for clerics the world over comes largely from the same source: Saudi Arabia and the middle east. The intent on turning everyone Muslim is proclaimed, the notion that everyone else is a sinner and should be annihilated is not covert - but overt.
Do you really think the rest of the world thinks of this as charming? The distance between what you claim is the religion, and what we see as its practice, is insurmountably large and horrifying. Get it?
33
@Kalidan asserts that "no displaced Muslim in five years has gone to an Islamic country." This is false. Turkey---an overwhelmingly Muslim country, with an Islamist government-is currently hosting millions of Syrian refugees, most of whom are Muslim. Other Muslim-majority countries are also hosting refugees.
1
The charge against Islam not being a religion is a standard accusation of monotheistic religions; fanatic monotheist Christians cannot accept any other religion even though the majority of the population of the world in non-Christina and non-Muslim; as to Sharia Law that was practiced by the orthodox Catholic Church and it was copied by Islam.
3
Islam certainly is a religion. It's the latest of several versions of the God/Messiah Saga: One God human messiah no crucifixion; Judaism One God Messiah hasn't arrive to restore Israel; Christianity One God who moves in to his Chosen One divine from the beginning or made divine at his resurrection after making the Sin Offering to end all such and estab. a new covenant plus a personification of His Spirit (Ruah). Take your pic.
The difference is that in Islam the political civil world is a product and exemplification of the Quran - everything seen thru the prism of this book. In Islam politics and religion are married and the latter is the senior partner. Not so in Christianity which though it was linked to the State frequently tried to assert its independence from the secular authorities recalling that it had begun as a pacifist anti-State outfit: render unto Caesar what is his and to God what is his and that being the handmaiden of the State polluted its mission which is not to side with any ideology, culture, political or social system as likely to seduce it (unless you live in Putin's Russia).
Islam is a religion and political religion. Those who deny this don't know what they are talking about. Most Muslims and many Islamic States try to keep the political side out of their lives. Because they know as do members of other religion that religion in government becomes bossy and intrusive.
9
@Alexander
I would remind you that this same political quality is the basis of the Christian Church's power, beginning in the 5th century. Christianity, from the time it was legalized by Constantine, was thereafter a powerful political force—especially throughout the Middle Ages and up until the enlightenment.
1
"a political system that uses a deity to advance its agenda of global conquest” sounds to me like a perfect description of the Roman Catholic church.
15
Ms. Asma T. Uddin has answered the questions she raised in her description of how the local authorities and courts opposed her coreligionists’ bid to build a mosque but that the appellate court upheld them and their rights. She might have also noticed how the President’s ban orders against the entry/reentry of Muslim residents were rejected by the Federal Courts. To paraphrase Martin Luther King, Jr’, 'the law cannot force every citizen to love you’ or approve/applaud your religious precepts, but it would protect your right to practice your religion --- so long as your practice does not infringe on another person’s rights. Please also note that our constitution extends equal rights to agnostics and atheists and heretics persecuted by the majority sects of some religions, including Islam.
I have heard Islamic scholars proudly proclaim that ‘Islam is not just a religion, but a way of life and its jurisprudence'. Indeed, almost all religions do represent the values and ways of life of their times and societies.
3
And this is why I don't believe in organized religion. Why can't people mind their own business and keep their religious beliefs to them self? This country was founded on separation of church and state. The right has gone way too far trying installing a national religion.
10
@Rebecca The power over sheep, and the attendant money, are too good.
"A political system that uses a deity to advance its agenda of global conquest" describe American Christianity pretty well. Manifest Destiny was literally the idea that God told white people to kill the Natives and take their land.
10
Where is that written in the New Testament? On the otherhand, their are ample incitements to violence and murder of nonmuslims By Muslims. "Kill them (nonmuslims) wherever you might find them." When people say they want to kill you, believe them. Mohammade was a warlord leading about 100 violent raidsa, mass murderer (he ordered and oversaw the beheading of 600 Jewish men) and an enslaver, men for labor, women and children as sex slaves.
1
Denying Islam to be a religion is the same nonsense the Nazis applied to Judaism. And it's just as false in the present context as it was then. On the other hand, "organized" religions in general do impose behavioral expectations upon their adherents--Christianity no less than the rest. And cultures are constructed from the habit and expectation of such behaviors. Some religious peoole choose to derive meta-historical inferences from day-to-day political, societal, environmental events, and seek to act to influence them at a similarly abstracted level. Such thinking--and acting-- is "religion" par excellence.
1
Ok gang, let's go over it again, what history has taught us.
Marx got it right, religion is a drug, or at least a form of a drug.
When used in moderation it can be like two glasses of fine wine, very nice. However when abused as with the Catholic religion you get the dark ages, child sexual abuse etc.
What modern islam did to pervert it was to mix church and state in many of their countries like in the Middle East with the resulting horror story, endless wars between jews, muslims and christians or within muslim sects.
Thank God we had the founding father to create separation of church and state and Lincoln for saving it otherwise we would be in the same horror story as in the Middle East.
We would have a protestant country south, a deist, atheist country in Calif., a Catholic country in the North and a state of Israel in NYC and killing each there for the last 250 yrs. instead of enjoying the religious peace we have now.
6
@Paul
If things were as you say, neither Catholics nor Jews would have been allowed into the colonies in the first place. Furthermore, the colonies would never have broken from Britain to become the United States and we would all be Anglicans. And since the Revolution was as much a fight over not being allowed to move west over the mountains into "Indian" territories because Britain forbade it after the French and Indian War (aka Seven Years War in Europe) as it was over taxes or tyranny, Thomas Jefferson (who was a radical Francophile) would never have been able to purchase "Louisiana", we would have fought for England in the Napoleonic Wars, and California would be Spanish and therefore Catholic along with the rest of the Rocky Mountain West.
I don't much like playing "what if" history because it's an exercise in futility but if you are going to play you can't base outcomes on steps that never would have happened if you've already removed the steps that led to them in the first place. The South was far more Anglican/Episcopalian than Protestant. Anglicanism/Episcopalianism were just Henry XIII's way to escape the Pope in Rome and his refusal to allow him to keep marrying, divorcing, and killing wives until he got a son. The Archbishop of Canterbury replaced the Pope, and that's why the many radical Protestant sects are to be thanked for separation of church and state which really originates in the Virginia constitution Jefferson wrote with the Baptists.
1
I find it bizarre that whether Islam is a bona fide religion is being questioned, whereas Scientology, a money-making scheme developed by a science fiction writer, is advertising for converts on our local radio stations here in Tennessee.
Go figure.
11
Fundamentalist, unreformed, organized religion is a pox on humanity be it Christian, Judaism, Hinduism, or Islam. Islam leads the pack of unreformed religions and has intense brain washing and violent internal controls to stop any possible reforms. It is 7th century thinking and incompatible with our Bill of Rights...especially separation of church and state. It is totally opposed to women's rights. We would be stupid to import it or encourage it. We already have enough fundamentalist religious crazies in this country without adding to our problems.
11
If history has taught us anything, it's that when Muslims are in the minority they demand "religious liberty." But the moment Muslims are in the majority, they crack the whip, and religious liberty for everyone else goes out the window.
31
@Noodles I think that comes under the rubric of "Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely". Which is why religious institutions should never be given absolute political power and separation of church and state maintained.
Speaking as someone whose own forebears were driven out of Massachusetts along with Roger Williams when Puritans held sway in that colony, I fear that Americans tend to be rather ignorant of all religions but their own and therefore too often are intolerant of other ones.
Fortunately, there are excellent books available for anyone who would like to know more about other religions. I would particularly recommend the books written by Katherine Armstrong, especially A History of God: The 4,000-Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam.
6
I think many people are ignorant of their own religions and use “sound-bites” rather than seeking knowledge to learn how their religion fuels their personal growth. It takes effort to do that. It’s easier to repeat biases you hear rather than understanding their emptiness. The problem occurs when people exhibit certainty about their religions and when they are in the majority. Adam and Eve were punished for eating fruit from the Tree of Knowledge. Important lesson for those who say the believe the Bible literally, I think.
@SCReader
I believe you mean "Karen" Armstrong.
1
Virtually every argument advanced against Islam here can be applied to the Southern Baptist Convention, a "church" that is, and always has been, a political party. It was founded in 1845 as church distinct from the Baptist church because of the SBC's support for slavery, assertion that the Bible supported race-based slavery and the issue of pro-slave parishioners serving as missionaries. It still unabashedly supports right-wing political candidates and specific political issues.
So how is the SBC different from Islam as described here?
17
"The idea that Islam, which has over 1.6 billion adherents worldwide ..."
I see this number bandied about a lot. It may be factual, technically, but the truth is that a vast number of these people have no choice but to identify as Muslim. In some of the largest Muslim countries such as Pakistan, Bangladesh, Iran and Saudi Arabia, there is no viable alternative except death. Even in "secular" Muslim countries like Turkey and Indonesia, life must be increasingly difficult for the tiny percentage of the population who believe in a different god or no god at all.
Religion should be totally separate from the workings of the state. Until Islam embraces this idea wholeheartedly then for all practical purposes it should be treated as a political ideology. As other readers have pointed out, the same principle, of course, should be applied to evangelical Christians.
24
Religious oppression is a venerable American tradition.
Puritans eagerly executed Quakers and imprisoned Baptists. Their desire to flee religious oppression was rivaled by their desire to create religious oppression. The tradition lives on.
13
How curious.
Everything said by Christians is exactly my position on Christianity.
Or any other religion for that matter.
They are all a simple means for controlling others and specifically, females.
To tie this in to the other big story of the week, the Supreme Court, I suspect that the time has come for the SC to finally define exactly what a religion is.
I'm sick of carrying their tax-load and tired of them sticking their noses into my anatomy.
I want the SC and the Justices to lay it out exactly what a religion is... or isn't.
I want doctrine defined.
Dogma.
Ritual.
Laws.
Heavens.
Hells.
Pastors, priests, reverends, popes, nuns, deacons.....
I think we are well past the time for this.
Big deal that the Christians are out to get the Muslims.
There are, literally, 4,000+ denominations of Christianity.
Let's define it and see how many still apply.
Kavanaugh will be delighted to help sort this out!
5
Offensive as the argument is, Islam itself creates an opening by including a vast swath of secular activities within the scope of what it seeks to regulate. Of course, so does Judaism and Christianity in their more fundamentalist incarnations.
It's important to parse: to the extent it acts a religious belief system Islam deserves the same protections afforded to any religion. To the extent it instead acts as a system for social governance, it does not. It is an embarrassment, for example, that New York state treats Orthodox Jewish yeshivas as an equivalent to basic education. That is a problem with politicians pandering to single-issue constituents who vote as blocks, but it should not be a precedent for allowing religion to usurp core functions of the state.
In America, state and religion are required to be separate. Policing the line requires constant vigilance, the price of religious freedom. Like any religion, Islam deserves the benefit of the latter, but must be subordinate to the former.
155
Almost every holy book has some instructions and applications for secular life, because the concept of "secular" is an invention of the last few centuries. Keep in mind that basic banking services were banned in Europe for centuries because of religious prohibitions against "usury", and ironically many European Jews were forced into money-lending as one of the few lines of work not prohibited to them by the state. Where suitable accommodations for religious principle can be made (religious dress, etc), there is little reason not to make such accommodation; heck, I have no issue with religious education so long as it meets all the requirements of any other educational facility. But singling out Islam for having rules impacting the "secular" is to ignore all other religious history in favor of revisionism.
@NLG
Amen to that.
As an ex-catholic, I find more and more that I want freedom FROM religion rather than freedom OF religion. I want this country to be as secular as possible, and I think everyone should keep their crazy beliefs AT HOME. I don't want to know about it - if I can determine someone's religion just by looking at them, I am put off by that. Perhaps that's unfortunate, but far too much evil has been committed in the name of god for me to look at it any other way.
@NLG actually, Christianity itself has separation of church and state BUILT IN. Christ said render unto Caesar that which is his. He taught his kingdom is in heaven, not on this earth - ergo, dispelling the notion of theocracy here. even the apostles, stating their interpretations and what they will do with the gospel, stated there are no rituals.
Christianity is inherently the most 'liberal' religion, while Islam is the most extreme form of monotheism and theocracy. There absolutely is no separation.
2
As a non-religious person, I find most religions to have a political bent. Evangelicals strongly work their belief system in schools, politics around abortion, the very nature of laws and governance of the country. Jewish people largely support APAC and the Israeli state and promote US policy and politics to support their beliefs. Hard to not see the Mormon faith no affecting the position of elected officials in Utah. That said, our Constitution is specifically designed to protect people's beliefs and bend over backwards to not create a system of national religion. Islam is 100% a religion and deserves the protections afforded religions that the mainstream may not belief in.
56
@Chris Precisely! It doesn't actually matter if "Islam is not even a religion; it is a political system that uses a deity to advance its agenda of global conquest.” as the Xenophobe from Ohio says. Even in this case, we protect this speech, and the right to it.
Also, that description very much applies to more than half of the Christian sects in America.
There are no Islamic laws.
The faith is strictly voluntary and the matter or personal choice.
The laws are man-made, mandatory and repressive.
Those two are fully incompatible categories.
The faith is not mandatory at all because it is in our best interest, thus there is nobody to enforce it as prescribed and defined by the Holy Book.
In contrast, the laws are mandatory and enforced by the humans – the police officers and the courts!
1
Only John Lennon had it right in "Imagine." Sadly, this ( American) attack is not about "religion." It is about power and control.
1
What we should do is eliminate all exemptions for religions. After all, why should we subsidize organizations composed of delusional people that believe in a mythological being.
There is no valid reason for religions to avoid paying taxes on their properties and income like the rest of us.
And, for all of you people pointing to the sky to your imaginary "god".....we live on a sphere and, as a result, everyone on it may be pointing upwards but all are pointing in a different direction.
14
Anyone who thinks that Islam is not a religion should visit a mosque to witness first hand the spiritual joy of adherents.
32
@Michael Anasakta Spiritual joy is also, unfortunately, experienced by those committing terrible acts.
9
@Michael Anasakta so then by your measurement star wars is a religion. go to a convention and witness first hand the spiritual joy of its fans
Onward Christian soldier marching as to war?, or I bring a sword?
Just wondering.
1
Just ask the Republicans: Islam is not a religion because they have not found Christ.
2
Ms. Uddin does not put forth any argument contradicting the idea that Islam is a political and not a religious entity as put forth by the people she quotes.
15
@Robert Topper
The burden of proof is not on Ms. Uddin. It is on those Christians, opining from their myopic point of view, who would claim the right to decide whose beliefs constitute a legitimate religion.
6
Interestingly, while the author doesn’t counter the claims that Islam is more ideology than religion she also fails to explore the notion that this claim applies equally to most branches of Christianity. Since it’s official adoption by the late Roman Empire until recent times all authority in the west has come through divine right and the religious Neo-right ask to return to this all the time. This is why there is and needs to be strict separation as the founders clearly intended. A constitution that can be overthrown by god isn’t worth a damn.
2
Any religion, Islam being one of them, ought to have liberty to practice it's beliefs, and dogma, as it wishes....as long as it is not imposed on others. The beauty in the U.S. -thus far- is the constitutional freedom from any given religion, allowing the law to be applied equally to all, and all the protections it implies. Have we forgotten that many immigrants have come to this country because of religious persecutions in their own?
5
Perhaps the author might want to review what Ayaan Hirsi Ali has said, and written, about Islam....or Sam Harris.
17
@Shenoa you may want to read the old testament then comment on what Judaism and Christianity are when practiced by the orthodox. It resembles Islam when practiced by their orthdox
Except Old Testament is not followed literally by any significant number of people to make a difference, unlike many in Islam who pine for life as it was during 7th century in Arabia!
6
Unless, of course, the topic is homosexuality. Then Leviticus is cherry-picked and quoted repeatedly.
1
US history is filled with religious discrimination, dating back to Anne Hutchison when she questioned the leaders of the Puritans. JFK as a catholic was a worrisome candidate. And on and on. If it isn't white, male, and protestant, it was different, And different was not good. So they attacked it. So, you wonder why the leaders of the world laugh at the US, or Trump in this case, because the hypocrisy of US history is living in the body of Trump as he stands there spewing ideology of sovereignty and patriotism. Whose sovereignty and patriotism? White, male, protestant. If that's not you, move on.
4
In that case Fundamentalist and Evangelical Christianity are also a political ideologies that use a deity to advance their agenda of global conquest and therefore are not religions. And the Roman Catholic Church has been playing that role for hundreds of years. Just ask the Moors driven from Spain during the Spanish Inquisition. Jesus wept, indeed.
19
I don't disagree that Islam is a religion (and political system). But what religious liberty does Saudi Arabia, Iran, Pakistan or Afghanistan accord Christians?
18
@Atlantis
It's true that some countries have unjust laws of religious discrimination. However, those are the laws of their governments, not laws embedded in the religion. Secondly, if your implication is that the US should retaliate by creating mirror image discriminatory laws, I think you miss the point of America's Constitution.
5
So, your point is that, because other nations do not grant religious freedom, we are justified in doing the same? What do thise nations have to do with our Constitutionally guaranteed rights?
"“Islam is not even a religion; it is a political system that uses a deity to advance its agenda of global conquest.” "
It has been GOP strategy for a number of years to accuse others of what the GOP itself is guilty of. Much of the Evangelical and RC factions of the GOP have become little more than tax-exempt PACs. They seek not religious freedom but religious privilege, the privilege of telling others, mostly women, of what they can and cannot do.
8
@The Poet McTeagle, I agree with you - deeply - in this extent - it IS a rhetorical device, practiced since the days of the Ancient Greeks (if not in fact before then) to accuse others of what you yourself are guilty.
If Debate were still a subject taught in school, this fact would be more known. Then, perhaps less people would fall for it.
As a practicing Catholic, I don't believe that spirituality, or even organized religion, is at fault. I think it's when extreme members of any organized religion perverts their "beliefs" and thinks they can and should impose them onto others. I don't understand how anyone can oppress others let alone cause violence, injury and death in the name of a God. It was done during the Crusades, when the Europeans went to "convert" Africa, when the Puritans ruled New England, and other times too numerous to mention. Beware of fundamentalist anything.
76
@A woman
Powerful post, thanks.
2
@A woman
The Crusades were not to "convert" Africa. They were to recover formerly Christian lands and cities (e.g., Antioch and Jerusalem) conquered by Muslims.
Let's mention that all three Abrahamic religions approve of slavery (St. Paul: Slaves obey your masters); that adherents of all three participated in the African slave trade (from West Africa and East Africa); that slavery was only made formally illegal in Brazil and Cuba (Catholic countries) in 1888 (this year is the 130th anniversary), and that the last country to do so was Saudi Arabia in 1964.
Let's also remember that the anti-abortion and anti-contraception mob are trying and succeeding in getting their version of sharia passed in the United States, despite supposed separation of church and state. All true believers always seek ways to ram their beliefs down the throats of "infidels".
Btw, let those states which have passed anti-sharia laws be aware that their legislative attacks on gay rights are enforcement of sharia law and therefore, by their own legislation, illegal.
1
There is no one official version of Islam. The tiny minority of Muslim extremist are treated , in the West, as if the speak for all Muslims. But, let us not forget the others including Muslim Sufi who outnumber the fundamentalist . As a Muslim who believe in the Sufi peaceful path. "Ours is not a caravan of despair". I will remind you of the following Rumi verses about the Islam I believe in:
Come, come, whoever you are.
Wonderer, worshipper, lover of leaving.
Ours is not a caravan of despair.
Come, even if you have broken your vow
a thousand times
Come, yet again, come, come.
7
@Hussein ABdelGalil
Unfortunately, Rumi’s poetry is not the guiding principle of Islam today...nor ever.
5
Sufi is peaceful but had a minor influence on Islam than the so called extremists who by the way are not really fringe in Islam. The extremists are a significant portion of Islam.
Many of the 'so called' Christians are just that: Christian In Name Only.
Cafeteria Christians....they pick which parts of the (Catholic Church Approved) Bible and ignore the fact that Jesus taught love and tolerance....and told us NOT to Judge others.
10
A religion is a ‘system of beliefs’. Thus if you believe on it, you can say it is your religion. Thus you cannot decide ‘this is a religion’ and ‘this is not’.
Since it is protected by the First Amendment, then you cannot go around telling people that their system of beliefs is not valid.
What is not valid is a ‘religious’ code of law that denies little girls an education, keeps women suppressed, hidden away like a shameful property, allows the marriage of 50+ men with 9 year old girls, and who ordains people to murder others who do not believe like you.
I do not think this country has a real issue with ‘religion’, but it has a real issue with the suppression of people in the name of a god.
6
@AutumLeaff. Sounds like you're suggesting that evangelical Christianity needs to be kept on a short leash as "not valid."
Ironically, every accusation these right wing Christians launch at Islam applies with full force to their Christianity as well.
2
Many 'Christians' believe that women are second class citizens who should honor and obey even when they are the victims of spousal abuse. Women should be'barefoot and pregnant'. Subjugation of women is a common theme in many religions.
2
"...almost half of all American adults believed that “at least some” American Muslims are anti-American..."
Well, it's true. It's also true that at least some Christian Americans are anti-American and at least some atheists are anti-American.
15
@tanstaafl
Yours is a sad, misguided post.
Religion has NOTHING to do with being "Anti-American".
Atheist are NOT "Anti American", and for you to post such foolishness claiming they are, shows the limits of your ability to separate two distinct thoughts.
2
@Paul P. All tanstaafl is saying is that any belief system is going to have a fringe.
There always have existed Americans who suffer a psychological need for an enemy. The clerics and politicians supposedly leading congregants and constituents, who play the lie that Islam is not a religion, have just found the evil de jure that they can use to maintain their power. They want their followers to stay spiritually immature. They want their followers to believe that anyone who is outside a narrow definition of acceptability is automatically evil. The need for an enemy is always present in each us. It is weak in most people; but for the ministers and politicians who rely upon fear to keep their power it is a characteristic that these so-called leaders gin up as though fanning a fire. The ability of these leaders to keep up bonfires of hate servers the desire to maintain a culture of fear, hatred, hostility and belligerence.
This is the way of fascists. Select an enemy, create a culture of hate against that enemy and justify the destruction of that enemy.
3
The problem is that Islam isn't freely chosen by most of its adherents. It's imposed on them at birth and if they choose to convert to another religion or reject religion altogether they will not merely be rejected from their family and community but hunted down and killed. That's not religious freedom.
19
@Cloudy that's the case almost (minus the killing) of many orthodox religions. NOT news.
What religion isn’t imposed on kids from birth?
1
@Cloudy My parents didn't ask me my opinion when they had me baptized Catholic at the age of one week.
What is curious to me is that the very people who claim Islam is trying to take over the US, are the same people who create laws based on Christianity. The same people who, when they talk about "bringing back the old days," and reinstilling values into US society, are talking about a Christian-centric world view.
They are fine with pushing Christian values on those US citizens who are not Christian--Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, etc.
For the record, I'm Catholic. When conservative politicians start spouting off about values and morals, I get worried. My Christianity is not their Christianity. Some of them would not consider me a Christian at all.
There's reasons why we have the First Amendment. There is no state religion in the US, not even Christianity.
7
Of course Islam is a religion. The ugly suspicion about it is in the great American tradition of ugly suspicion of Roman Catholicism and Judaism. In both cases, huge American battlefield losses of members of those faiths in the Civil War, World War I, and World War II made it clear to the nation that these groups' patriotism was secure. If a few hundred thousand Muslim young men and women were to enlist, become soldiers, and fight and die for America, any suspicion about Islam would be over in a generation.
1
@Observer of the Zeitgeist American Muslims do enlist in the armed service, and do fight. That doesn't seem to make any difference to many of the posters here.
When Trumpf gets his 5-4 majority Roman Catholic Supreme Court very soon, I suspect the Federalist Society goal will be achieved: a special carve out in the Constitution for godists to discriminate on the basis of religious liberty. Then Leviticus and Shari'a can be used to justify mistreating American citizens.
3
Whats the point of this article. This is a Christian country which allows you to practice your religion sure we have many religious groups. I don't fear muslims they can worship or do whatever they do. If you are insisting upon recognition then the authour should have looked at all the muslim countries of the world and ask one question. Do they recognise Christianity? Please don't do double standards here trying to promote Islam as a 'suffragette' community.
9
@Singhrao
Who cares what other counties do with Christianity? We aren’t discussing other counties, only America. Do you also look to other countries as to how they are addressing climate change in arguing for American climate change action? Because other countries are addressing climate change far more effectively than the US. Until you use your deflective “other countries” argument in all areas of American law, don’t do it with religion.
3
All Muslims the world over not only “recognize” Christianity it is in the enshrined in our 6 beliefs of a Muslim that even a 5 year old can recite. Belief in One God, belief in the Hereafter, belief in the angels, belief in all the preceding prophets, belief in the holy books and belief in our own prophet. The only chapter named for a woman is named after Mary, mother of the Prophet Jesus. Whether dictatorial theocracies protect their minority citizens is the question you need to be asking.
6
@Singhrao
"Whats the point of this article. This is a Christian country which allows you to practice your religion sure we have many religious groups."
The point of this article is that the Christians in government (at various levels, county, state, etc.) are preventing Muslims from following their religion in accordance with the law and constitution. The answer to your question is that your second sentence is not what is put in practice.
2
It is not the role of lawmakers to dabble as theologians. If a group follows the teachings of a deity, and assembles to worship together, they are entitled to First Amendment Freedom of Religion. That should be good enough for any court of law. Period.
7
Sharia, Sharia law, or Islamic law (Arabic: شريعة (IPA: [ʃaˈriːʕa])) is a religious law forming part of the Islamic tradition.[1] It is derived from the religious precepts of Islam, particularly the Quran and the Hadith. In Arabic, the term sharīʿah refers to God's immutable divine law and is contrasted with fiqh, which refers to its human scholarly interpretations.
3
Similarly, Christianity is increasingly a political ideology in the US (right Mr. Pence?) and certainly Judaism is a political ideology in Israel. Dare I mention Hinduism in India?
6
The irony is that very few Muslims, especially in the U.S., would prefer Sharia as a basis of civil law. The vast majority of Muslim immigrants migrated here for a chance to live under clear and fair non-religious civil law. Go to any mosque in L.A. and ask the Iranian immigrants if they'd like to return to Iran and its theocracy. There is quite simply no plot to spread Islamic law in the U.S.
81
@Josh FALSE. the majority who are interviewed would choose sharia, they're documented as saying as such. the 'majority' you are referring to are the ones that use the taqqiya and kitman saying "Oh the two are compatible!"
Know what? We should get rid of all laws pertaining to freedom of religion, for ALL religions. No more tax breaks, no more "under God", no more "God Bless America", none of it for Christians, Jews, Muslims or any of the other religious sects in this country.
Sure we can have freedom of religion, you are free to worship whatever god you wish, but in private. You want to worship in a church with others? Fine, but you pay taxes on the real estate.
No more religion on the airwaves, no more trying to convert others to your belief system. You want to believe the Bible or the Koran or the Torah is how you should live your life, do it in your own home.
Total separation of church and state. Enough killing and power struggles over who has the better imaginary friend. The things the human race could accomplish without these inane wars and conflicts.....
12
I don't see anything wrong with legislation aimed at preventing Shariah Law. I don't believe the US is at risk of being taken over by Shariah, but the fact remains that it is a brutal, ignorant, undemocratic system that terrorizes women, homosexuals, nonbelievers and anyone else considered deviant, across huge swaths of the world.
13
@Samuel Russell -I assume from your post that you would also ban the Laws of Kashrut, and the labeling of foods as Kosher. And that you would ban Rabbinical Courts from settling disputes and granting religious divorces? How kind (of insane) of you.
6
@Samuel Russell, already been done, and DONE.
The Supremacy Clause of the Federal Constitution (Article VI, Clause 2) establishes that the Constitution, federal laws made pursuant to it, and treaties made under its authority, constitute the supreme law of the land.
It is therefore constitutionally NOT POSSIBLE that Shariah Law could EVER replace it.
replace 'Islam' in this article with Christianity, and there's hardly any changes. tell me that proselytizing fundamentalist Christians don't do exactly the same thing?
4
And Christianity and Judaism are not political systems as well as religions? Ask the Vatican. Ask Israel.
9
@William O, Beeman
Ask Mike Pence and Betsy DeVos Christian Dominionists who are depending on ramming Kavanaugh’s confirmation through in order to begin reversing decades of civil rights for women, gays, and people of color so they can enforce a white Christian theocracy on the US.
4
Somehow , in the midst of writing my comment, it posted itself...incomplete.
....and as the Koran features in the Islamic religion ,the right winged Evangelists have insisted that this country stick to their interpretations of the Bible to guide the government(see Pence & Sessions),It seems like a calculated attempt by Evangelists to separate Islam from any eventual religious freedom laws that they want to force on us. Be warned and resist.
3
The absurdity and racism of this argument astounds me.
1
Scientology is in the club now, You should be okay. Start worrying when they come for your tax exemption.
1
There are so many parallels with Islam fundamentalism and Christian Evangelistism , that you could write a book. For Evangelists to suggest that Islam is not a religion indicates the corruption of Christian fundamentalism. We hear the right winged Islamic factions adhere and insist that their interpretation of the Koran be the only policy to run a country.
4
While your point is theoretically true, unless you have an agenda against evangelicals, it’s hard not to notice that evangelicals are not and will never be able to change our country to be as bad as even the most moderate Islamic majority country. Please have some consideration to the scale of religious influence and negative effects in USA vs many countries where Islam is majority or even a significant minority.
Just based on history, christians are the biggest hypocrites on the planet. They'll try to pass laws discriminating against Islam even though the Constitution expressly forbids it. This is no doubt the same crowd that believes reverse discrimination against whites is a bigger problem than racism against blacks.
6
The last time I read the Quran I immediately noticed that the Sharia law wasn’t a part of it at all, thus it cannot be the part of the faith either because those are the man-made laws created long after the Holy Book was completed and delivered.
If the Muslims claim the Holy Book consists of the direct God’s Commandments and recommendations, then they shouldn’t make themselves equal to the Almighty by equating the verses coming from God with the earthly laws created by the ancient tribesmen.
Prove me wrong and I will freely admit I am the worst fool in this universe.
1
Oh my gosh talk about projecting. Conservative Christians claiming Islam is just religious window dressing on a political ideology.
4
If the theocratic Muslim countries are so wonderful why are there so many of them leaving to come here? Dragging their stone age baggage right along with them. No thanks.
11
There'll always be some Christians and some Muslims who want to fight each other. I wouldn't care one bit about either if they'd quit trying to drag the rest of us into their mess as well.
2
Thanks for sharing the angst of so many GOD loving people. We are all children of GOD. Wish everyone extended respect to others to the same extent they wished to receive.
4
I once asked a Muslim historian what he thought of Hinduism, and he opened up:
"Hinduism is not a religion;
Hindus don't have a religion.
They don't have a Khuda or Allah.
Sometimes they worship the sky,
sometimes the sun,
sometimes the earth,
sometimes mountain peaks,
sometimes fire,
sometimes rivers,
sometimes trees,
sometimes plants,
sometimes cows,
sometimes monkeys,
sometimes snakes.
Even rats.
Often, they worship human beings,
dead or alive, as gods.
Almost all worship protagonists in their longer works of literature.
One can never tell
whom or what they will next turn into a god.”
10
@Bush Gulati
Indeed, Hindus worshiped millions of gods and demigods. Indra, the head of Vedic Hindu pantheon shared the honor with many pre-Christian Slavic tribes. Hindus, like other Indo-European pagans, adopted gods freely from other tribes and civilizations. Many aimed to become 'god' by yoga and meditation. Some were atheists and agnostics. At least one propagated 'materialism.
After exposure to the Abrahamic faiths some adopted the One God myth and the firm belief that other religions are superstitions.
"...is not even a religion; it is a political system that uses a deity to advance its agenda of global conquest.” This sounds like one of the best descriptions of Christianity I have heard. It certainly applies more to Christianity than any other religion, as the Christian world certainly dominates in the world, and certainly in the US.
21
@Larry Figdill As in " the U.S. is a christian nation".
1
@Douglas Lowenthal you need to read Madison and Jefferson on religion and church and state.
This is an interesting debate whether Islam is a religion or polity. Islam is both a religion and a polity, that is what many clerics believe. Islam is not only an ethical ideal it is also a certain kind of polity. Religion for a Muslim is not a matter of private conscience or private practice as Christianity can be for the man in the West. To accept Islam is to accept certain "legal concepts" these concepts revelatory have civic significance. Islam demands rule according to Sharia, a body of rules and regulations that are fundamentally at odds with modernity. You cannot deny that politics is combined with religion in Islam.
14
@Padman This is only true for the devout Muslim, but the same can be said for the devout Christians who seem to constantly want to shape our laws and our society, from banning abortion to proscribing the teaching of Creationism. Don't pretend that Christians are just offering a different flavor of the same thing. Painting with a broad brush does not help.
2
@Padman Ever hear of the Talmud? A legal book studied, and used in many civil and marital disputes ruled on in Rabbinical courts, for dozens of centuries. FYI rabbinical courts exist everywhere where Judaism is practiced in the present day. Would you ban that as well?
3
Well it seems undeniable that Islam and the Q'uran are intrinsically more political than biblical Christianity. It seems to be about as political as, say, biblical Judaism, which also defines a polity and the rules which should govern it. These issues come up for very Orthodox Jews in the United States, too, as certain communities feel overwhelmed by the sheer numbers of Orthodox and their insistence on Shabbat observance, modest dress, etc. Religion is not the problem, but religious fundamentalism of any color may not be compatible with Western democracy.
19
@rob just takeout the word religious i your last sentence and you have it.
1
Fascinating. Also interesting to tie in with the originalism argument that will be popular in our new and improved Supreme Court. I have always thought that the Founders concept of freedom of religion was freedom to be a Christian of one type or another. I doubt they were concerned with providing religious freedom for Muslims, Hindus, Sikhs or, for that matter, even Jews. We have regressed about 200 years or so.
8
@Disillusioned
We in the Western world have not regressed but progressed to the point where we respect the freedom of religion for any and all religions.
2
@Disillusioned
The founders wrote the first amendment using Islam as an example why it was needed in the constitution: https://www.usnews.com/opinion/articles/2015/01/27/islam-has-a-long-stan...
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/why-thomas-jeffer...
2
Of course Islam is a religion. And also a political system, the results of which can be seen in the official misogyny, suppressed civil rights and intolerance of most Islamic societies. If Islamic immigrants wish to import these systems, which are truly antithetical to American democratic values, rather than assimilate to America (which does not require religious conversion of any sort), then why are they even coming? Islamic immigrants adapting to America are just as welcome as all the many immigrant groups over the centuries who have adapted and some of which have maintained cultural and religious identity. Those who insist on importing abhorrent customs, such as suppression of female freedom, raise the question of how far a tolerant U.S. can tolerate intolerance.
78
@anwesend
You have no idea what you are talking about. Please do not confuse Fox News propaganda with one the greatest world religions.
7
Islam and suppression of female freedom, reminds me of Christianity and their attempt to suppress female freedom.
4
@anwesend "Official misogyny, suppressed civil rights and intolerance" is also characteristic of many christian sects. Look at the evangelicals.
3
Go on line and google religious groups in America if you have the time to read through them. In America and Canada, any monkey's uncle can register a cult as a religious organization and enjoy a tax free life; can you say Scientology, Branch Dravidian. There are six long standing, historically traceable, legitimate religions in the world: Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hindu, Sikh and Buddist. Each has its off shoots who have strayed a ways from the core of the religion but they stem from the authentic origins; Christian Conservatives (Christians in name Only) a clear example of being of course. How dare they imply that they can decide what is considered a religion.
One thing legitimate God loving, God fearing Christians like myself know for sure is that the Mulligan crowd known as the Christian Conservatives along with Trump, his family and his enablers will be loaded onto the down elevator when they meet our maker.
14
Thoughts:
English philosopher and political theorist John Locke (1632-1704) laid much of the groundwork for the Enlightenment:
1. The growing development and influence of scientific rationalism which was supported by both Protestants and Roman Catholics;
2. A growing free-market economy supported by an increasingly educated middle-class;
3. Growing support for parliamentary democracy .
Muslim rationalism, as put forward by the Mu’tazila, and the discipline of rational theological discourse, kalam, have been condemned as heretical by mainstream traditionalist Islam since the 10th century. Until this changes, and rationalism and kalam are accepted by Muslim culture, Lockean ideas can find no support.
Each proselytizing religion thinks its Way is the only Way, its Truth the only Truth, and that its duty to God and religion is to impose that Way and Truth on Others.
Proselytizing religions are intolerant and, more often than not, take their intolerance to an extreme level.
27
You are not suggesting that good faithful christians would ever try to impose their way on non-believers, are you?
1
Arguing that Islam is not a religion is going to be a heavy lift, but I'm willing to hear the case. Step one, define what makes a religion. If by some miracle a definition can be constructed that is widely agreed upon, we may proceed.
11
IRS definition of a church
Established time and place for worship Identifiable creed and liturgy
History Ecclesiastical government Ordained leaders who've studied
A religion is a system of beliefs unsupported by facts.
3
Those who make this charge against Islam would do well to study how Southerners and other white supremacists used Christianity to justify slavery and segregation. Theirs was a political and an economic system. In practice, how different was it from Shariah law? Fanatics and true believers have always been dangerous, no matter which God they claim to be following.
59
@Randall Don't forget the Crusades.
There is a degree of truth to the idea that religions are also political organizations; this is not unique to Islam. Christianity at one point was synonymous with the Catholic church which was very political in much of the middle ages, vying with kings and emperors for control of the populace, and even fielding armies and engaging in warfare.
This attempt to marginalize a religion is not new in America. For much of the early 20th century there was a strong anti-Catholic bias due to the heavy flow of Catholic immigrants from Italy and Ireland. John F. Kennedy was the first, and only, Roman Catholic president of the US. In that era it was believed by right wingers that there was a Catholic conspiracy to insinuate itself into our government. This of course is exactly what is going on today with Islamic immigrants.
16
Is isn't it obvious that the "church" is the political arm of religion, where by "church" we mean any organized religious body: christian, islam, jewish, shinto, buddhists, whatever ?
6
the only religion i have and faith in and truly lifts the hearts of all humans is Music.
Music is religion and i do not want any tax incentives to continue with my faith.
church service is open ended for life. pretty neat religion.
5
@daniel r potter Why cant music just be music? Does it make your heart any lighter to call it your religion, or is this just your way of saying that you do not believe in any religion? I think music is better just being music. There have been more murders and wars and oppression on this planet in the name of religion. You can not say anyone was ever murdered because of music. Better to just enjoy your music with a pure heart and leave religion to the religious.
4
@Mark He just wants the tax breaks that churches get for believing whatever they choose to believe. Sounds fair to me. How about if we call it liturgy? I myself am partial the church of holy cannabis.
I am surprised that Prof Uddin is surprised by this attitude of some Americans, especially Republicans, This attitude is not specific to Islam and also covers other belief systems, especially Eastern religion such as Hinduism, Buddhism etc. Sikh faith has been a persistent target for quite some time. In short, if you donn't belong to a specific version of Christian faith, you have no religious right, no matter what the law or constitution says. This type of discrimination is overt in totalitarian countries like Saudi Arabia, but covert in US.
8
Islam being a political ideology with a spiritual element is the description given by ex-Muslim Ayaan Hirsi Ali. When one studies it, it's doctrine, theology, history and law, one finds out she is correct in her assessment. None of the faiths of the West (like Christianity or Judaism) much less of the East (like Buddhism of Hinduism) have the ideology Islam has. It's doctrine, theology and law is well-developed making any dissent or changes to Islam extremely difficult. The million dollar question is: do Muslims as a whole and the Islamic clerics who interpret and give sermons and issue declarations to Muslims want Islam to change?
21
@AZRandFan Just wondering if you have a specific example of any malady visited upon you by a Muslim or through the action of a Muslim -- more so than by, say, a Christian?
3
@Jeffrey Yes. I talked at length with a Muslim I met who was from Uzbekistan and he said my knowledge of Islam was correct.
Bennett "Islam is... a political system that uses a deity to advance its agenda of global conquest" Remove 'Islam', insert 'Evangelical Christianity'. Fits pretty well doesn't it? Evangelicals in particular try to infect the US military. I have little doubt how they would use it if they had the chance. This is classic conservative 'projection': claiming that your nemesis is guilty of what you yourself are guilty of. They are both religions, and both have a global agenda. Its the rest of us who must find ways to encourage the former while preventing the latter.
The people who wrote our Constitution, European refugees of things like the Thirty Years War of Protestants against Catholics (in which half the people of Germany, in certain areas, died), thought they had made it pretty clear about the role religion should play in politics. We forget our own past to our peril.
20
"Islam is not even a religion; it is a political system that uses a deity to advance its agenda of global conquest."
Can you say, 'Crusades'?
Either way, no matter the religion, it needs to be completely separate from the rule of law applied to any peoples and/or the lands on which they reside.
19
Please learn some history. The Crusades were nothing cimpared to 1,400 years of Islamic conquest and imperialism. In fact, the Crusades were a response to 300 years of brutal Islamic oppression in the Holy Land.
3
@Rob
And the Crusades massacred Jews throughout Europe and Orthodox Christians galore when they sacked Constantinop
1
@Rob You need to dig a bit deeper.
1
If the author listens and takes seriously the ignorant rantings of legislators he will be in a constant state of anxiety.
Whatever it takes to be a religion is Islam is one. My objections to Islam are first it does not believe in seperation of church and state and secondly women are treated as second class citizens. In both regards Islam is not unique but shares the same beliefs with the Ultra Orthodox and most Evangelicals.
I am all for freedom of religiion as long as I can be free of religion.
43
@Edward Blau
You've got to stop with that fetish around Muslim women. They have more rights than you would imagine. 1400 years ago, Muslim women were given the right to divorce, to inherit, and when they work their income belongs to them only. And yes education is a right, too. Now, that some Muslims around the world follow tribal customs does not make Islam any less of a great religion.
3
Most 'free' countries give citizens the right to be illogical, indoctrinated, afraid, etc. Contemplating our own mortality is tough on the brain so we like it softened somehow. Most religions do that, and as a bonus, offer some ethical tenets to live by. Many threaten a terrible price to pay if we don't, yet none of us can be certain. Conformity by group makes us less afraid. As a member of the oxy-moronic named 'spiritual atheists,' I side with scientists like the late Linus Pauling, who said "either you believe everything is a miracle or nothing is a miracle." We find for the former. Now is there any way we can get tax-exempt status?
4
Let us all get with the 21st Century.
These religions have many stone age beliefs and the status of women in all of them is completely unacceptable to a modern society.
27
I would like to see father-dominated authoritarian-God religions phased out by process of deterioration from within. Wouldn't that be nice and peaceful?
14
"It is a political system that uses a deity to advance its agenda of global conquest." Yes, that's the definition of a religion.
7
Islam is certainly a religion.
But like all of the others, it's certainly nothing to brag about.
And if you believe pointing a finger at the hypocrisy of the Christian religious right in this country will make your case stronger for your own religious "liberty", you are certainly barking up the wrong tree in this nation.
The separation of church and state in this country is much too narrow enough as it is. The assault on this separation since 1980 by Christian fundamentalists has done grave damage to the fabric of our laws with activist supreme court rulings and has ratcheted up the tension between the secular and the sectarian.
You are preaching to a very small choir here, and that choir is not even on your side.
12
Of Christianity, Judaism and islam, Judaism as evidenced by the Talmud, intended to specify every aspect of life. The same is true of Islam.
Except for a relatively short period of time and in a small geographic location, Judaism never had political control.
I suspect the control over life by Islam isn't much different than the control over life for the Tallmud. But I'm no expert.
6
Any impediment to Muslims practicing their faith in the U.S. would have to be considered unconstitutional. However, if practicing their faith includes adhering to Sharia Law, as followed in many Muslim nations, then there's a serious problem: Sharia Law has aspects that are clearly in conflict with the laws of our nation. Anyone who doubts that needs only to read what it entails.
24
@Teller As others have pointed out, this is hardly restricted to Islam. Within my own American Jewish community, these same structural conflicts over a particular type of circumcision, educational standards in yeshivot (religious schools in the Orthodox community) etc. share many of the same conflicts. I am saddened and angered by people who refuse to look around and see the widespread similarities among virtually all religious communities and the broader society.
Replying to@Teller
As I understand it, "Sharia law" is a fluid, country-specific set of principals which inform a religious community, much as Talmudic law and rabbinical interpretation promulgate rules and values in Judaism. There are several schools of interpretation, and the application of Sharia law in Saudi Arabia, for instance, is far more sweeping, atavistic and political than in the United States.
The vast majority of Muslims in the US regard Sharia law as a traditional fabric of rules shaping personal and business relations within the community, and recognize the authority of civil law in disputes which enter its sphere.
The more lurid practices within "fundamentalist" Sharia, such as revenge killing, which are serious crimes in civil law, are fortunately rare here; and they parallel examples involving members of some fundamental Christian sects whose beliefs rationalize atrocities.
Furthermore, US law is based on "foreign" jurisprudence, going all the way back to the Code of Hammurabi, almost four thousand years ago. The US Constitution did not invent all the principles it enshrined; most were inherited.
John Bennett, a Republican state legislator in Oklahoma, said in 2014, “Islam is not even a religion; it is a political system that uses a deity to advance its agenda of global conquest.”
----
Talk about the pot calling the kettle black... People who go about spouting this argument, especially those who identify themselves closely with Evangelical Christians, should pause and think when they attempt to bring their so-called Christian values into mainstream government and ram it down everyone's throats. They fail to realise that they are not too different from their Islamic fundamentalist counterparts.
“Christianity is not even a religion; it is a political system that uses a deity to advance its agenda of global conquest.”
This statement does not seem terribly far-fetched these days, does it? Sad.
11
NYT, please stop saying "religious liberty" when what you are talking about is theocracy. Christian fundamentalists demand "religious liberty" when they want to impose their religion on others.
13
The so-called Christians who are pushing to deny religious freedoms to those of others are not sincere Christians, they are "Donald Trump Christians," who believe:
1. God created mankind in his own image (that of a Caucasian male)
2. Lying, bullying and cheating are not sins when committed by Donald Trump
3. Religious and racial discrimination are perfectly acceptable when practiced BY Caucasian-Christians AGAINST non-Caucasian-Christians
4. In God's eyes, supporting Donald Trump is more important than following his teachings, so when the two conflict supporting Trump is ALWAYS the right answer
“I think every good Christian ought to kick [Jerry] Falwell right in the a-s.” – US Senator Barry Goldwater (Time Magazine, July 20 1981)
5
Isn't it funny that these far-right Christian advocates who spend millions of dollars in proselitizing their bizarre religious views throughout the world call other religions a threat? As for the fake argument regarding the islamic religion and politics, these Christian lunatics would be hard at task to find one example where the Islamic law has been implemented in the American public sphere. As usual with fanatics, it all boils down to ignorance and racism. They find it reassuring the stick to themselves, to recycle the dumbest form of hatred, rather than take that step to meet their neighbors, enter a mosque, and simply inquire with an open mind and an open heart.
4
Please be honest. I've never met an imam in support of gay marriage. A very high majority of religions do not sanctify gay marriage. Orthodox Jewish women wear wigs, the Amish women wear caps to cover their buns of hair, and Muslim women wear hijab (or horribly, niqab/burqa). Jewish boys (and most Christian boys) suffer circumcision, and Muslim girls suffer female genital mutilation. In some Muslim nations, gay men are persecuted or forced to present as transgender. Most religions are misogynistic, and Islam is the most misogynistic. As an atheist and a feminist, I do hesitate to open our boarders to South American Latino Catholics who perceive only misogynistic, pro-life priests as gateways to god. And to Muslims, as the expression of their faith is imposed on the women, who can't even experience a public warm day in shorts with the sensation of a breeze floating through their hair. But we see their husbands and sons in the community pool, shirts off and in swimming trunks. The type of freedom - a licentious freedom - you expect has its consequences. Americans must be cautious in allowing into the country immigrants who hold to a religious fundamentalism that is inherently oppressive of women. Women's freedom can be quickly lost if it's not guarded.
26
@Step
Too much nonsense to correct everything! But for your information: there is no such a thing as "genital mutilation" in Islam. Show us any reference to the contrary in the Quran or the Prophetic tradition, please.
It's like assuming that, based on the model of multi-million dollars churches in the US, Christianity is a religion for the rich, while the message of Jesus was geared toward the poors. Do you grasp the irony?
1
@Dauphin Female circumcision/mutilation is not mentioned in the quran but it is in the hadith and sunrah and is practiced more in muslim communities than in non-muslim.
I am not suggesting that this hideous prectice makes islam more barbaric than any other religion.
No doubt Islam is indeed a religion. One of the three main religions in the world and a close "cousin" of Christianity. HOWEVER... Islam has been usurped by many in their sick quest for power (ISIS, Iran, boko haram anyone?). So although I am for defending the rights of ALL religious views (including atheists), I am also not so naive as to omit the great harm that hijacked Islam has done to the world. Lets love Muslims, the vast majority of whom are decent people. But lets not give those who use "islam" with lowercase "i", a pass on the great harm they have done in the name of their religion.
7
Everyone needs freedom of religion. That includes people of any religious belief, and it includes agnostics and atheists. None of us should have someone else's beliefs forced on us or be discriminated against because we don't believe what someone else believes. The laws should be religiously neutral because we're all citizens, and we all deserve the same rights.
7
It would be more accurate to say that Islam is not ‘solely’ a religion. It’s also a political, economic, and social ideology...as stipulated in the Qur’an...adhering to a very specific judiciary...Shariah Law.
Christianity used to operate on a similar basis, but then underwent a reformation....centuries ago.
21
Let’s sum up the bad faith of conservatives
Baking a cake = Religion
Islam = Not a Religion.
Christian leaders mobilizing for a Supreme Court to outlaw practices = Not Politics
But the existence of sharia law means all Islam is political.
2
Honestly, I think the descriptor: "a political system that uses a deity to advance its agenda of global conquest" can be applied to Christianity as well. I'd love to see religion - of all varieties - fade away; the world, I believe, would be a better place.
15
It meets the legal definition of religion, We do have sharia law, we have to use Arabic numerals.
4
Modern Arabic numerals are different than what you are referring to.
It is a lot more complex than this facile treatment of the issue in question. There are nations where Islam and the government are joined at the hip, and religious freedom, much less separation of church and state doesn't exist. Of course, in past centuries and even as late as 1870 in Italy, Roman Catholicism preached a theocratic state and only grudgingly accepted religious pluralism where it had to, in majority Protestant countries. Since the 1960's they changed. Islam never formally did so.
Moreover, as the very terms Muslim and Islam convey, it is more than a set of dogmas or a holy book. It is a way of life as any practicing Muslim knows. It is a system of ordering everything in the society in which one lives, and allowing non-Muslims various levels of personal freedom, often deeply circumscribed.
While certain of our atheists would shout "It's all garbage, don't bore me with the details", facts as Adams said are stubborn things. So is history. Islam never had either a Reformation or the experience of the Enlightenment. All that said, of course for purposes of the First Amendment, courts should tread with utmost caution in determining what is and what is not a religion. They should err on the side of a broad interpretation, and to that extent only I agree with the authors.
13
@Unworthy Servant
If you are right, then Judaism is not a religion. Just look at Israel. Judaism as practiced there puts all other religions in second place, forces non-Jews to obey halacha, and has dreams of conquering the Middle East. In fact, Israel even puts American Jews in the position of being lesser Jews, secondary to the ultra-Orthodox.
Further, Christian Dominionists want to conquer the world and enforce their Christian version of Shariah on all mankind. They believe that non-Christians have no rights, and must be converted or suppressed. They have had no reformation and never renounced their plans.
Thus, Judaism and Christianity are not religions.
4
@Unworthy Servant
The United States is not subject to Protestant, Catholic, Jewish, Buddhist, or any other religious law.
Islam is no different. Regardless of what Muslims believe, their religion is no more likely to influence the law than the Pope.
The real danger in America is the influence of evangelical Christianity, which already is influencing what is supposed to be secular law.
6
@Unworthy Servant I don't believe many from outside Europe really understand democracy, and as far as a theocracy, the Puritans believed in a theocratic state too. nonetheless, when I look around Paterson NJ and see the veiled women with the kids, I see hard working folks who seem willing to meet America at least half way.
Islam, Christianity and Judaism, the Abrahamic religions, all share the characteristic of being focused on personal morality, i.e. having clear rules about personal behavior, which throughout history has been reflected in the organisation of the state, government, and laws.
When either religion has been in the overwhelming majority and in power, it has been the basis for the political system. Judaism has never been in the position to implement this since antiquity, but is now in Israel, and has been doing it. Christianity no longer is in most places. Islam is in many countries, but not in the western world - yet.
As for " “at least some” people doing or believing anything, who can ever legitimately claim that "no one" does - whatever the action or belief is?
5
Sadly the war on terror that has lasted two decades since the tragedy of 9/11 has allowed islamophobia to take hold. Our attitude towards Islam reminds me of my grandfather who served in WWII's attitude towards the Japanese. The lingering anger towards the Japanese for the attack on Pearl harbor has stayed with him his entire life. We weren't allowed to own anything Japanese and he still tells war stories that are anti-japanese decades after the war.
We need to end our involvement in the middle east. Our actions have led to the rise of ISIS and the terrorist attacks we have seen around the world that have been committed in the name of Islam. Not all Muslims are terrorists just like not all Irish were terrorists during the Irish troubles.
An attack on one religion opens the door for the attack on all religion. We're a nation founded on the principal of religious liberty. Separation between church and state has allowed people to worship however they want without fear of persecution. We're one of the few nations on earth that enjoys this luxury.
Let's not allow fear to take away our religious freedom. Once gone freedom of any kind is difficult to restore. If we allow this then the terrorists win.
8
Oh this is maddening.
Listen. "Religious freedom" to a certain group of right wing Christians OBVIOUSLY means, freedom for their religion to order the rest of us around.
This is despicable, it's a clear violation of the First Amendment, it's anti-American.
I'm sorry to see this happening in the United States of America, which was founded largely to escape both political and religious tyranny.
Our Constitution explicitly condemns the establishment of a state religion. Yet this is precisely what right wing theocrats are attempting, particularly by their judicial choices but also by nominating and electing ever more extreme political candidates.
We must all stand against this attempt to degrade core American values.
And, of course, we went to war, we fought a horrible World War against people whose assault on a minority religion was a core element of their power.
23
With the cross in one hand and the sword or gun in the other, Europe conquer most of the planet for its economic agenda.
5
@Jorge Rolon "conquered"
"a political system that uses a deity to advance its agenda of global conquest"
That's a pretty good description of Europeans in most of the world after 1500 to about 1900, isn't it?
24
@Pquincy14
Haven't societies evolved in the past century+? Shouldn't we expect that of Islamic cultures as well?
1
@SParker
Sorry for the cliche, but "Expectations are postponed disappointments."
Islam is a religion. At the same time, for some, it is more than that, it is a political system in which Islamic law governs all in the "Ummah". So to downplay the politically element deliberately in this piece is to oversimplify the issue.
22
Born and raised a Catholic, I can honestly say that Christianity is not the religion of Christ. In fact, it no longer defines what “religion” is meant to be...a means, a path, on which people walk toward moral and just lives, free of judgment and discrimination, instead embracing love and compassion toward one’s fellow LIVING human being. Christians need look into their own metaphorical mirrors to wake up to the fact that it is a sect, now a cult, riddled with the extreme, hypocrisy, and perversion of the universal moral code.
10
The take-away here is pretty the same for every headline these days, from the Kavanaugh hearings to immigration: the Trump crowd are hypocrites. It's always one set of rules for them, and another set of rules for everybody else.
11
Religion? They have all done good and they have all done evil and that's because of very flawed humans each of whom is capable of doing great good and capable of doing cruel, obscene actions. As for the Bible i think of it as more of a fairy tale or mythology. There are many beautiful examples in the Bible, but there are even more that make God look like he's trying to beat the record for cruelty and stupidity.
However, i tend to believe in Jesus Christ as God could see that He Himself was responsible for human behavior by letting us get in the scene in the first place. I think the same of the Islam, Hindu, etc., religions. They all have their good points and even snatches of the Ultimate Truth.
Too many Homo sapiens use religion as a weapon for political power and power over women. Let's try and get along and recognize that all religions have at least hopefully a smidgen of the Truth.
3
Or rather, none of them grasp the “ truth”. That we are biological organisms living out a finite lifespan, then...gone.
1
@BBH
I believe you have hit on the basis of religions: the human fear and denial of our own total death - which most treat like a bad rumor. We cannot face oblivion so we create something else.
@Mark Shyres Read my comment to BBH if it ever goes in.
Interesting that some Christians are arguing that Islam is not a religion, since they also argue when it benefits them that atheism (secular humanism) IS a religion, even though clearly there is no central book, central authority, nor ordained practices of any kind, unlike Islam.
8
@Michael Ando
Good catch.
I totally agree, Islam is a political system that indoctrinates it's adherence by claiming it all comes from an eternal God (never seen) and they are using it to invade America. Unfortunately, I also agree that the EXACT same is true of Christianity and it is poisoning the one, best, enlightenment country that thrived when we made religion a minor thing but decays when religion grows.
22
@BarryG You nailed it my friend
2
@Bruce Northwood
Except for the spelling and historical accuracy but his basic point is right on.
The problem is that islam is not *only* a religion; it's also a political force with a specific agenda, which is clearly specified in the 'holy' koran: to spread islam by any means necessary.
15
And the Spanish Inquisition was instituted to spread Christianity by any means possible in the 15 century. All fanatics are the same hypocrites!
4
@NYCSandi
Dear NYCSandi,
The Spanish Inquisition is rather a long time ago. In general, you do not see many people going around saying in the name of Jesus we shoot up 175 people in a French music hall.
Certainly evil men have used the name of Christ to perpetrate all kinds of wickedness, but it does not have its origins in anything that Jesus taught.
Name on teaching of Christ that justifies his followers of doing anything but leading a quiet and godly life.
1
The author never addressed the concern about Islam being a political system. I guess all the anxiety stems from radical Muslims flying airplanes with innocent people into buildings filled with innocent people and saying AA as they ram the WTC. Cutting off the heads of journalists and innocent civilians in the name of god doesn’t engender much empathy, either. Finally, Americans want immigrants that not only add to the fabric, but also embrace our culture. That’s the problem. Muslims need to help eradicate the extremists among their midsts or continue to face skepticism of their long term interests. Just saying........
13
@Average American
There is no "American culture" — unless you mean exclusively white, Protestant, bourgeois culture.
The US is a mixture of many different cultures.
1
Unless your version of religion is quietist--the version that teaches withdrawal from all worldly things--it's either a political system or has the seeds of a political system within it. Morality tends to be political, so religion tends to be political. As many other commenters have noted, much of current Evangelical Christianity is at least as much a political system as many of the varieties of Islam.
@Average American
Yes. We need more average americans like timothy mcvey and maybe the Las Vegas shooter. Maybe fox nus forgets to tell you when average (white) people commit atrocities. I'm just saying....
Dogmatic religions and partisan politics are the same thing. Of course Muslims want to conquer the world. So do Christians. People are more comfortable being with people like themselves. But theists believe in the supernatural and that makes them dangerous.
4
To say Islam is not a religion is absurd. However, Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, Islam, and other religions have in their ancient texts directives that would violate US criminal law if carried out.
7
@Peter S
Dear Peter S,
I'll bite. What practices taught by Jesus would be considered at odds with US criminal law? People are called Christians because at least theoretically they adhere to his teachings. So again what did Jesus teach that would be in opposition to US Criminal Law?
1
He said Christianity. That includes St. Paul not just Jesus. On that score, try: Slaves obey your earthly masters (Ephesians 6:5). We had to fight a civil war and adopt the 13th Amendment to get rid of that one.
1
Islam is primarily a political system.
6
It used to be about Catholics, and then about Jews.
21
@Cassandra
I don't think Jesus was born "King of the Catholics". You might have it backwards.
Our constitution protects every individual's right to practice his or her own religion, including Christianity, Judaism, Islam, etc. Those rights exist and should be protected, to the extent that they do not interfere with the protected rights of others.
That has nothing whatsoever to do with what we think, ourselves, of peoples' views. That a person would believe (and base his or her actions on) the idea that some supernatural being up in the sky exists, grants prayers, sets moral rules, guides behavior, created the universe, cares about people (and their sexual conduct!), and sends people to "heaven" or "hell" is extremely frightening in this day and age. Such conduct and beliefs are primitive, superstitious, self-indulgent, and irrational.
Why would anyone vote for a candidate for a position of leadership, responsible for sophisticated decision-making, who admits to having primitive, superstitious, self-indulgent, and irrational traits, i.e., that they admit to being Christians, Jews, or Muslims? We voters are certainly entitled, constitutionally and for the sake of progress and humanity, to take such shortcomings into consideration.
19
Excellent letter. I long for the day when an unabashed atheist, like me, can run for political office and not fear the mob of “ good christians” calling for his death.
7
Many countries do not believe in separation of church and state. When these governments embrace or demand a certain religion that makes that particular government a religious institution.
Here, people are twisting that fact to make a religion appear to be the government--an important distinction. Lets not confuse the two!
7
The notion that Islam isn't a religion is akin to the polemical feuds between Christian denominations each claiming to be the true one and the others not.
That said, the author glosses over the fact that Sharia is embedded in the concept of an Islamic state, a concept alien, not only to the separation of church and state, but the First Amendment the protections that are so vital to freedom generally, and more to the point, the free exercise of one's religion.
Great Britain for example has had difficulty in resolving the conflict between Sharia and Civil Law, particularly in regard to women's marriage, support and other domestic issues and rights, which is now being dealt with piecemeal by its Judiciary.
Hopefully the issue can be addressed here without compromising the fundamental principles that have defined our constitutional premise for so long.
16
@Sam
While Sharia rests on the premise of an Islamic-ruled state, true, have you looked at, say, Catholic canon law in this respect, which calls on all secular rulers to support The Church and give it free rein? Or what many evangelical Protestants say about who may legitimately rule (i.e., various brands of Christian Dominionist thought)?
Religions routinely claim authority to regulate secular affairs, including political leadership. And contemporary religious thinkers often argue that the idea of a secular state separate from religion and religious values is itself religious in that it _excludes_ religion from some of the most important aspects of life (ready any Republican attack on Jefferson's "wall of separation between church and state", for example).
Entanglement of secular and religious is the norm, not the exception.
9
@Pquincy14
True enough.
However, even in countries such as Great Britain which has an official church its doctrines are not incorporated into its legal fabric and as such cannot be enforced by law.
Such is not the case with Sharia which in an Islamic State is in fact substantive law to which everyone courts included must adhere.
I'll say this for "conservatives," they're going for it. No more of their lame excuses, they're declaring their bad faith these days.
Trump outright stated he wanted a Muslim ban. Loudly. PROUDLY. Upon gaining power, he tried to make it happen. He even fired Yates when she wouldn't play ball. Sure he was forced at judicial gunpoint to put a fig leaf over it, but he has always maintained that the original, unconstitutionally discriminatory version of his ban was what he wanted. He went for it.
Conservative politicians have openly campaigned on legislative proposals designed to give LGBTQ citizens no legal recourse when they are discriminated against in the market and workplace. The EEOC writes briefs fighting discrimination and there's Sessions throwing the DOJ's weight behind bigoted employers. Trump has tried (multiple times) to simply discharge all transgender troops by Tweet! Again, they're just going for it.
The GOP, with regard to SCOTUS appointments, ended Obama's presidency over a year early, plain and simple. It wasn't a matter of "advice and consent." McConnell outright stated that Obama simply would NOT be allowed to pick a Justice. Now he has already crowed that Kavanaugh WILL be appointed. It's not a matter of who he is, so much as WHAT he is (i.e., "their guy"). #goingforit
It's like that scene in "The Big Short" where Steve asks why someone is confessing fraud to him. His friends had to explain: "He's not confessing... he's bragging."
24
Dear NYTimes, can we PLEASE just call these racists the racists that they are for once? This isn’t some “misguided” belief, it is racism and the goal is to willfully institutionalize that racism. Furthermore, these Christo-fascist groups do not in any way, shape, or form represent the fight for “religious liberty,” and are actually the worst offenders. They do not seek “freedom,” but rather the legal, political, social superiority to unconstitutionally oppress the American people under their extreme and minoritarian religious beliefs. If any religion is actually a “political ideology” and not a religion, it is the American Christian Far-Right.
27
What I really want is freedom FROM religion and an oppressive tax code that subsidizes its existence.
181
@UH -- just add 2 more things: zoning and property tax (specifically) and sign me up. Property taxes alone are somewhere in the neighborhood of $26 billion a year.
3
Islam is a religion, period. But it's also a political system. The founder assumed that Islam would dominate all societies and established various laws reflecting that basic assumption, as did the earlier Moses with the Hebrews. People of the book (Jews, Christians, Zoroastrians) would be tolerated but anyone else was a heathen to be converted or killed. Christians have acted similarly at times but it wasn't formalized as a religious duty in Christianity and considered an aberration in other eras.
Because the assumption of dominance is hardwired into the basic structure of Islam it mandates that Moslems seek to dominate, and if one does not is one still a 'true' Moslem? It really doesn't play well with others, and especially UNDER other systems. Sad but true.
It can co-exist without problems in a secular state as long as no other religion is singled out and allowed to dominate over it but there must be complete parity. Anything else is problematic. And the state must take measures to ensure that Islam does not undermine the state in the eternal quest to dominate it. There's no easy solution, certainly not by embracing Christian evangelicals and their own quest for political dominance.
58
@hysterium
Christians have acted similarly at times but it wasn't formalized as a religious duty in Christianity
Reread your history re. the Crusades, Albgensian heresies, inquisition, etc. etc.
2
@hysterium
I can say exactly the same about Christianity. When Catholic priests instruct their parishioners not to vote for a pro choice candidate, they are imposing their religious dogma on me. They have infringed my freedom FROM religion. They have become a political system. They have interfered in our politics. Their aim is to impose their beliefs, in the end, on everyone. Is that not at attempt to dominate?
I listened to a Muslim man who lost a son who fought for this country, a Gold Star father, speak eloquently at the DNC about our Constitution. I don't think he and his family has espoused quite the version of Islam you put forth. He didn't seem to me to be a man seeking dominance. He seemed to be a man who valued the Constitution of the United States.
As an agnostic, I feel persecuted every single day in this country.
4
The "not-a-religion" argument is bizarre, especially in light of the basic legal principle that a court won't inquire into a person's sincerely-held religious beliefs; it's generally enough that he claims to have such beliefs, and courts aren't in the business of testing religions for authenticity. It's not up to a court, for example, to figure out whether the baker really believes that his religion commands him to discriminate against same-sex couples (that would be a pretty odd thing to see in a list of holy commandments, but whatever), as long as he says that's what his religion commands. There is just no way to know a person's deepest thoughts on spiritual matters, and it's not the business of the court to figure them out, and opening the door to any kind of test along those lines would just invite discrimination. That's why it's weird to see people arguing that Islam is somehow not a religion at all: it's not only a denial of an obvious reality, it's a denial of a basic presumption that a lot of the critics have benefited from. It's as if they're unaware of the fact that their own religion (and aren't all religions fundamentally wacky in some way? Isn't that inherent in a belief in the supernatural?) been given the benefit of the doubt for decades.
2
It doesn't take a genius to realize that "religious liberty" is not about religious liberty, but rather allowing evangelical Christians beliefs to be either de jure or de facto recognized as 'true belief'. For example, legislatures in denying same sex marriage argued that the US was a "Christian Nation" and therefore making SSM legal violated the religious belief of Christians; yet no one of course mentioned that many Christians disagree on that. Evangelical Christians argue that not allowing official prayer in schools violates "religious liberty", while ignoring of course whose prayers would be used? Would it be evangelicals saying "Donald Trump is our god given president" or someone saying "Trump is not Christian"? The irony is that it is the evangelicals who are political, who seek to force their beliefs on others.
As far as Islam goes, it is a religion. The opponents do have a point that many liberals ignore, and that is under Islam there is no concept of separation of religion and state, to them government is a branch of religion. That doesn't mean that most Muslims think we should have Shariah law, but many, like the evangelicals, have to realize that their beliefs and systems are unique to their beliefs, and cannot be part of the government. It is one thing to argue, for example, that some loans are usurious based in their faith belief and want them banned, it is another to want schools not to celebrate LGBT pride month because "it offends their beliefs".
17
If you are raised evangelical, it is likely that you've heard Islam described as a "cult" since you first went to Sunday school. Evangelicals use all sorts of words to avoid calling Islam a religion (and Hinduism and Buddhism and many others).
One Southern Baptist in my town described these religions to me as "Orientalisms"; this was the word used in his church's "classes" about non-Christian religions.
So by the time they get to high school, they already think these religions do not deserve to be protected as such.
8
Please! ... the minute a persuasion leaves the constraints of its practicing temple and attempts to convert "the dhimy infidel" by any means including violence, its attributes metamorphose mainly into a political movement.
9
@Dontbelieveit
Please... the minute a persuasion leaves the constraints of its practicing church and attempts to convert the 'godless secular infidel', by any means including violence, its attributes metamorphose mainly into a political movements.
Face it: almost all religions make claims about political authority, and at least consider extreme means to keep the 'godless' (whoever they may be) from power.
That's a precondition of managing religion in a secular state.
2
Are you talking about Evangeline Christians?
1
@Pquincy14
Attempting to be balanced and impartial as much as possible, I suggest to enter "terrorism" in Wikipedia and confirm that the overwhelming worldwide number of events is at Islamic hands.
No question that other religions conducted despicable acts in the past. That's over, they reformed and moved on. If Islam will do so is still a valid question mark and an urgent necessity.
The idea that this country was founded by the Pilgrims to enable freedom of religion is pure bunk. The only freedom of religion they were interested then, and the only freedom of religion the religious right is interested in now, is their freedom to dictate what others believe and how others live their lives.
Freedom of religion? Hah! I'd rather be from religion.
29
There must be a distinction made between holding religious beliefs or ideas, which are always legal, and actions stemming from those beliefs, which may or may not be legal. Freedom of religion means that Muslims, like those of other faiths, have the right to believe whatever they want, and to assemble peacefully with those who share their beliefs. That includes building a structure to assemble in.
However, the law of the United States of America can, and does, forbid actions such as female genital mutilation (FGM), providing money or other support to terrorist organizations, and "honor killings." Of course, not all Muslims support such actions (most are probably just as horrified as the rest of us). Those who don't support such things, and who don't want to live under Saudi-style Sharia law, need to speak up and repudiate the bad apples, alert law enforcement when necessary, and assimilate into the larger American society.
This applies just as much to the evangelical Christian, Mormon, or other religious communities -- the David Koreshes, Warren Jeffses, and other "religious" nutcases who think their beliefs give them leave to ignore the law.
41
Obviously Islam is a religion. But it is also a political movement and legal system. It is no accident that democracy does not thrive in any Muslim majority country- Islamic mixing of Church and State effectively prevents any true democracy. Further, Islam is replete with "bloody borders." It seems to be associated with armed conflict whenever and wherever it tries to share power or territory with another religious group. Just look at a world map.
Many right-wing American Christians have also begun to ally their religion with a political movement (conservative Republicanism) which is why they should lose their tax exemption.
And finally, every American whatever their religion should be able to pledge their loyalty to our civil law as superior and controlling over Shariah or other religious laws when they are in the public sphere. Let's keep religion in the Church where it belongs.
49
Evangelical Christianity is also a religion AND a political movement working to deny any non- believers of their legal rights. All fanatics are the same hypocrites.
5
Devils advocate, but what if Islam was treated here they way Christianity is treated in Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, Pakistan, etc? I hear your argument and agree with you but want to point out that are building a house on quick sand when the equality you seek here can't be in nations that are governed by Sunni Islam.
19
I'm an agnostic and to be honest, the top three world religions (Christianity, Islam and Hinduism) all terrify me and fill me with dread. All of them are rampantly sexist, misogynist, and homophobic and offer women and LGBT people very little in terms of life, liberty or freedom. I also see all of them as a corrupting influence to progressive secular humanist societies and their values. And yes, as a gay female, I personally view some of these religions are worse than others in protecting or respecting people like me.
As Gene Siskel once said during and episode of his TV movie review program, "Religions are a club."
49
As someone who lived and worked in the Gulf Middle East for 19 years, I believe, as do many other expats, that Islam bears all the hallmarks of a cult, not a religion.
11
“Religious liberty”? They say “Military Intelligence” is an oxymoron. Virtually all religions are man made constraints on individual liberty dressed up as immutable Divine Law in order to keep the people obedient and subservient to their overlords. Until we realize religion is just highly dressed up propaganda we will continue to debate how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.
32
For Muslims making up just 1% of the US population today, they sure do make a lot of noise in regards their personal beliefs.
One word, apostasy.
I want to not only be separated entirely from the Islamic faith but ALL religions. As an American, I demand that right.
14
I know Americans who are members of most major world religions, including Islam. I also, as an atheist, know other atheists. The only people interested in curtailing the religious liberty of others and foisting their religious values upon me are Christians. It feels as if a subsection of Christians--people I would've called plain vanilla Christians until now--are becoming so radical that they'll do just about anything to push their agenda.
15
@e w
Wrong
3
Islam's devotees are definitely following a religion. How many Evangelical Christians 1. do not smoke or drink? 2. set aside several times a day to pray? 3. eat certain foods prepared in a certain way, eg. Jewish have their Kosher foods, and Islam has their Halal meats, no pork, etc.
I grant you that some Islamic devotees do not do this as some of the Jewish do not stay Kosher, but it is in their religious teachings.
Christians think they need to spread Christianity by having ministers or priests in almost every country of the world. So does the Islam believers who believe according to the Koran need to spread the word of Islam.
The political aspect of religion is about getting more of one religion than another. (No birth control, no abortions, but have many, many children to increase the amount of people of a particular religion.). We are as a nation, supposed to allow all religions to spread their gospels without interference. Just because Christianity is more predominate in the USA we have Christian Holidays celebrated throughout the year. Unfortunately, people of other religions get to get their holidays (Holy days) off too. Is this all about jealously because they have more days off with pay than we do?
The Muslims that I know are much more religious than the right-wing “christians” who support Trump. They use Christianity as a weapon to advance their narrow minded political beliefs, without any understanding or respect for the actual teachings of Jesus.
14
The answer here is simple, and I think I can speak to this because I am a former Republican, and a blood relative to many conservatives. The conservatives who say this are just racist and they hate Muslim/Middle Eastern people. It might seem oversimplified, but it is true. They see no inconsistency with their belief that one religion is a religion and another is not. They are the deciders. What they like should be legal, and what they don't like should be illegal. They don't like gays so that should be illegal. They don't like Muslims - so illegal. They don't like Blacks, Hispanics, etc. - illegal. For them there is no hypocrisy or irony. It is just plain common sense to them: "My group comes first. If you're not in my group then you can go to heck."
5
If Islam, according to John Bennett, Islam is not a religion because " it used a deity to advance its agenda of global conquest" then Christianity Judaism, Buddhism, and all other organized "religions" are not really religions.
It is becoming too obvious that the Right Wing Republicans only accept christianity, and only specific branches of christianity as a "true religion."
6
If you're a Native American, everything John Bennett said about Islam, that "it is a political system that uses a deity to advance its agenda of global conquest", applies equally if not more so to Christianity.
Manifest Destiny, anyone?
I personally have my doubts about all organized religions.
14
Muslims have been saying for decades that Islam is not a religion, it’s a lifestyle. So maybe it’s both a faith, a way of life or a culture. But this elevation or distinction between religion and lifestyle was created and spread by Muslims themselves. Here are two examples from Islamic websites:
https://www.islamweb.net/en/article/158625/islam-��-a-comprehensive-way-of-life
http://aboutislam.net/reading-islam/my-journey-to-islam/islam-peaceful-w...
5
Nobody masters the arts of hypocrisy, duplicity, cognitive dissonance and fake religiosity better than America's radical, Republican, regressive Whited Sepulchers R Us religious right.
John Bennett, the Republican state legislator in Oklahoma, who said “Islam is not even a religion; it is a political system that uses a deity to advance its agenda of global conquest.”
Of course, it turns out that conservative American Christianity is also a political system that uses a deity to advance its agenda of global conquest.
Former Palestinian foreign minister Nabil Shaath says the evangelical George W. Bush told him in 2003 and Mahmoud Abbas, former prime minister and Palestinian President: "I'm driven with a mission from God. God would tell me, 'George, go and fight those terrorists in Afghanistan.' And I did, and then God would tell me, 'George go and end the tyranny in Iraq,' and I did."
And "now again", Mr Bush is quoted as telling the two, "I feel God's words coming to me: 'Go get the Palestinians their state and get the Israelis their security, and get peace in the Middle East.' And by God, I'm gonna do it."
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/bush-god-told-me-to-in...
And then there's conservative American Christianity's endless efforts to turn America into a cruel vulturistic winner-take-all 'free-market' insane asylum with unaffordable healthcare, collapsed education, and right-wing corruption via the Republican party.
Nice GOPeople
48
@Socrates: Your comment almost totally ignores the subject at hand.
4
Not really, Jimmy.
Conservative American Christianity - and its political godfather, the destructive Republican party - is essentially the enemy of most fundamental American ideals, principles and values.
1
@Socrates Claims that Islam is a political system coming from a Christian politician. I think we may have just discovered the fabled, fourth type of irony. There is dramatic irony, verbal irony, situational irony, and now dogmatic irony.
1
Whenever the world tries to have one God more important than another, then it has almost invariably led to wars. This has been essentially since time immemorial.
Having said that, religious liberty does not usurp human rights of any kind, no matter what the courts pronounce. (SCOTUS being radically activist on the right for the temporary moment)
The founding fathers of the United States were genius to not elevate any one religion, and to go further by separating church and state.
However, there have been many that have tried in every which way to run an end around with various things such as school prayer, monuments, and the big one - tax exemption.
If the United States (or anywhere in the world for that matter) wants to be completely neutral in regards to all religions, then all of these fights (regarding control, governments and money at their root) would be moot if there was no longer tax exemption status for them.
That would be treating ALL religions to stand on their own, and furthermore take away the cudgel that tax exemption status enables to wage political war by using that money (that you the taxpayer subsidizes) to buy ads and politicians alike.
Just a thought.
8
Some religions, like Buddhism, Taoism, Shamanism, and Animism, are seldom if ever political. However, all the Abrahamic religions, and to some extent Hinduism, ARE political. Roman Catholic and Protestant evangelical efforts to legally ban abortion and even contraception, and their recent attempts to legalize anti-gay bigotry under the banner of "freedom of religion," are only the latest examples.
I'm old enough to remember when, in this country, people were thrown in jail for being gay, and when it was impossible for someone to be elected if they were divorced, and when Creationism was taught in public school science classes.
But political activity by religionists is not always bad. Many Christian churches were extremely important in the Black civil rights movement, for example.
We probably need to tolerate some political activity from adherents of various religious groups. I think a good rule of thumb is, if a particular activity seriously infringes on other peoples' constitutional rights, it should not be protected under the banner of freedom of religion.
4
It's time we come to grips with the fact that no religion is any more valid or dangerous than any other. What makes a religion -- ANY religion -- dangerous is the level of fundamentalism with which it's practiced. And virtually every religion has both its lax, common-sense practitioners and its zealots.
I know "moderate" believers of many faiths (my own family boasts Jews, Christians, Muslims, Buddhists and atheists -- we're a better, more interesting bunch for that), and they're all good people.
I have no fear of or concern about moderate Christians, Muslims, Jews, etc. But why should we afford legal protections to fundamentalist practitioners of any faith who value a blind adherence to their beliefs above secular law, who view their brand of their religion as the one and only legitimate denomination, or who use religion to justify their bigotry and deny the humanity and basic rights of their fellow human beings?
16
@D Price
Agree completely. That's why the best Christians or Muslims are nominal Christians or Muslims. Anyone with an entirely faith-based epistemology is a real danger to society.
5
These people accusing Islam of being a political movement rather than a religion -- are they by any chance supporters of the Trump administration's efforts to allow churches to engage in politics without losing their tax exempt status?
14
Ok, I’ll bite. If Islam isn’t a religion, then neither is evangelical Christianity. I’m certainly no biblical scholar, but my understanding is , that at least as far as southern baptists are concerned, they split from the baptist church to allow for the justification of slavery. So in the effort not to sound like them, why are we even paying attention to these folks. Either way, contrary to the whims of conservatives, no religion should be involved in politics period. The first amendment allows freedom of worship as well as the freedom from worship.
54
Organized religions are social clubs for people who believe in particular fictions that include at least one "god" or other "holy" figure. They tend to be (in no particular order):
- very good at indoctrination into their "beliefs",
-legalistic,
-bureaucratic,
-whizzes at making money,
-builders of excessively large structures,
-experts at gaining political power and insinuating their prejudices into law.
While many consider them to be a waste of time, the US Constitution allows them to exist unfettered. Each of these non-Islamic people working overtime to demonize Islam, or somehow redefine it, should take a good long look into their own social club and see how much one differs from the other.
27
Islam is a religion like any other in the U.S that must abide by civil law over religious law. Freedom of religion means freedom of belief not freedom for all so-called religious practices publicly or privately.
If your religion requires separation of genders, that's fine privately but not in public space like a pool. If a civil judge grants a divorce, those terms outweigh any religious decrees or practices. Physical violations should go without saying that criminal law outweighs religious acceptance. And what is acceptable in other countries is not ever relevant in U.S law enforcement.
Freedom of religion is freedom of belief not unfettered freedom of action. For any religion.
92
Bravo! Well said! Now please tell that huckster Mike Pence.
1
I would argue that there are no religions any longer and I have a solution to the "religion" problems in the U.S.: Tax them. Tax them hard.
Every day I drive down the streets here in central Michigan and note how many churches there are. None are paying taxes into the communities while their neighbors, home owners and businesses are required to do so. And let's be honest, today churches are nothing more than tax-free businesses masquerading as religions. And you all know that soon they will be able to act as incubators for political causes and money laundering centers for PAC's.
135
@mrfreeze6 taxation participation
Of course Islam has a political dimension. So does every other religion! The spirit that drives some Muslims to jihad is the same as the spirit that drives some Christians to crusade (figurative or literal). The conflicts in Myanmar, in Sri Lanka, in the former Yugoslavia, and in Israel/Palestine all have a religious dimension.
But the whole point of religious tolerance, as expressed in the First Amendment, is to get past that sort of religious infighting. You and I may disagree on religion, we may disagree on politics, and our differing religious views may cause us to disagree on politics, but we don't go to war over it.
In America, we don't use the power of the government to impose our will on each other. Our public creed acknowledges that we're both entitled to a share of the public square. We're both entitled to pray as we wish without harassment, and we're both entitled to express our views.
That's not Islamification. That's good old American freedom.
10
We need reciprocity. Let Saudi Arabia allow churches to be built on its soil, and open them for free worship.
11
@KB
The US was founded precisely because other countries did not allow religious liberty. We enshrine religious freedom and tolerance as a principle, not as a negotiation.
8
Good point; the Islamaphobes described in the article want America to become like Saudi Arabia.
4
@KB - No. The whole point is that we are better than that. Regardless of what Saudi Arabia does, we will still have freedom of religion in this country.
1
Atheists and other folks who are for the total separation of church and state should use this Islam religious liberty issue as a cudgel against those who seek to tear down the wall between church and state. They should be funding the creation of Hindu idols and Islamic crescents and placing them right next to monuments to Christianity on public lands. The Christians will then have no choice but to either allow these heretical religious symbols on public lands OR remove ALL religious symbols from public lands.
12
We should remember that 250 years ago Catholics and Jews were barred from practicing their religion in New York State, which allowed any other religion to be practiced.
5
These are straw-man arguments. What percent of adults don't believe that Islam is a religion? By your own numbers, 11% of adults think that "most[+]" American Muslims are anti-American. (I would agree with the majority that "some" Muslims are, as are "some" Christians, Jews, Buddhists....) Also, the poll you cited has the headline, "In recent years, warmer feelings toward Muslims," in response to a dramatic uptick of Americans with "warm" feelings toward Islam (48%).
1
The attitudes described here may reflect what scholars like Walter Russell Mead call the “Neo-Jacksonian Creed” that accepts only what is very familiar and thus rejects all that is not. For a long time, Neo-Jacksonian Americans viewed Catholicism as a religion from Satan, because the urban Catholics were “not like them,” the predominately Scots-Irish of the American mid-lands. While Mead may push the comparison too hard, there is something familiar with this current attitude towards Islam. To argue that Islam “is not really a religion” or that Muslims are trying to push “Shari’a Law” onto the country is to display the deep ignorance that too many Americans have of religion in general and of non-Christian religions in particular. In a 2010 poll done by the Pew Charitable Trust, only 17 percent of self-identified Christian evangelicals could answer 32 questions on religion correctly, and 53 percent of Protestants could not identify Martin Luther as the founder of the Protestant Reformation. So are we surprised that these respondents do not think that Islam is a religion?
7
Don’t all religions use a deity to advance an agenda? Based on that logic, there should be no religions. That actually sounds like a great result. Then maybe after millennia of religious strife, mankind can finally be free of this nonsense.
7
@Steven
You're too optimistic when it comes to human nature. WWI and WWII had nothing to do with religion.
It's especially shocking to hear these comments about Islam, which is definitely a spiritual belief system including a monotheistic god, not different than the Jewish Jehovah or Christian God while the pedophile club known as the Catholic church continues to have all benefits and tax relief available in the United States and other countries. Anyone who has studied these three religions in particular know that they share the "Old testament" view of the genesis of the world - only diverging in whether Jesus was the son of "God" or merely a prophet of his time, preaching a gospel which is so divergent from the evil being done in "his name". Using your personal views on how the world came into being to discriminate against your fellow humans, is just wrong.
6
It's more nuanced than that. Of course Islam is a religion, and of course most practitioners are not terrorists. But I'm just as uncomfortable with Shariah law as I am with Orthodox Judaism (and I say that as a lapsed Jew). They both treat women horribly, and refuse to assimilate into American culture. You're surely aware that Orthodox Yeshivas in NYC do not teach science or math or English--they have to teach men how to sign a wedding license. Women get no education at all. Yet this is supported with our tax dollars as a "Religious school." The only reason Trump and his born-again buddies are so pro-Israel is that they can't wait for the Rapture.
54
If people deny acceptance of Muslims then how can they defend Mormonism? How are the two different?
3
@DK I agree with the central point about acceptance but Muslims and Mormons are as different as Muslims and evangelicals or Catholics, for that matter. How are they NOT different may be a better question.
3
No mormons ever went to a dance club in Paris and shot down 150 people in cold blood while screaming "god is great", no mormons has ever run down 75 people in a rental truck, nor do we hear weekly stabbing attacks from Mormons in Europe.My day is short do I'll stop here, but please refrain from comparing apples to say rotten oranges...the comparison simply does not hold and leads nowhere.
4
@john - But Mormons did slaughter over a hundred people in the mid nineteenth century Mountain Meadows Massacre.
Rep. Duncan D. Hunter of East San Diego County spoke of Islamists as a political party seeking to infiltrate U.S. government in remarks Monday at a GOP women’s club: https://timesofsandiego.com/politics/2018/09/24/duncan-hunter-rages-in-r...
1
Religions should be rank-ordered based on the gallons of blood they have bled from others in the name of their god. Killing in the name of god is the defining characteristic of religion. If Islam kills in the name of god - like Christens do - then it is a religion. Period. The United States protects the freedom of those that murder in the name of god.
5
@Mark Clevey
More people have died thru history at the hands of CHRISTIANS than by any other means of death-understand?
1
@DK You might check the history of the death toll in India from the Muslim religious invasions before getting all excited. But this isn't the Religious Murder Olympics.
1
@DK
I don't know if that is true.
It is true in this century.
Because of the technology our modern armies have I assume many more people have been killed than in wars in the past.
Because what you say is true now than your statement can be considerred true.
However I am pretty sure it isn't true in the past.
There were many wars you do not know about in places like in India and the technology the Islamic nations had were superior to those that the other nations had so the wars that took place in those nations had a lot of casualties.
You miss the idea.
The first and second world war were between nations that had mostly a Christian populations but the wars were not based on that fact.
Even when Jews were killed in the Holocaust the Germans did not do it as Christians even when they were all Christian.
This is not true with the wars that the Muslims have fought.
They were fought so their religion or their version would dominate all others.
They invaded India and Spain so their religion would dominate.
The Catholic Church would not have fought the crusades if the Islamic nations had not attacked them first by taking over Jerusalem.
It's not just Islam, they don't like Jews either. This whole Judeo-Christian line they spout is strictly because they think Armegeddon is going to begin in Israel and they need to be able to go there. They're crazy, and getting worse.
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“Islam is not even a religion; it is a political system that uses a deity to advance its agenda of global conquest.”
Wow, this cretin has no idea what he’s talking about at all.
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Hell, my brother’s in-laws (born-again, evangelical robots) called our family’s historical faith, Serbian Eastern Orthodoxy, a cult. A cult! Right Wing Evangelicals have a problem with other branches of the Christian Faith; why are we surprised when they consider Islam a “non-religion?”
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Of course, one could make the same argument about modern evangelical Christianity, which, it seems, has become increasingly politicized, and is more and more intrusive into our daily lives, having less and less to do with the actual teachings of Jesus. Religions in general, and the Abrahamic faiths in particular, seem less concerned with spiritual verities than with enforcing laws that were given for their time – and more fixated on people's sexual behavior than with humanitarian concerns. Every religion I have encountered has a version of the "golden rule," yet few practice it. The modern world has little place for Theocracies, but many American Christians would not be averse to having one of their own right here and now. The first amendment has been turned upside down by religious zealots, and is increasingly invoked to justify discrimination, bigotry, and intrusiveness.
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The loudest claimants for religious liberty are seeking it ONLY for their version of religion. All other faiths or non faiths do not qualify for the protection for or from religious beliefs. Islam has been around much longer than the non-Catholic versions of Christianity which has developed a number of different sects over the last five centuries by whatever leader/founder of each decided on different rules. Religious liberty is about accepting everyone's varying belief system without imposing anyone's belief system on others. Only certain Christians seem anxious to actually impose their own belief system on everyone else.
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I find it interesting that the same people who will claim that Islam is not a religion, will claim that atheism is when it suits their legal purposes. Why, it's almost as if their true intention was not to safeguard religious liberty generally, but to insure the primacy of their own religion and safeguard the privileges accorded to it.
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Unfortunately, every religion is also a potential political system. And every one of them would be sexist, misogynist, and homophobic. That's why the worst countries in the world are the most religious, and the very worst are theocracies.
We used to see that when we looked at 'the other,' like Saudi Arabia (with beheadings of women in the public square).
Now we just have to look in the mirror, and see what Tony Perkins, James Dobson, Jerry Falwell Jr and Franklin Graham (Billy Graham Jr), Ralph Reed have to say.
So yes, let's get rid of First Amendment protections of religion, but be fair about it and apply it to Christianity as well. Just making them pay taxes on all the churches and the residencies of all their 'religious leaders' would help balance the budget. Why do we subsidize any of them with their tax breaks?
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I am so looking forward to the article dealing with POLITICAL Christianity.....
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proselytizing christian missionaries seeking converts: are part of a political system that uses a deity to advance its agenda of global conquest.
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The only way to ensure religious liberty for one group is to ensure it for all groups. I'm an atheist, but if I don't defend all minority beliefs, then I should have no expectation that they will defend (the lack of) mine.
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@RMurphy I doubt that many people actually will defend atheism or agnosticism, no matter how well you treat their beliefs. In the Muslim countries I've travelled in, it was fine for me to be Christian or Jewish, but I was met with open hostility if I acknowledged my (non)-belief.
Some of my Muslim friends in the US pretty much feel the same way: my not believing in god (theirs or mine) is very disturbing to them.
In the USA, what I'd like to see an equality that brings the elimination of all tax breaks to all religious institutions. Why should non-believers be required to subsidize religion? Where's the freedom in that?
(And, of course, we're not really "non-believers", are we? For example, we certainly don't lack a system of beliefs about what is right and what is morally wrong.)
This said, I strongly agree with the author of this column regarding the attitude of many Americans about Islam: it frightens me that so many in power are so ignorant and so prejudiced.
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But they DON'T defend atheist beliefs! "In God We Trust" is, by federal law (1956), the national motto of the United States. By federal law (1957) this motto must appear on all US coins and paper money. Moreover, it is displayed on court room walls, in legislative chambers, and, now, in many public school classrooms, libraries, and cafeterias, in some states by law. In other words, it is rammed down our throats daily. 90% of Americans approve, and the accommodationist federal courts have found that it is "primarily" secular in nature! Until the Civil war, our national coinage bore only two texts: E Pluribus Unum (From many, one) and "Liberty". They both still appear, but not by law. It appears that the political meaning of E Pluribus Unum has been forgotten in our tribal society and that "Liberty" does not mean being able to escape from being a God trusting money changer (and you thought Christ drove them from the Temple!).
So, let us bow our atheist heads and repeat our secular motto: In God We Trust.
(All others pay cash.)
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This atheist thinks Islam is a religion like any other. Now, I'd be fine with treating all the religions like any other non-profit, but singling out Islam? That's bigotry pure and simple.
The religious right does seem to think only their Christian Sharia should be accepted.
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Oh good god, codifying that Sharia law may not usurp federal and state law is only "anti-Islam" if you accept that Islam is a political movement. Let me give you a hint. It is both a valid religion and a very powerfull political movement. More of the worlds has been conquered byIslam in my lifetime than by communism or democracy.
No christians, budhists or taoists are openly demanding that their religion replace civil government. Islam is different.
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@John You do realize that no less than SCOTUS Asoociate Justice Clarence Thomas has written from the bench that STATES may institute a favored religion and base state laws on that without violating the federal constitution?
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@John Partly true. Virulent strains of Christianity are demanding to replace our government.
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Come on! Not all or even most Muslims are asking for a theocracy. And some Christians seem intent on forcing their religous views on to others and certainly did so in the past. Ditto for other faiths in other countries.
Christianity was a a political system that uses a deity to advance its agenda of global conquest during the crusades.
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@true patriot You don't think that American Christians are trying to that today as well?
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@maxsub: if you insert the word "some" in front of the phrase "American Christians" in your statement, then -- in a word -- yes!
I appears that 100% of the comments were made by people who have never read the Koran and have little knowledge of history.@maxsub