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JimG
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Where is the ACLU when you need them?
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murtad
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I think it is you who is ignorant of Islam/Islamic terms as you do not know that when the four rightly guided Caliphs invaded the non-Arab Byzantine Empire, they forced upon them the jizyah and the kharaj upon the pain of death. So, the Coptic people of Egypt had to become Arabs if they could not pay the tribute.
Justice2006, from the above you show us that you do not even know Islam and its history. As a former Muslim, I have studied the acts of the FOUR RIGHTLY GUIDED CALIPHS (ie. Abu Bakr, Umar, Uthman and Ali) in Islamic Studies. These four Caliphs invaded the following provinces of the Byzantine Empire, named:
- EGYPT
- before Islamic conquest was 90% Coptic and 10% Greek
- SYRIA, LEBANON and IRAQ
- before Islamic conquest was 80% Assyrian, 15% Armenian
and 5% Greek
- PALESTINE
- before Islamic conquest was 98% Greek and 2% Jews.
My answer is this: Its due to forced conversion to Islam, imposed via poll tax (jizyah) and land tax (kharaj) those who could not pay the tribute taxes, were declared idolators and had one two choices: convert to Islam or die. So, many Copts, Assyrians and Greeks chose to become Arabs rather than die.
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak forefathers were Coptic Christians who were forced to convert as Arab Muslims. Today Hosni Mubarak boasts that he is an Arab and calls Copts, an inferior race.
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StMarkEofE
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Then you know first hand what we in the west have to look forward too.
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Cyber_Knight
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I urge everyone not to send email to any member that you do not know for quite sometime. It is better to use PM that Forum has provided. Its all for your own safety. No offence Jesus_Freak! Hope you understand!.
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pro_universal
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StMarkEofE;
Jesus_freak:
Murtad:
Your breakdown of percentage races is worthless, because it is not based on genetics but rather language. Any time a country is dominated by another for long periods of time, people learn the language of the dominant nation. That’s why the Irish speak english. It doesn’t mean all Irish are actually english.
This is one of the examples of less credible sources. Ibn Warraq is a fake name, and used to author books like “Why I am not a Muslim”, which to me reminisce of “Why I am not Catholic” from Jack Chick types. No credibility at all.
Jesus_freak:
The Allah-hubal connection exists only on the internet at fundamentalist christian websites. It has precisely zero scholarly backing. It is a garbage theory of history. Even the Popes acknowledge that muslims worship the same God as Christians.
Murtad:
This answer makes no sense given the perserverance of the Jews under Muslim rule. Most of them converted because Nestorian and Arian Christianity, the most common beliefs in that time in those regions, is more amenable to Islam than Orthodox Christianity. There are still millions of Copts today, btw, and of all Christian sects there were many more before the Saudis became important in the 1920’s.
Your breakdown of percentage races is worthless, because it is not based on genetics but rather language. Any time a country is dominated by another for long periods of time, people learn the language of the dominant nation. That’s why the Irish speak english. It doesn’t mean all Irish are actually english.
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Franze
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Murtad, welcome home, it´s very interesting what you have proposed in this thread, but in my opinion it´s necessary that an amount of muslims converted to catholicism in Europe and in US with their knowledges of isla, arabic, urdu or farsi would come back to their lands to evangelize. But the first step is evangelize the West, where many muslims live.
A problem, is that many muslims believe that christians are the religion that is practised in the West, but this is false, because here there are many atheism and agnoticism. And there are great intolerance against christians and followers of other religions.
I have seen your proposal very interesting, for example a good way to evangelize would be that the evangelization in the arabic population would be with the maronite rite that is in arabic, but it´s only a proposal. I would like to be better formed, I want to read more to answer better.
Greetings and welcome home.
A problem, is that many muslims believe that christians are the religion that is practised in the West, but this is false, because here there are many atheism and agnoticism. And there are great intolerance against christians and followers of other religions.
I have seen your proposal very interesting, for example a good way to evangelize would be that the evangelization in the arabic population would be with the maronite rite that is in arabic, but it´s only a proposal. I would like to be better formed, I want to read more to answer better.
Greetings and welcome home.
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inJESUS
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Maronite -Catholics are only in Lebanon and Christianity in Lebanon is
…the focus should be on other countries but unfortunately not without peril like Irak or Egypt or Palestine…i think Syria and Jordan are good choices…my opinion only…
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murtad
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The pen name Ibn Warraq is no more a “fake name” than your name “pro_universal”. Such pen names are used by book authors whose controversial writings can endanger their lives. Such is especially true for those who live in contemporary Islamic societies, where there is a death penalty for leaving Islam.
I challenge “pro-universal” to post his real name, phone number, and postal address here. If he does not dare to do so, then who is he to ask Ibn Warraq to reveal his real name? I suspect “pro-universal” is an Islamist masqurading as a Christian with the aim to insult the Catholic Church and its teachings.
Every true member of the Catholic Church who faithfully follows the CCC and the Bible is a fundamentalist. The word “fundamentalist” derives from the root word “fundamental” meaning “basics”, so a fundamentalist is one who follows the basics of Catholic faith. Obviously, you are not since you reject its teachings.
Again, the term “scholarly backing” is nonsense as the “scholars” of one man are not scholars to other men. We need to carefully judge the personality of men and check for contradiction in their personality and expose this to the rest of human society. This is what our Lord Jesus did to the Pharisees, the sons of Hagar, our present day Islamists when he exposed their character and called them hypocrites.
While every Pope since Vatican II say Muslims worship the same God as Christians, they were refering to Trinitarian Muslims, meaning those Muslims who confess the Nicene Creed and not the Islamist Muslims. Remember, we have Jews for Jesus and Jews for Judaism.
The same could be said of Jews living in Catholic Europe or Orthodox Russia, who co-existed in harmony with Christians until the Nazi Holocaust called by a godless Atheist, Adolf Hitler who massacred 6 million Jews. On other hand, Islamists were no different from Atheists in the persecution of Coptic Christians in Egypt who were forced on the pain of death to pay Jizyah and Kharaj or become Arab Muslims, if they could not. Even if there were millions of Copts today, why are they just 5% of Egypt, when Muslims (Arabs) make up 95% of Egypt? This is proof that there was a cultural genocide against Coptic people.
Pro-universal, you show off your ignorance of English language, which was, is and will always be a Christian language. The term “race” means language for every human is biologically and genetically similar as we descend from common parents Adam and Eve. Anything else is ATHEISM. So, my breakdown is not worthless as I am showing how Arab racism by Islamists forced majority of Egypt to become Arabs.
This is not true as Jewish people were dominated for a long time by Christians and Muslims, yet they did not convert to either. They remain Jewish and worship in Hebrew, the language of Israel. If Irish speak English, then they are actually English. Anything else is blatant lie by atheists.
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pro_universal
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Pen names are used by fiction authors. Plenty of people criticize islam in academia, and they do so with their real names. There is no reason not to use your real name except to conceal a lack of credentials with such a book.
On the contrary, I am schooled in its teachings and I love and appreciate the study of what it means to be Catholic. That is why I understand that there’s more to Christianity than “Jesus good, muhammad bad.”
Follow the teachings of the Church: good scholarship, just like good science, is universal. That’s why we fund and host thousands of real scholars in our Universities. Our standards of academic are straight in line with those of secular schools, and for good reason. Rationality is universal, hence, it does not matter if one is a Christian or some other faith, when considering the rationale behind his or her points.
I have no clue where you got this idea, but it is completely wrong. Read Lumen Gentium. It does not even use the word “muslim”, but rather, Mohammedian. Are there Mohammedian trinitarians too? You are simply trying to trick your way out of the plain meaning of a Papal Encyclical and the Catechism of the Catholic Church with this point. Muslims means Muslims, not some “trick sect” like Jews for Jesus.
If you wish to dispute this point further, please refer to Lumen Gentium’s use of the term “Mohammedian”, and explain to me how “Mohammedian” means “trinitarian.”
This is false. The Czars persecuted Jews with almost as much rigor as the communists.
The Jizya tax of the past actually let christians persist, which is why there are still so many Copts. Your history is simply inaccurate, and it’s doubly misleading when you compare the practice of Jizya year for year with the European standard which was: convert or die, period. There was no third “pay a tax and live as you wish” option in Europe. By the time Europe finally stopped persecuting religious minorities (ie, after 1945), the jizya was long gone.
Well, then I guess all black Americans and native Americans are the same race as the Irish, since they both are relatives of Adam and speak english, right?
I think perhaps you need to do a little research on the english use of the term “race.”
Yes they did. Most of them are dead. In medieval times, the vast majority of the world’s Jews lived in Muslim Spain. Later on, during the Enlightenment, they managed to regain some ground in Europe, but their populations took a huge toll under the Nazi genocide. That’s why Hebrew is still a language and not just yiddish; because millions of Jews persisted in the middle eastern cultures. (For clarity’s sake: Yiddish is the language of European Jews; Hebrew, being so similar to Arabic, is the language of middle eastern Jews)
Tell that to the Catholic brothers of ours in Ireland who are fighting to keep Ireland ethnically Irish. Are they phoney Catholics, all those Irish who claim that they are not English?
The linguage=race point is absurd and won’t be revisited, as common sense, basic english, and science are against you on this. Feel free to expect a response on any challenges to my other points.
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murtad
Guest
Mr. inJESUS,Maronite -Catholics are only in Lebanon and Christianity in Lebanon is
I agree with you that Syria, Jordan, and Egypt can be a good start for evangelism of Muslims. However, we need to take into account the cultural norms when we perform evangelism. One way is to establish a Muslim Rite, like the many Eastern Rite Catholic Church, Coptic Rite, Syriac Rite, Greek Rite and Russian Rite.
His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI himself said that Christians and Muslims worship one, mercify God. This is true only if Muslims believe in Trinity by confessing Nicene Creed. Then, they will be true Muslims, who will call themselves Trinitarian Muslims.
These types of Muslims are no different from Jews for Jesus, Trinitarian Jews who confess the Nicene Creed.
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pro_universal
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Murtad, here’s an article that makes your error on this point about muslims clear:msnbc.msn.com/id/7630968/
murtad:
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murtad
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Its easy to see the reason you call critics of Islamism, “fiction authors” because you are Islamist masqurading as Christian. When you claim we lack “credentials” can you explain to us what do you mean by “credentials”? Today as I see it, atheists and islamists alike have learnt the way to lie and they claim that their fake “Christian” or “secular” scholars are reputable, despite the fact most of these “scholars” have dubious backgrounds (such as personality, character, etc), despite their so-called Ph.D qualifications.
If you really “schooled” in the teachings of the Catholic Church, then you will surely know why we have Eastern Rite Catholic Churches, like Coptic Rite, Syriac Rite, Greek Rite, Russian Rite and Hebrew Rite! But as you do not know, you prove to us, Christians, you are hardly a true member of the Catholic Church, and so definitely not Christian. Today, within the Church, we have a concept called Ecumenical Evangelism, which means politically correct evangelism. We usually call fake Christians (ie. Protestants and Eastern Orthodox) as “seperated brothers and sisters”, rather than the rude word heretic. The same goes for Jews and Muslims.
As in contemporary English, the word “secular” means ATHEIST so a “secular” school comprises of scholars who have an atheistic worldview of science, whether biology, chemistry or physics. Such scholars are hardly real scholars since they do not confess their atheistic bias but masqurade as religious. This discredits them just as you, “pro-universal” are discredited. I wonder why you have not replied to my challenge to you to reveal your real name, phone number and postal address? Are you afraid? If yes, then you have no reason to tell Ibn Warraq to reveal his/her real identity.
The issue here is language semantics and not theology. In the early days, the Church used the term “Muhammandian” that meant a people who worshipped according to Arabic Rites but today, the word “Muhammadian” is politically correct, so to appease the Muslim race, the Pope uses the word “Muslim”. This is no different from the word “Jewess” or “Jew woman”, which is often rude and considered Anti-Semitic. BTW, Jews for Jesus is not a trick sect, they are real Orthodox Jews who are ethnically Jewish according to Halacha (ie. mother is Jewish) and who practise Christian faith.
I explained above that “Muhammadian” and “Muslim” mean the same thing. Its just language sematics not theology. Whether we call ourselves Christian or Catholic or Latin, it means the same thing as they are not three different religions.
This is yet another blatant lie from you, “pro-universal”. The world war 2 was hardly religious but a war waged by secular nationalist German regime to Germanise the 25 European races. Muslims, especially Yugoslav Muslims and Ukrainian Muslims colloborated with Adolf Hitler as shown by the Russian records. Europe abolished “persecution” of Jews in the early 19th century, which coincides with the rise of secularism. That is long before Islam abolished jizyah/kharaj after the defeat of the Ottoman Empire in World War 1, in 1924.
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murtad
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You are correct to say White Americans, Black Americans, Irish Americans and Native Americans are all of the same race if they love the English language with all their heart, soul and mind. In our Catholic parish, we have Chinese, Malays and Tamils, yet we are all one race as we worship in English, an international language.
Thanks but no thanks. I definitely cannot do an honest research from those biased “secular” sources, whose self-proclaimed “scholars” are really atheists who try to conceal their atheistic bias by pretending to be religious! That is not “scholarship” but dishonest lying.
You show your gross misunderstanding of history of the Jewish people. During the time spent by our Lord Jesus (who was an Orthodox Jew) on this Earth, his natural language was Aramaic not Hebrew (which was dead as a dodo). It was only in the 19th century C.E., Hebrew was revived as a spoken language by the Zionist movement and in 1948 C.E., Israel was esblished a Hebrew State with Hebrew as its official language. So as you may see, a dead language can be revived as a spoken tongue if a community has the religious zeal to do so.
Also, just to let you know “pro-universal”, I know the difference among Yiddish (a Germanic language written in Hebrew alphabet), Ladino (a Romance language written in Hebrew alphabet), and Hebrew (a Semitic language written in Hebrew alphabet).
Yiddish is spoken predominantly by Eastern European Jews, while Ladino is spoken by by those Jews who live in Islamic Spain, Levant North Afrika and Ottoman Turkey regions. Moses Maimonedes (or The Rambam) was a Spanish Jew who spoke fluent Ladino. There was nothing like a Hebrew-speaking Jew before the 19th century C.E.
Not all Irish are Catholics but many of them are godless atheists. It is these atheists who keep resisting the English when the Christian thing to do is to accept English as the official language of Ireland and think everyone (that is the 4 colours of humanity, Black, White, Yellow and Brown) as one race for we descended from common parents Adam and Eve.
You think it is absurd most likely because you are an atheist and your limited intellect proves this. I called you an Islamist in the past but now think you are more likely an atheist. Islamists know the truth but they purposely lie to conceal it, while atheists with limited intellect are fools who fall into the trap set by the lies of Islamists.
Christian sociologists have clearly pointed out that from a perspective of psychology all humans are one race and we only differ in language and skin-colour, which is sometimes called “race”. Arabs are called Arabs because they worship in Arabic, while Copts are called Copts because they worship in Coptic, and Chinese are called Chinese because the worship in Chinese. Of course, in USA, since all people speak English, the word “race” peculiarly changed its meaning to refer to skin-color, White, Black, Brown or Yellow.
In conclusion, we have in Malaysia, race=language, but in USA race=skin color. In Malaysia, a racist in a language supremacist (ie. Malay supremacist), while in USA, a racist is a skin color supremacist (ie White supremacist). I ask you how did this confusion of English words happen? Who confused them? As I see it, humans are divisive and secretarian in nature. Even if we have one language, they will purposely create artificial divisions like skin color. This is not a fault of English language but human beings.
That is my 2 cents. Feel free to give me your reaction to it, both positive or negative.
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murtad
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You seem to misunderstand what the English phrase “forcing your faith” means. Its correct meaning is to evangelise through the pain of bodily torture or death. The English phrase “making disciples” means “dialogue”, which is to evangelise through non-violent methods (ie. social engineering methods).
This is false and shows us that you have not read the Bible. In the time of our Lord Jesus, there were three faiths, Saducees (aka Judaism), Pharisees (aka Islamism) and Christians (aka Catholics). He told the Saducees that “Ye do err, not knowing the scriptures, nor the power of God” (Matthew 22:29) and to the Pharisees he told them this “Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, Hypocrites! for ye pay tithes of mint, anise and cumin and have omitted the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy and faith” (Matthew 23:23). Our Lord tried his best to show people the light meaning to get the Saducees and the Pharisees convert to Christian faith and he was martyred for preaching the Gospel through his crucifixtion. So, were his 12 Apostles, including the greatest of the 12 Apostles, St. Paul of Tarsus, Apostle to the Gentiles.
Just my 2 cents. Feel free to criticise them either positively or negatively.
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exoflare
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Just wanted to point this out… Paul wasn’t one of the original “twelve”; he came later on. He was an apostle by succession, but not directly from Jesus as the original 12 apostles were.
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exoflare
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It’s interesting to me how you refer to the Pharisees as the “Islamists”. Is there a particular reason behind it? I’ve always noticed that they are rather similar in religious practice (i.e. “cleaning the outside of the cup while the inside is dirty”) but was this the same thing you had in mind when you made that connection?
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pro_universal
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As noted, the languag-race point is no longer something I will address, so that leaves:
Since I also consider this claim to be spurious and not worth another paragraph, if you can’t provide a source to back up this claim of yours, it too will be ignored.
- “Muslim” and “Mohammedian”: You repeatedly claim that these Papal encyclicals refer to “trinitarian muslims who accept the Nicene creed.” Please provide just one example of a Pope referring to a group that accepts the nicene creed as muslim.
Since I also consider this claim to be spurious and not worth another paragraph, if you can’t provide a source to back up this claim of yours, it too will be ignored.
- “Secular” scholarship:
The Church operates a giant and worldwide network of Universities that pride themselves on adhering to the highest standards of academic integrity. Since the Church fully embraces participation in the search for truth employing the rational method, I’m going to say it disagrees with you here.
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inJESUS
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all,i was at mass today with like 20 members of my family…when the priest was preaching, a veiled muslim woman enters holding a baby and she rushed to the altar…the priest told her she cannot step to the altar and she said : i want to put my baby under the cross…so the priest asked her gently to step back and sit next to people ( he was puzzled) and she sat next to me…i didnt understand as well what was going on but she was smiling all the time…after like 15mn she asked me: does it take more time?my husband is waiting for me at the end of the church ( he looked like a sheikh with his long beard and clothes but maybe he wasnt donno) i said yes…so she said: where can i donate to the church? so i showed her…a woman at the end of the church explained to her what to do next time and when and she left…at lunch time we were trying to figure out what was going on…some said she had too much faith thats why she rushed to the altar smiling and kept smiling all the time…others were puzzled at the way she rushed before asking what she should do …well whatever the reason i think Jesus did something to her child …may Jesus bless her family…
something else : i was listening to the radio today, going from one station to the other when i heard someone yelling…so i stopped at that station and it was a muslim sheikh yelling and saying: stop converting to Christianity…we thought we should be afraid of non-moslems but i say we should be afraid of muslims themselves who are destroying islam by their disloyalty to mohammad…and kept yelling calling us names and insulting as…
well, it seems conversion is higher that i thought…if he insults us, he is insulting Jesus for Jesus said : what you do to my people you do to me…and let him shout out loud with his all strenghth…he can do nothing when the King of Kings is here… coz when Jesus’ voice is heard, all other voices shut up…
Praise to The King and may all people hear His voive and join His sheep.
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Shadowcry
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How do we know your not making these stories up?
Anyway its not like it would matter anyway people convert to what ever they want.
Anyway its not like it would matter anyway people convert to what ever they want.
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Athanasius18
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all souls are fallen and in need of a Savior. The Church must convert all peoples, muslims included. end of story…if anyone tries to argue this basic point, they are not Catholic, plain and simple.
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