Posted on 05/22/2007 5:21:17 AM PDT by nuconvert
Mennonites' gesture to Iran spurs protest
Academics decry attempt at `dialogue' with 6 controversial Islamic scholars
May 16, 2007
lynda hurst
A group of Iranian-Canadian academics and artists is vehemently protesting an invitation by the Mennonite Central Committee of Ontario to six Iranian Islamic scholars to take part in a conference at the University of Waterloo this month.
The Shia scholars, who are still awaiting visas, are from the Imam Khomeini Education and Research Institute. Its director is the controversial fundamentalist Ayatollah Mohammad Taqi Mesbah-Yazdi, spiritual adviser to Iran's hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
This year, six representatives from the institute will present papers on the theme of spirituality at a four-day "dialogue on faith," co-sponsored by the Conrad Grebel University College, an affiliate of the University of Waterloo.
"We're not against dialogue but the Mennonites are naive if they think they can open one with these people," says Haideh Moghissi, a York University sociologist who with 17 others signed a protest letter sent to the university.
She says Mesbah-Yazdi and his followers are "at the forefront of oppression in Iran," responsible for silencing all intellectuals who disagree with the regime.
"It hurts to know that while people are losing their lives over there, some people are opening the door to `dialogue' over here. Why doesn't the institute open it back there?"
It is the third symposium between the Mennonite committee and the Mesbah-Yazdi's institute since a relationship was established in 1998. The committee has also sponsored two of its post-graduate students to complete their PhDs at the University of Toronto.
"It's precisely because of the institute's closeness to Ahmadinejad that it's particularly important to cultivate a relationship," says committee director Rick Cober-Bauman.
He has responded to the critics, he says, offering a separate meeting to hear their views: "By no means do we want to minimize their concerns. Mennonites understand persecution."
But they also believe it is their calling to build peace, he adds.
"Maybe we are naive, but maybe things come from people who appear misguided or naive."
From his seminary in Qom, the holy city north of Tehran, Ayatollah Mesbah-Yazdi espouses total isolation from the West and zero tolerance to any veering away from fundamentalist Shia interpretation of Islam.
Mesbah-Yazdi is a strong advocate of the death penalty, public flogging and the use of suicide bombers against "enemies of Islam." Although his institute has dispatched 15 students to universities in Canada, Britain, Austria and elsewhere, Mesbah-Yazdi himself seems to have mixed feelings. He has said that Iranians who question the regime after studying abroad do so because they'd been trained in "psychological warfare" by foreign universities.
"He is the most dangerous mullah in Iran," says Saeed Rahnema, director of York University School of Public Policy and Administration, who spearheaded the protest.
Rahnema thinks that by co-sponsoring the May 27-30 conference, Conrad Grebel University College is giving legitimacy to Mesbah-Yazdi's ideology.
Jim Pankratz, academic dean at the college, says the scholars have assured him that they "don't necessarily represent the views of Mesbah-Yazdi any more than all Mennonites represent the views of the head of Conrad Grebel."
Pankratz has invited critics to meet with the college. But if they attend the last two days of the conference, which are open to the public, he hopes they "won't be disruptive."
The statements of the ayatollah and Iran's president may horrify people, he says, "but we really do believe it's important to talk to those who take opposing, even hostile, views.
"What are the alternatives? Ignore them, isolate them, crush them? We're already seeing too many examples of that in the world today."
I come from a family of Mennonites on my father’s side, and while they/we are good people, they are usually pacifist in nature, and, yes, NAIVE.
why dont they just read the koran, its all there in black and white all you need to know...the beheading, the beating, the one world view...
Do you think these people would have invited six SS scholars over in 1939.
(Answering my own question)
The answer is yes, they would have.
They don’t read the koran and find out because they are living in canada where their unfounded and misplaced belief that you can talk ANYTHING away, and that there is NEVER a need for force in defence of yourself is a prized world view. That’s why canadians are so pale - because you don’t get much of a tan with your head stuck in the sand.
But they also believe it is their calling to build peace, he adds."
BS, Mennonites don’t have a clue about what it is to be persecuted. Their idea of persecution is when people look at them funny for wearing silly clothes. They ought to go to Iran if they want to discuss things with people who would happily show them what real persecution is.
“Maybe we are naive, but maybe things come from people who appear misguided or naive.”
Yeah, ignorance and stupidity. Mennonites would all be dead if they had to live in Muslim countries. They are too dumb to defend themselves.
There are many Mennonite families in these parts. They seem more or less permanently linked to kinder, gentler time...
...you shouldn’t confuse Mennonite folk with the Mennonite Central Committee, which is nothing but a front for uberradical leftwingers...
No such time has ever existed. There has been war, plague, famine, death and destruction, pretty much continually during the whole of human history.
Mennonites live in a fantasy world of their own creation, which wouldn’t even be possible were it not for the sacrifices of the soldiers of free and democratic nations who have fought and died for their right to live in peace.
Thanks for that distinction and clarification.
I'm not sure their proposed "dialog" with this guy would accomplish anything, unless accompanied by large caliber weapons.
Quite true. They have gone along with the Wallis-Campolo duo and the leftist Episcopals who think the USA is the real culprit and if only we love the Iranians, all will be peaceful . And of course, we pull out of Iraq too. BTW, Mennonite Brethren are not pacifists. Mennonites are. I have pastored a MB church for 20 years as a Reformed pastor. Strange huh? But, we preach the full Gospel of Jesus and are strong conservative Evangelicals who love the Lord , this nation but will speak out on all sin. Not just selective sin as the Left does. Naturally, they do not believe in sin, but saving the whales for them is moral. Get it? Of course, I know you do.
There’s nothing kinder or gentler about manual labor for housewives. The burdens of “the plain people” are borne on the backs of the women who sacrifice beyond the imagination of the average american.
Amongst the Mennonite families I’ve met, both sexes have calloused hands.
Study history before spouting off. Many Mennonites have been jailed and killed for their beliefs.
As someone from a Mennoite background myself, I can attest to their naivete, but don't sell them short on their dedication.
They have only their stories to go on though...
Actually, the answer might shock you. Some Mennonites even fought WITH Hitler.
http://musicofmylife.wordpress.com/2007/05/26/theological-compromises-led-to-mennonite-nazism/
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