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Church sign: 'Islam – America's No. 1 enemy'
WorldNetDaily.com ^
| 08, October 2003
| WND news report
Posted on 10/08/2003 4:52:25 PM PDT by Salem
Baptist preacher defends placard some call message of hate
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted: September 9, 2003
1:00 a.m. Eastern
© 2003 WorldNetDaily.com
A Indiana Baptist pastor has been accused of spewing "hate speech" after he posted the following message on his church's marquee: "Sunday sermon 10:30 a.m. 'Islam: America's No. 1 Enemy.'"
Marc Monte has been pastor of Faith Baptist Church in Avon, Ind., for five years, according to a report in the Indianapolis Star. He says his sermon would include important information the pubic is not getting from the media.
"I want to stir interest, not alarm, but Islam is a false religion, dangerous and hate-promoting," Monte told the paper.
"If I were a pastor who read KKK literature or Hitler's 'Mein Kampf,' I would hope the members of my church would head to other churches. It is awful stuff. I repudiate it, and I put Islam in the same camp."
Not everyone feels placing such a message on a church marquee is appropriate, however.
"To call Islam an 'enemy' seems to be a message of hate," Susan Jones, who passes the sign twice a day, told the Star.
Sayyid M. Syeed, director of a nearby Islamic Center of North America, said such views were inflammatory and dangerous to society.
"Whether it is a pastor in Avon or Osama bin Laden, it is religion spoken with the same language to incite others and provoke violence. It is the same treatment of religion; extremists think a lot alike," Syeed told the paper.
Monte says he met with Syeed shortly after the Sept. 11 attacks and afterward decided to study the Quran to learn more about Islam.
"I met with Syeed, and it got me very curious. In this personal conversation, there were things that struck me as odd," he is quoted by the Star as saying. "I opened the Quran and smelled a stinking, bloated, dead rat on every page."
Monte told the paper he has had only one call about the marquee. His church normally draws about 350 people to Sunday service, the report said.
Shortly after 9-11, both the Rev. Jerry Falwell and Christian evangelist Franklin Graham took heat in the media for articulating their opinions about Islam.
Graham called Islam a "very evil and wicked religion" in an interview about his latest book. In "The Name," he wrote, "Islam unlike Christianity has among its basic teachings a deep intolerance for those who follow other faiths."
In an interview with Beliefnet, he said, "I believe the Quran teaches violence, not peace," and, in an indirect criticism of President Bush, he said that after the Sept. 11 attacks "there was this hoo-rah around Islam being a peaceful religion but then you start having suicide bombers, and people start saying, 'Wait a minute, something doesn't add up here.'"
Graham explained to Beliefnet last spring that "when people ask, I let them know I don't believe in their God. But I respect their right to believe whatever they want to believe."
TOPICS: Culture/Society; Foreign Affairs; Israel; News/Current Events; Philosophy; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: baptist; christianity; islam; muslim; muslims; sign; terror; war; wot
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""I met with Syeed, and it got me very curious. In this personal conversation, there were things that struck me as odd," he is quoted by the Star as saying. "I opened the Quran and smelled a stinking, bloated, dead rat on every page." "
Indeed. A conclusion any other sane person with a shred of analytical, critical thinking skills would come to.
1
posted on
10/08/2003 4:52:26 PM PDT
by
Salem
To: All
2
posted on
10/08/2003 4:53:24 PM PDT
by
Support Free Republic
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To: SJackson; yonif; rdb3; Simcha7; American in Israel; spectacularbid2003; Binyamin; Taiwan Bocks; ...
3
posted on
10/08/2003 4:54:30 PM PDT
by
Salem
(FREE REPUBLIC - Fighting to win within the Arena of the War of Ideas! So get in the fight!)
To: Salem
As if the product of his activity is not hateful?
Stupid is, Stupid Does.
4
posted on
10/08/2003 4:55:13 PM PDT
by
Persia
To: Salem
What smells worse than a stinking, bloated dead rat????
5
posted on
10/08/2003 4:56:09 PM PDT
by
Coroner
To: Salem
A live muslim!!
6
posted on
10/08/2003 4:56:36 PM PDT
by
Coroner
To: Salem
;A Indiana Baptist pastor has been accused of spewing "hate
;speech" after he posted the following message on his
;church's marquee: "Sunday sermon 10:30 a.m. 'Islam:
;America's No. 1 Enemy.'"
Funny the Islamists declare America and Christianity/Judiasm the #1 enemy of Islam. They have declared a Holy War against it. Yet I don't hear any outcry that they are engaging in "Hate". Instead all I hear is how peaceful they are.
Usually you hear about how peaceful they are right after one of their follows has just blown up another batch of kids........
The pastor is just pointing out that the emperor has no clothes and no one likes to hear that...........
7
posted on
10/08/2003 4:56:39 PM PDT
by
festus
To: festus
There is no issue with the quote
"radical islamists" are the enemy, the issue is "islam is the enemy", something tons of people including our President has a huge problem with.
8
posted on
10/08/2003 4:58:14 PM PDT
by
Persia
To: Persia
"As if the product of his activity is not hateful?"
And what, pray tell, is "the product of his activity"?
9
posted on
10/08/2003 4:59:31 PM PDT
by
Salem
(FREE REPUBLIC - Fighting to win within the Arena of the War of Ideas! So get in the fight!)
To: Salem
Friends who work in the D.C. government tell me that half the people there are having to relearn eachothers names. In other words, a whole lot of the people who figured it was cool to become muslims back in the 80s are giving up on the idea and re-converting to being baptists and what not.
10
posted on
10/08/2003 4:59:47 PM PDT
by
judywillow
(the supposed Kr)
To: Salem
It's not a message of hate, but a message of reality. This nation has become filled with soft useless wimps who can't confront reality.
11
posted on
10/08/2003 5:01:36 PM PDT
by
RLK
To: Persia
"radical islamists" are the enemy, the issue is "islam is the enemy", something tons of people including our President has a huge problem with.
-------------------
So please tell me, what part of the Koran do the nice islamists reject?
12
posted on
10/08/2003 5:04:47 PM PDT
by
RLK
To: RLK
for example the entire movement in Iran is between moderates and extremists and the people who happen to be more secular than both but everyone is still muslim
13
posted on
10/08/2003 5:08:47 PM PDT
by
Persia
To: Salem
Another duplicate thread
14
posted on
10/08/2003 5:12:59 PM PDT
by
BSunday
To: Salem
ping
15
posted on
10/08/2003 5:14:23 PM PDT
by
pointsal
To: Salem
"To call Islam an 'enemy' seems to be a message of hate," Susan Jones, who passes the sign twice a day, told the Star.
Was calling Nazis an 'enemy' a message of hate?
No - you don't have to hate them to recognize that their whole ideology and dogma is to hate you and to kill you. What does 'enemy' mean, if not that?
You're an idiot if you don't see that, and if you don't see it, you can't defend against it.
How did so many Americans get brainwashed with moral relativism? There should seriously be a Congressional investigation...
To: Persia
Your homepage is hilarious!
17
posted on
10/08/2003 5:16:02 PM PDT
by
Ajnin
To: Persia
entire movement in Iran is between moderates and extremists and the people who happen to be more secular than both but everyone is still muslim
This is the country where the B'Hai faith was started. Even Muslims with the ability to question came up with something better.
To this day I think they are under a death sentence if their B'hai beliefs are found out. These people when they get to America called themselves Persion not Iranian.
18
posted on
10/08/2003 5:25:13 PM PDT
by
BabsC
To: Persia
for example the entire movement in Iran is between moderates and extremists and the people who happen to be more secular than both but everyone is still muslim Americans would have a much easier time signing onto making a distinction if the good Muslims would start "giving up" the bad Muslims, instead of telling us how terrible we are for not giving them the benefit of the doubt.
19
posted on
10/08/2003 5:26:00 PM PDT
by
Woahhs
To: BabsC
iranians call themselves persians not due to nationality but ethnicity.
Similar to how Iraqis are Arabs, Iranians are, in fact, ethnically Persians.
Youre correct about Bahai persecution its very unfortunate. Iran was always land of free religion and respect for minority religions, Cyrus was the Persian king who freed the Jews.
with change of regime things will change there will be a major backlash against radical islam for generations to come
20
posted on
10/08/2003 5:30:26 PM PDT
by
Persia
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