Maybe you’ve noticed. As part of this shrinking world we live in, cultures are rubbing up against each other, and it isn’t always pretty.
The slow-witted “Coexist” crowd will finger-wag and scold us that we must all “accept” one another’s way of life. (Which is a lie that not even they abide by.) The jury is still out whether they say this because they are unable to understand, or unwilling to understand that the way of life some people fight for is exactly the one that others seek to overthrow.
In such exchanges one thing is clear: one will triumph, and one will bow. The struggle is in determining which is which.
For example, a patriot holding to traditional American values as spelled out in America’s Founding Documents will have a very different view of the world than a Sharia-compliant Imam.
What binds Americans? People of any race, color or creed can gather around a certain set of ideas (see: Founding Documents) and build a culture around those ideas.
While there are examples where it is misapplied, or when the powerful do not face normal consequences, Americans have a single rule of law for all citizens. Public outrage against the abuses underscore the intended equality under the law. Young, old, male, female, rich or poor — it should make no difference in the outcome.
Contrast that to another culture where a woman’s testimony is not equal with a man’s in a court of law. A culture where a rape victim can be victimized a second time by a death sentence from the supposed justice system. A culture where husbands have moral and legal authority to beat their wives.
In America, religion speaks to our moral character, and addresses big questions like existence, purpose, and what happens to us after we die. It gives a sense of how we are to find peace with God, and our place in Community.
Government doesn’t address any of that. It looks after the day-to-day running of a nation. It is intentional that those who oversee the Government, the legal system, and the meting out of legal consequences is a different body than those in the Church that might offer guidance hope and comfort — even to those the law condemns.
Jesus himself, when speaking to Pilate said, “My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting, that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But my kingdom is not from the world.”
Elsewhere, Jesus taught us this distinction between legal and religious authority, when all other cultures blended them. He said, give to Caesar that which is Caesar’s and to God that which is God’s. In America, is intentional for example, that heresy is not a criminal offence weighed by law courts. Islam, however is nothing like this. The death penalty waits for Muslims who abandon their religion.
Islam knows no distinction between religious and political leadership. War becomes a religious duty, with rewards awaiting the valiant in eternity, and punishments for cowardice in both this life and the next.
Nor does Islam recognize any sense of equality under the law, theoretical or otherwise. Slaves can be taken in war, and slept with or sold. Conquered peoples are — in the strictest sense — second-class citizens. (Unless they convert.) There are rules about the kind of house they can live in, and the clothes they can wear. They are forbidden to publicly speak of or display symbols of their faith, are forbidden to openly display wine or pork… and so on.
Some Muslims are very upset by American expectation that they sing the anthem, or say the Pledge of Allegiance. Of course they are. Both of those things are predicated on the belief that America’s culture is better than someone else’s. That Americans elevate this one — including its rule of law — above all others, rather than try to defeat and replace it with Sharia.
Guess what? By definition, one culture IS better. Hint: It’s the one that doesn’t assume women are less, that they can be beaten by husbands, that unbelievers can’t have their hand cut off if they strike a Muslim. The one that doesn’t divide the world into two groups: the house of submission and the house of war.
If you are someone with strong commitments to a foreign way of life (e.g. Sharia) here’s a news flash: you don’t HAVE to come here. But if you DO come here? Then YOU will be expected to adapt to OUR way of life. We have no intention of adapting to yours.
Because frankly, yours sucks.
If Muslims Are OFFENDED By Our ANTHEM Should They Go Back To SUCKISTAN?
