I understand your angst. I do. But let me ask you a hypothetical. If the head of the Southern Baptist Convention had said we should have mutual respect between Christians and, I don’t know, say the wiccans, would you feel this reflected poorly on that leader?
Now wiccans are a poor example, because they do not routinely slaughter their theological enemies. But they are adverse to the cause of Christ. I honestly cannot picture the Apostle Paul or John or least of all Jesus offering them the cover of some purported “mutual respect.”
But the subjects of this controversy don’t need and don’t deserve our respect *as muslims.” But we should still love our enemies. And if that had been the approach taken, instead of the treacherous waters of “mutual respect,” I do not think it would have raised so many eyebrows.
the wiccan religion does not have a core belief to force conversion or kill those who won’t convert to wicca.
people that want to jihad you to death arent interested in mutual respect.
>>>But we should still love our enemies.>>>
I once heard a priest explain the above statement in this way: We cannot love all our enemies. We sometimes even have neighbors we cannot like. What God requires of us is to love the soul he has created. He even said that we do not have to allow them to keep harming us. All came clear to me with that statement.