No Respect
Wed., March 17, 12:20 PM
No Respect
I heard something on the radio about some Baptist missionaries who had been killed in Iraq. That can’t be right, I thought. I must have heard it wrong, it was probably some ministers who were helping to feed people or perhaps assisting medical personnel. I would have to listen again.
Y’know, it’s not rocket science. There is cause and effect here. Invasion and domination lead to resentment of the invaders, at the very least. If general conditions don’t improve as rapidly as promised, the resentment may lead to hatred and violence. Are you with me? I don’t think this is too hard to understand.
So certainly the last thing you’re going to do, even though you feel the invasion was necessary, is to go and antagonize those people further. What you certainly aren’t going to do is to tell them that their most personal, dearly held beliefs are no good and you are going to replace them with what you know is better. Right?
Evidently, not right. I listened for further information, from which I learned that not only were they religious missionaries, but their fellow seminarians were ready to fly out to Iraq and take their place, bringing the word of Jesus to the Muslims.
Are you crazy? I don’t attack your religion. What right do you have to attack someone else’s? And you’re not just going to put yourself in danger; you’re putting a lot of other people in danger too. … I’ll have to stop, before I say something really politically incorrect.
Let’s give a few good words for France as well. They are going to solve the problems of intolerance by forbidding the schoolchildren to wear any form of religious identification – no Islamic veils, no yarmulkes and, I assume, no crosses. What are the children to learn from this regulation? That being different is wrong? That you can be different but you can’t tell anyone? (Me, I’m a “closet” Jew.) Well, it’s not the first time I thought the French were a little more than eccentric.
I would despair of the world, except for the kind of action I saw on “CBS Sunday Morning” last week. Sean Touhy is an American basketball player who is now playing professionally in Ireland. He had the idea of teaching basketball to young children – both Catholic and Protestant – before they got old enough to hate each other. And he holds regular games, with mixed teams – boys and girls, “orange” and “green” – where their loyalty is to the team.
They’re allowed to make comments about someone’s play, but not about their religion.
Meanwhile, Sean’s brothers are working for his cause too. They raise funds, they help run the programs. It’s so simple, so logical, I can’t believe someone is actually doing it. Sean, you’re a man after my own heart.
