Sharia is not fun

Haider Ala Hamoudi, Assistant Professor of Law at the University of Pittsburgh, is criticizing the many fatwa's of salafi Muslims that seem to aim at taking any join out of life. Watching Mickey Mouse is haraam, the eating of certain deserts, flying kites... is Islam against joy in life?

Hamoudi considers the fatwa's 'mostly for vulgar entertainment value (it really can be funny how ridiculous some of these things get, it's my version of Jerry Springer to look through them), but I've sort of noticed a pattern'. What is the pattern? According to Hamoudi:

If I might proffer a simple, additional reason that some of this might be coming about is that for the most part, the Islamist resistance is filled with angry and frustrated people, in many cases very extreme ideologues, who don't really think very highly of fun, as might be said of ideologues the world over, whether Marxists or abortion doctor killers or whoever. To them, the world is serious business, not to be laughed at, and ideas in their purity meant to prevail. The notion that their ideas aren't entirely consistent in application (it's the world, they never will be, when you try to force the world into the consistent idea, it usually ends pretty badly) engenders a furious reaction. They don't believe it, they insist it is consistent, and pure, and comprehensive and absolute.

Interesting reading - and funny because of the examples Hamoudi uses. Read more on his website. For this very article by Hamoudi, see HERE.

Smile: Kadhafi about Barack Obama

Sorry, a bit off-topic here, but I could not resist. Elections in the USA are a permission for many transgressions.

In the last few days, I see many pro-Republican websites and blogs where the story appears that according to the Libyan leader Muammar Kadhafi, Barack Obama is a Muslim of Kenyan origins who studied in Islamic schools and whose campaign may have been financed by people in the Islamic and African worlds. Kadhafi said this on TV in June. Funny how these words are now, months later, brought to us by MEMRI, the institute that exists to support Israel and that will do anything to get a Republican president elected.

I do not vote for Obama, let me ensure you that. But it is so funny how his alleged Islamic background is now 'confirmed' by no-one less than the Libyan leader. Do you know that years ago, Kadhafi said on TV that Shakespeare was an Arab Muslim who immigrated to England? His real name was Sheikh Zubayr. If you believe that to be credible, than, by all means, treat Kadhafi as a credible source of information about Obama.

Mission - Absolute Priority

Pope Benedict XVI about the need for mission:

The missionary mandate continues to be an absolute priority for all baptized persons who are called to be "servants and apostles of Christ Jesus" at the beginning of this millennium.

To be taken seriously by all baptized Christians!

Another St Francis Missiological Conference

This month, 20 or so mission practitioners from the Muslim world meet to present and discuss papers on the cutting edge of Church, Islam, and Arab World. The subjects of the papers promise great mind-stretching discussions! The papers will probably be published in the December issue of St Francis Magazine - so keep coming back!

Coptic Christian to prison... ridiculous

An Egyptian Coptic Christian woman has been sentenced to three years in prison for failing to uphold her Islamic identity – an identity she didn’t know she had for over four decades.

Sisters Shadia and Bahia Nagy El-Sisi, both in their late 40s and residents of the small east Delta town Mit-Ghamr, were arrested and tried for claiming their official religious identity as Christian. Unknown to them, their religious identity officially changed 46 years ago due to their father’s brief conversion to Islam. Both are illiterate.

Shadia El-Sisi was tried for stating her religion as Christian on her marriage certificate and sentenced to three years in prison on Nov. 21, 2007. She was released two months later. Last Sept. 23 a judge also sentenced Bahia El-Sisi to three years in prison for “forging” her marriage certificate by stating her religion as Christian. This story of Compass News can be found on OneNewsNow

Iran critical of discrimination in the world of Islam

The Iranian News Agency (IRNA) reports that 200 Iranian instructors have asked Saudi King Abdullah for stopping insults to pilgrims to the holy sites in that country. The letter reads, among other things,

Unfortunately, many cases of insult and disrespect to the followers of other sects are seen in the land of revelation near the tomb of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH). ... Such acts will increase schisms among Muslims.

Muslims like to stress how united they are, but this letter shows that the shiite Muslims are not happy with how they are being treated when on pilgrimage in Mekka. The fact that this letter is published by IRNA is also an insult by Iran to Saudi Arabia, even though the language used sounds friendly. The Saudi KIng, Abdullah, is told in public by Iran that he is not implementing his role as protector of the holy sites too well.

Allah no longer has 99 most beautiful names

During the last weeks, scholars at al-Azhar have agreed to dump some of Allah's most beautiful names. The firebrand sheikh Yusuf al-Badri has even started a courtcase in Egypt to forbid any singing of the 99 most beautiful names.

What is happening to Islam? Are the foundations shaking? Ah.. it is this Coptic-Orthdox priest Zakari. On his daily TV program on LifeTV (owned by Joyce Meyer by the way...) he has been tearing these 99 names apart. And Islamic scholars had to agree with him. How can you call Allah, just to give a few examples, The Hurtful (al-Dharr), or the Useful (al-Nafia).

About 20 more names are now seen as too problematic to be used. A clear proof that the Christian TV broadcasts to the Arab World are not in vain; beside leading many to Christ (see HERE for instance), they are obviousuly impacting Islamic theology. Here the 99 names, on a Sufi website, as long as it lasts.