The Pope Pisses Off Muslims!

[theprophet0]

By BENJAMIN HARVEY

Sept. 14, 2006 — ISTANBUL, Turkey (AP) - Turkey's top Islamic cleric asked Pope Benedict XVI on Thursday to take back recent remarks he made about Islam and unleashed a string of counteraccusations against Christianity, raising tensions before the pontiff's November visit — his first to a Muslim country.

The Vatican hastened to defend the pope, saying that the pontiff wanted to promote respect and dialogue toward other religions, "obviously also toward Islam."

Ali Bardakoglu, head of Turkey's powerful Religious Affairs Directorate, said he was deeply offended by remarks about Islamic holy war made Tuesday by the pope during a visit to Germany, calling them "extraordinarily worrying, saddening and unfortunate."

Bardakoglu said that "if the pope was reflecting the spite, hatred and enmity" of others in the Christian world, it would be even more troubling.

In a speech Tuesday, the pope quoted from a book recounting a conversation between 14th century Byzantine Christian Emperor Manuel Paleologos II and an educated Persian on the truths of Islam and Christianity.

"The emperor comes to speak about the issue of jihad, holy war," the pope said.

"He said, I quote, 'Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached."'

Clearly aware of the delicacy of the issue, Benedict said "I quote" twice before pronouncing the phrases on Islam and described them as "brusque," while neither explicitly agreeing with nor repudiating them.

The Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, said Tuesday the pontiff had not been giving an interpretation of Islam as "something violent," although Lombardi said the religion contained both violent and nonviolent strains.

Bardakoglu said he expected an apology from the pope and said it was Christianity, not Islam, that popularized conversion by the sword, according to Turkey's state-owned Anatolia news agency.





Bardakoglu is a complete dumb ass!

[Anti_Liberal]

what doesnt piss off muslims? religion of peace my ass. islam is the most demanding and intolerant religion on earth.








ahhh, cant you just feel the peace and love?

[ron28]

Well of course it's easy to find the extremists in any religion and then label that particular religion X,Y or Z.












Christianity must be a religion of hate, intolerance and violence

[tabassman]

pffff, obvious photoshop ron. we all know christians are tolerant, peaceful and intelligent. additionally, tv tells me that all muslims want me dead. im no expert, but i'd believe TV over the internet anyday. conclusion: christianity is great and islam is evil. case closed.

[Anti_Liberal]

oh yes thank you ron28. Christian extremists are on the same level and are equally as dangerous as islamic extremists. thanks for clarifying. I'm going to have to start calling you rosie.

[theprophet0]

Ron unfortunately you missed the point.

Let me sum this up in a nutshell for you. Muhammed and his disciples waged jihad not J.C. and the apostals.

Oh yeah ditto on what the froh dude said too.

[WUB]

"Anyone who describes Islam as a religion as intolerant encourages violence," Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Tasnim Aslam said.

[UMD TSAR]

Ron, I'm pretty sure you're only half-serious, and playing devil's advocate.

Even moderate muslim scholars (like some dude on Bill Maher last week, can't recall his name), pretty much concur that the Muslim faith is going through a Dark Ages. Just as Christians saw Protestants and Catholics butchering each other for 5 centuries, and uniting only to kill non-Christians, Sunni and Shea muslims are doing the same thing now.

Christianity has a history of bloodshed every bit as bad as Islam. But the present situation is one where Islam is at a peak of violence while Christianity is a few hundred years past it's own peak.

[gribble]

Muhammed and his disciples waged jihad not J.C. and the apostals.

Prophet may have just made his best point ever. The peace part of Islam comes at the end of the sword. Islam will be at peace when the entire world has been subjugated to its laws. It is only about peace when everyone in the world is a muslim.

[theprophet0]

Christianity has a history of bloodshed every bit as bad as Islam. But the present situation is one where Islam is at a peak of violence while Christianity is a few hundred years past it's own peak.

Nope your definitely wrong there cause Muhammed and his followers waged holy war. Jesus and his disciples never did. The crusades happened almost a 1000 years after Christ.

If it wasn't for The Hammer Europe would of been over run by muslims.

[Stang76]

[UMD TSAR]

Prophet, you're a tool. There's plenty of hellfire and damnation in the Bible if you look into the Old Testament. There's plenty of calling for the stoning of sinners. The idea that Christianity is somehow innately peaceful neglects the human interpretations that led to savage warfare for 1500 throughout Europe. I'm not defending Muslim fanatics, but it is important to understand.

What I find very interesting is that the articles out there an unanimously referring to "The Pope's contraversial remarks", but being so careful to omit the actual remarks. After digging around for 15 minutes on Google, Prophet's article is still the only one I can find that has the actual "offensive" quotes.

You gotta laugh at the leftwing "live and let live" perspective with these radicals. That philosophy only works when if the radicals embrace it too - and clearly they don't.

[krosch]

Not to mention all of the war and "god's people" taking lands from other peoples. There is a bit of violence in the bible to say the least...

[gribble]

Dude, I'm pretty sure prophet is right on this one. Sure there have been plenty of wars waged in the name of Christ. But if someone wants to follow in the path of Jesus, the founder of Christianity, he can do so by living a peaceful life and loving his neighbor even if his neighbor is an unbeliever. Christ himself never took up arms to spread his gospel, and neither did his disciples. War in the name of Christ was entirely political.

As far as Mohammed goes though, the founder of Islam founded Islam in the name of Holy War. The only way to follow in the footsteps of Mohammed is to be a jihadi. I would call that a stark contrast between the two religions that makes one peaceful and one extremely prone to violence.

[gribble]

And one other thing is that you guys are reading the bible completely wrong. Christianity is all about the New Testament and could basically give a damn about the Old Testament. Christ and his followers don't call for war against anybody. Jesus said to spread the word of God through good deeds. Jews could care less if other people lived by the same rules they did. Muhammed said and did kill the unbeliever unless they converted to his way of living. You guys are wrong.

[krosch]

You want to get a source on Mohammed saying that? Because yes there was warefare under Mohammed but he got his poltical start in a village that had a large number of jews in it. They were called "brothers of the book" by Muhammed himself and didn't force conversion of most of their conquered people they did however give more social advantages to "those of their faith" however few nations in history haven't until recently.

Also the comparsions can be tough because Jesus never led a nation Muhammed had a dual role.

[UMD TSAR]

And one other thing is that you guys are reading the bible completely wrong. Christianity is all about the New Testament and could basically give a damn about the Old Testament. Christ and his followers don't call for war against anybody. Jesus said to spread the word of God through good deeds. Jews could care less if other people lived by the same rules they did. Muhammed said and did kill the unbeliever unless they converted to his way of living. You guys are wrong.

You are framing Christianity nicely.

However, the reality is that many "Christian" sects - a tiny one called Catholics among them - take the Old Testament very seriously.

We can sit and argue back and forth about the extent of violence in the text of Christianity, and whether those violence references are are part of "true Christianity". But this is the IDENTICAL debate taking place is Islam right now.

Here's my point, and you have to be pretty ideological to refute it:
1. Christianity has textual foundations of violence.
2. Christianity has a past every bit as bloody as Islam.
3. Muslims have not yet had their Enlightenment, which pulled Europe from centuries of religious warfare.

Note that I am not justifying Islamic violence whatsoever. But if we want to defeat it, we have to understand it - rather than making incorrect assumptions. If you want to defeat Islamic violence, look at how Europe defeated Christian violence.

[gribble]

I'm not refuting any of those points. I just think it was a lot easier for Christian philosophers to come up with ideologies that denounce violence than it is going to be for Muslim philosophers to do the same when the founder of their religion carried out violence in the name of his God.

I guess what Islam is going through right now is akin to the Christian crusades in that it is an attempt to unite the entire religion against a common enemy regardless of political associations. A fact to me is that if muslims are going to buy into that kind of bullshit now in the same way that christians did 1000 years ago, they're going to get obliterated and I sure as hell won't be one to feel sorry for them.

I'm not disputing that many Christian adherents have used the bible to justify acts of war. And who knows, maybe I'm wrong about the Muslim faith. But seriously, 400,000 terrorists world-wide have the singular goal of either converting everyone in the world to Islam or killing them. My question is, how many Muslims who aren't on that list feel the same way?

I don't know. The bottom line for me is that right now, Muslims want to kill everybody who is not Muslim, and Christians do not want to kill everybody who is not Christian. Who fucking cares about what happened over 500 years ago?

[ron28]

1. Christianity has textual foundations of violence.
2. Christianity has a past every bit as bloody as Islam.
3. Muslims have not yet had their Enlightenment, which pulled Europe from centuries of religious warfare.

That pretty much sums it up. What's interesting is that, much like in the enlightenment age, anytime something is written or spoken that doesn't kowtow to the muslime party line, a fucking fatwah is issued (see Salaman Rushdie)......... The 95% of muslims that are not maniacs need to step up just as the 95% of christians who are not maniacs have stood up to the Fred Phelps gang. (Of course, Phelps doesnt have people blowing themselves up in nursing homes.)

[krosch]

I'm not refuting any of those points. I just think it was a lot easier for Christian philosophers to come up with ideologies that denounce violence than it is going to be for Muslim philosophers to do the same when the founder of their religion carried out violence in the name of his God.

I guess what Islam is going through right now is akin to the Christian crusades in that it is an attempt to unite the entire religion against a common enemy regardless of political associations. A fact to me is that if muslims are going to buy into that kind of bullshit now in the same way that christians did 1000 years ago, they're going to get obliterated and I sure as hell won't be one to feel sorry for them.

I'm not disputing that many Christian adherents have used the bible to justify acts of war. And who knows, maybe I'm wrong about the Muslim faith. But seriously, 400,000 terrorists world-wide have the singular goal of either converting everyone in the world to Islam or killing them. My question is, how many Muslims who aren't on that list feel the same way?

I don't know. The bottom line for me is that right now, Muslims want to kill everybody who is not Muslim, and Christians do not want to kill everybody who is not Christian. Who fucking cares about what happened over 500 years ago?

You mean other than anyone who knows how things have worked historically is likely to have a better understanding of situations that are unfolding today? Thus helping them make a more educated guess and produce a plan of action on what might solve the problem?

[gribble]

Right.

I'm pretty sure that more than five percent of muslims are psychopathic wack jobs and nowhere near five percent of christians have beliefs even remotely resembling fred phelps'. Who are all these muslims protesting the pope? Who were all the Muslims who violently protested a fucking cartoon? It's fucking ridiculous. Why do people point out that 1000 years ago christians were idiots? It doesn't help us get around the fact that right now Muslims are fucking retarded and want to have a nuclear war.