Of the many difficulties currently faced by mankind, one is, as it always has been, getting along with others. In the somewhat distance past, each village was nearly an island, and xenophobia led to misunderstanding, which led to conflict, which led to fighting and suffering, and so on.....cause and effect. Generally, there have been, consistently throughout history, the same reasons for conflicts between peoples, groups, cultures, countries, etc.: territory, resources and religion. In those far distant times I have referred to, ignorance was somewhat understandable. Today, given all the possibilities for educating oneself, I find it difficult to see it as understandable and tend to view it as more likely willful.
The problems now occurring between the Christian world and the Islamic word are devastating. What we see on the news, what we read about in the West, certainly gives a very negative impression of Islam. However, is it realistic, I wonder, to assume that millions, billions of people who believe in Islam are indeed as narrow minded, violent, and primitive in their thinking as they seem to be, based on what we see in the news?
My point here can be simplistically encapsulated in the term "cultural sensitivity." That's what I am getting at. What we see in the news is a very limited perspective of what goes on within Islamic culture. I was once visiting a country where, in part of that country, a full scale war was going on. Based on news reports, one would think it would be a very dangerous and scary place; on the contrary, only if one was in the general territory of where the fighting was going on was there any real danger--in the rest of the country, business went on as usual.
It is much the same regarding the perspective we have on Islam. The people who are blowing up innocent people are extremists. The vast majority of Muslims do not support them. When you see people in the streets cheering because the World Trade Center has been attacked, this is a very limited number of people, no different than if there is a protest in your city—downtown the streets may be packed with people, but 90% of the population is sitting at home, not involved and not supporting what is going in those protests.
Christianity and Islam are not the same. The tenets of the two religions are not the same. The perspectives of people who adhere to these two religions are not the same. Whilst it is offensive to many Christians to question Christ’s sexuality, it is not a taboo within our culture, and we are not breaking a religious law when we do so. Images of Christ or god are not forbidden in Christianity. They are forbidden in Islam. Normally, in the mainstream of Islam, no one would consider imposing serious punishment for breaking these laws, and interpreting the Koran as a basis for doing so is no different than interpreting biblical references to homosexuality a certain way and stoning homosexuals. Only fundamentalists and extremists believe in such punishment.
The vast majority of Muslims are neither extremists nor terrorists nor do they support them. However, the perspectives on life may be quite different because of culture and religion. What is acceptable in one culture is not acceptable in another, not because one culture or religion is more reasonable or unreasonable but because it is different. Those differences may be difficult to fathom, to understand, and to accept….but the value of having an open mind is that, whether or not one understands or embraces an idea, one may choose to respect that idea.
If we could learn to accept and respect our differences, even though we don’t understand them, what great strides we would make in creating more peace and stability in the world—and it works on both sides of course. But I don’t adhere to the philosophy that because someone has said something nasty to me, I then need to spew back something nasty. Tit for tat gets us nowhere.
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