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Reflections on America’s Freedoms

With the recent violence engulfing Americans and American property in the Middle East, we see once more the yawning chasm between many practitioners of the Islamic faith and the non-Muslim world. The flash point in the case of the deadly attack on the US Consulate in Benghazi is said to be a video produced in the US, allegedly critical of the Prophet Mohammed.

Seemingly, the merest whiff of an affront to Islam can send a host of Mohammed’s followers into the streets, frothing with righteous indignation. Not satisfied with protests and chants, they attack and kill people with no connection to the alleged indignity.

Meanwhile in the United States, by contrast, we cherish our First Amendment protection of free speech. Doing so is not always pleasant and many Americans endure personal outrage even as they defend this Amendment. One case in point is the painting by Chris Ofili in which the Virgin Mary is engrained with elephant dung. Notwithstanding this sacrilege, the artist was awarded the Turner Prize by the Tate, a group of four British art museums. Christians were outraged. Christians suffered without violent retribution.

Another case of note is the practice by congregants of the Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kansas, of conducting abusive protests outside the funerals of fallen American service members. Chief US District Judge Fernando Gaitan went to the defense of this obscenity by striking down as unconstitutional a Missouri law aimed at preventing these kinds of protests. Americans still bristle at this treatment of our fallen warriors and their grieving families. Yet, we remain steadfast to the concept of freedom of expression.

Foremost among the reasons that we sustain our advocacy of the First Amendment is that freedom requires it. The Supreme Court has brooked constraining free speech in only very limited instances. In their opinions, they have clearly feared a slippery slope of censorship and its effect on our liberties.

America is a land of conflicting opinions, aided and abetted by the First Amendment. Without it, we might be a land of the opinion of the most powerful. America is also, largely, a Judeo-Christian country, albeit also a haven for many other religions whose followers enjoy the freedoms that so many Americans have sacrificed and died for.

Most Americans believe God is almighty and needs no protection, no frenzied response to a blasphemy. After all, God is the maker of heaven and earth and all things, seen and unseen. He is the all-powerful. God does not need us to do his work in the world. He calls us into relationship with Him for our good, not His. We are asked only to act justly, to love mercy and to walk humbly with our God. God awaits all at Judgment Day.

So among the mysteries to me of Islam is the burning passion among its adherents to avenge any slight. What is it about the beliefs of Muslims toward Allah about whom they say Allāhu Akbar (God is the Greatest) that in their minds justifies their behavior? Do they think Allah needs their intervention on His behalf? Do they think Him so weak as to require human protection from derision? Will Allah not judge all at the end of time? Is it Allah’s will or simply the choice of His followers, based upon their interpretation of the Quran, to inflict judgment in His name on others?

Perhaps all the violence is the result of careful plotting by those who would use Islam as a political tool. If so, then Muslims are being duped by their brothers and sisters. Islamic extremists have not been disappointed in their efforts to elicit Muslim hostility toward non-Muslims, and especially citizens of the US, using only rumor of affronts to their religion. We have seen this in countless protests and attendant violence over the past thirty years across the globe. Whether the massed protestors act of their own volition or as the unwitting political bludgeon of the Islamic fringe, the outcomes are the same.

The chasm may already be an unbridgeable abyss.

On one side is the prejudice and subjugation inherent in the behavior of Muslims toward non-Muslims, documented so thoroughly by Joan Peters in her work “From Time Immemorial.” Christians and other non-Muslims are persecuted to this day throughout the Middle East. The history of Islam is replete with the repression, often state supported, of non-Muslims since the time of Mohammed. As a modern day example, there are no Christian churches in Saudi Arabia under the pretense that it would be offensive to the Islamic host country.

On the other side exists the abiding freedom of the US Constitution, largely derived from the Founders’ Judeo-Christian beliefs. America remains the land of promise and hope for all people of all races, creeds, religions, and ethnic backgrounds. No surprise, then, that on February 29, 2012, USA Today reported there were 2,106 mosques in the United States as of the end of 2010, up 74% from a decade earlier.

Many Muslims live in America ostensibly for the freedoms and opportunities afforded them. These and other Muslims who would live in a world of peace and acceptance need to step forward now and declare the teachings of Mohammed to be those of peace and an acceptance of the differences among the peoples of the earth. They need also to condemn those who would do harm in Allah’s name. Will they?

Will Americans exempt Islam, Mohammed, and Muslims from the slightest criticism while Christianity and all other religions receive no such protection from public or private offense? Will we hold our tongues and cap our pens because Muslims require us to do so if we are to escape their wrath? Will we be coerced to forfeit all that millions of Americans and others have fought for over the last two hundred plus years?

The strengthening “political correctness” in America would like us to do so. If we succumb, then when we ask in our national song, “Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner yet wave o’er the land of the free and the home of the brave?” our response will need to be a whimpered and shameful “No”.