THE REAL ENEMY IS RELIGIOUS BIGOTRY

CULTURE CLASH OVER CARTOONS

The anger of so-called Muslims who scream, burn flags, and threaten mayhem and murder in response to European cartoons depicting Islamic motifs in less than a respectful manner, rings completely hollow, and merely confirms the rest of the world's opinions about these people's inability to think, feel and act in a rational manner.

If they are truly concerned about upholding an image of Islam worthy of inspiring admiration and respect, they would exhibit an equally-intense-and-public outcry in response to terrorists shaming Mohammed by invoking Islam's name when murdering countless innocent fellow(!) Muslims.

Their murderous anger to the by-comparison harmless cartoon depiction of their prophet is misplaced, infantile or symptomatic of a greater and strategic evil to be resisted at all cost. I personally hope that it is infantile.

Do they really think that Mohammed or Allah would fall over dead with consternation when seeing cartoons of themselves, and so must be protected? Religious adherents who think of themselves and their religion too highly and beyond criticism (or even prohibit and punish dissent and questioning) are enemies of humanity.

Their evil starts with the ancient sin of pride that blinds them to the fact that humans are finite and limited in their understanding. The danger arises when in their embrace of religion, which tends toward absolute and ultimate claims (especially the monotheistic variety), they ignore these limitations and claim for themselves infallibility.

(Someone said: "It is one thing to believe in absolutes, another, to believe absolutely." G.K. Chesterton said: "It is not bigotry to be certain we are right; but it is bigotry to be unable to imagine how we might possibly have gone wrong.")

The only way to be faithful and true to both our finiteness and to the religion we genuinely "feel right" about, is to proceed with humility. True religion (and its followers aware of fallibility) will invite and allow questions and doubt, and be unafraid of dissent and criticism. Humility is and essential mark of true religion as it takes into consideration the possibility of being wrong. The alternative is religious fundamentalism practiced by fanatics and bigots who defensively (and insecurely) insist that their view is the only right and correct one.

Fundamentalists can of course be found not only among Muslims but also among my fellow Christians. What does it reveal but prideful arrogance and an irrational desire to be and feel right, when in the name of upholding respect for their religion, prophet or God, Muslims threaten murder of the very creatures God has made?!

The Muslim world has a serious disadvantage in that too many of its religious leaders not only encourage an unquestioned faith that maintains the status quo (and their power), but also discourage their followers from thinking and fearlessly examining their religion and tradition.

The Western world's advantage in this arena is that its freedoms of religion and of the press make it nigh impossible to hold on (blindly) to unexamined beliefs. Caricatures, humor and political or religious cartoons, while at times stinging, keep us humble and mitigate human hubris, and should be welcomed by any intellectually honest and humble mind; cartoons do not kill, human pride does.

By demanding an apology from Western governments, Muslims are now dangerously escalating this to a clash between Islam and the West.