In the piece you cite, the condemnation is not qualified. The only qualification is their disbelief that Muslims could do this. As I said above, I think this unwillingness to face the dark side of their own tradition is a problem for Muslims–but it’s a problem for Christians too. Over and over again on this forum we see Catholics whitewash evil things that Catholics have done in the past–and other Christians do the same thing.
I stand by my claim that so far I’m not convinced that Muslims have the same resources for facing the darkness of their own tradition as Christians do. Elwill cited some links where imams advised people to respond nonviolently to the Muhammad cartoons. I was very glad to see these links and applaud them, but the assumption behind the links is still that Islam is totally wonderful and that critics of Islam are misguided or malicious, and need to be instructed/refuted. An equivalently moderate Christian response would be, “well, people criticize us in large part because of our own sins, and we should repent, while also of course pointing out when the criticisms directed against us are unfair.” In other words, there’s a spectrum of responses in both religions, but there are a lot more Muslims at the “violent anger” end of the spectrum, and a lot more Christians at the “admit fault on our side” end.
And finally, to elwill: yes, when I spoke of Muslims disregarding much of their own tradition, I was talking about folks like Bin Laden, who discard much of the nuance that has surrounded discussions of jihad, many of the traditional restrictions on what may be done in warfare, etc. That being said, I would be surprised if a disregard for much of their own tradition is not fairly widespread among Muslims. It certainly is among Christians!
Edwin
