Religion and spending: Prudent but not puritan | The Economist

2014/12/09 Leave a comment

Interesting study by Vince Showers, a US finance professor, on the spending patterns of the religious (no breakdown by religion):

After using a lot of fancy statistical tools, they came up with some expected findings, and some rather unexpected ones. Households “with a strong commitment to faith”— demonstrated by higher spending on religious activities—are less likely to be weighed down by excessive mortgage outgoings or loan payments for cars. Compared with other households, they are more likely to be home owners but their property tax burden tends to be less—suggesting that “some moderation in [the] selection of home in terms of extravagance or location….”

Devout households seem keener on mitigating risk and therefore spend more on life insurance and health insurance; they lay out less on alcohol and tobacco and more on domestic appliances, including cooking utensils. Such homely behaviour is most heavily correlated with religious belief in the American South and Midwest, which are also the regions with “the most conservative interpretation of scripture,” Mr Showers notes, in an article in the Interdisciplinary Journal of Research on Religion. (The research more-or-less conflates the term “religious” with “Christian” or “Judeo-Christian” which in the American context is only a smallish distortion.)

But religious families do allow themselves some earthly pleasures. Indeed, they are if anything a little more likely than other households to spend spare money on clothing or jewellery, although the amount each household splurges on jewellery is a bit less. Some of that jewellery, of course, might be devotional: silver crosses or stars of David. They are as likely as anybody else to be spending money on child support or alimony—a proxy for failed marriages—and they are as inclined as other folk to incur interest payments on credit cards.

Religion and spending: Prudent but not puritan | The Economist.

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National Post editorial board: When church and state collide

2014/12/06 Leave a comment

National Post on Alberta’s Bill 10 on allowing gay-straight student clubs and the broader issue of separation of church and state (no funding is the cleanest option):

Above all else, this situation is simply undesirable: Governments shouldn’t be telling churches how to worship, and churches shouldn’t be telling legislators how to govern. And the gap between acceptable religious and political opinion seems unlikely to shrink.

Eventually, Canadian governments may have to make a decision: Fund religious schools and other alternatives to the secular public system — directly or through a portable subsidy — and let them teach according to the tenets of their faith or ideology; or don’t fund them at all. It would cause serious political headaches in the short term, but save many more in the long term.

National Post editorial board: When church and state collide

And Don Braid’s harsh criticism of the Bill and the Alberta government’s handling of the issue:

Bill 10 began life by voicing support for formation of alliances, but then allowing schools or school boards to refuse them. This was “balancing” the rights of students with those of parents and elected trustees, the government said.

If the students still wanted their alliances, well, they could appeal to Court of Queen’s Bench.

From the heart of the legislature gasbag, the PCs were actually serious about making gay teenage children march into court like a pack of government lawyers.

Greeted by torrents of scorn, the government backed up — into further absurdity, unfortunately.

Kids would no longer need appeal to the courts. Instead, if a school board refused an alliance, the minister of education would simply approve it.

There was no longer any thought to the precious “right” of schools to refuse gay-straight alliances. Apparently it never meant much to begin with.

But schools could still say no, which seems absurd when the minister would then say yes. How would children feel about that? Worse, the amended bill gives no guarantee that after ministerial approval, kids would be able to meet on school property.

Further ridicule ensued. This sounded like segregation — “normal” kids are welcome to have their club meetings at school, but gay students have to go down the street.

This bill can’t be allowed to stand in modern Alberta — and the government may finally know it.

Don Braid: Alberta backs away from bullying bill that treats gay students as unequal

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Father Raymond J. de Souza: ‘Islamophobia’ is not the problem

2014/12/06 1 Comment

While his argument that criticizing Islamic extremism and violence is not Islamophobic is of course correct, de Souza appears to dismiss the possibility of Islamphobia (or anti-Muslim prejudice and discrimination) as well as being silent on the language used (e.g., Pamela Geller and Robert Spencer are prime examples of the use of intemperate and overly broad condemnation of all Muslims as potential or actual extremists):

On the weekend Pope Francis was in Turkey to visit the leader of world Orthodoxy, Bartholomew, Patriarch of Constantinople. Like John Paul and Benedict before him, Francis went to show his esteem for the Orthodox Church and to foster the bonds of unity. But since Constantinople long ago fell to the Turks, this Christian meeting took place in a country that is 98% Muslim — and more to the point, in a country now led by an ambitious man, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who is not above using Islamism to advance his desire to be the leader of global Islam, recapturing the influence of his Ottoman predecessors.

Erdoğan took advantage of the Holy Father’s visit to argue that Western leaders who seek his aid in combatting jihadism need to clean up their own house first. Erdoğan urged the Pope in his welcome address to combat the “the very serious and rapid trend of growth in racism, discrimination, and hatred of others, especially Islamophobia in the West.”

The point was further amplified by Mehmet Görmez, the minister of religious affairs. “We feel anxiety and concern for the future, that the Islamophobic paranoia that has already been spread among Western public opinion is being used as a pretext for massive pressures, intimidation, discrimination, alienation, and actual attacks against our Muslim brothers and sisters living in the West,” he said.

It is hardly phobic or paranoid for Christians on Turkey’s borders in Syria and Iraq to fear the jihadism that is slaughtering their communities

Like most countries that have government departments for religious affairs, Turkey does not permit full religious liberty. The Orthodox Patriarchate, present in Constantinople since before Islam existed, is being strangled by the state, with heavy restrictions placed on its institutions and freedom of governance. So it is a bit much to hear from Turkey about “Islamophobia” inflaming public opinion abroad when “Christophobia” is practiced by law at home. Moreover, it is hardly phobic or paranoid for Christians on Turkey’s borders in Syria and Iraq to fear the jihadism that is slaughtering their communities.

Erdoğan and his ministers were offering a sort of pact: We will combat jihadism in our backyard if you condemn “Islamophobia” in yours. It is an offer that merits firm rejection.

Drawing moral equivalence between lethal jihadism and people who say nasty things about the co-religionists of such jihadis is meant to be disabling, as was the case in the days of the anti-anti-communists. It sows confusion by suggesting that any challenge even to Muslim pathologies is ill-motivated and illegitimate.

The obligation of Turkey and other Muslim states to combat extremist violence in the name of Islam binds independent of what is being done elsewhere. Indeed, one might argue that reducing jihadist attacks would do more to reduce “Islamophobia” than any number of pieties about Islam being a religion of peace.

More outrageously, to juxtapose “Islamophobia” and Islamist violence ignores that the vast majority of victims of jihadism are Muslims themselves. For every Muslim in the West anxious about “Islamophobia,” there are far, far more within the house of Islam who fear for their lives.

Jihadism is a clear, present and lethal danger, for Muslims first, and it is waxing rather than waning. It is not “phobic” to condemn it.

Father Raymond J. de Souza: ‘Islamophobia’ is not the problem

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Pope says it is wrong to equate Islam with violence

2014/12/02 Leave a comment

Much more productive approach than his predecessor:

The Argentine pope, who has been trying to foster cooperation with moderate Islam in order to work for peace and protect Christians in the Middle East, said it was wrong for anyone to react to terrorism by being “enraged” against Islam.

“You just can’t say that, just as you can’t say that all Christians are fundamentalists. We have our share of them fundamentalists. All religions have these little groups,” he said.

“They Muslims say: ‘No, we are not this, the Koran is a book of peace, it is a prophetic book of peace.”

Francis said he had made the suggestion of a global condemnation of terrorism by Islamic leaders in talks on Friday with Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan.

“I told the president that it would be beautiful if all Islamic leaders, whether they are political, religious or academic leaders, would speak out clearly and condemn this because this would help the majority of Muslim people,” he said.

Francis several times condemned Islamic States insurgents during his three-day trip. On the plane, he said some Christians had been forced to abandon everything: “They are driving us out of the Middle East.”

Pope says it is wrong to equate Islam with violence | Reuters.

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My radicalized son chose the other Islam

2014/11/27 Leave a comment

Powerful statement from an obviously distraught mother:

My son embraced the harsh, isolating view of the Wahhabis. He was encouraged to reject any information from non-Saudi sources. He scorned moderate imams and his parents. He learned to speak Arabic, read the Koran and form his own legal rulings. But since he’d never lived under a totalitarian regime, he broadcast their teachings openly. You mix a few ounces of religious fervour with a pound of a dogmatic, irrational ideology and you end up with extremists and terrorists. That’s the concoction ultraconservatism offers. His teachers and friends criticized him and withdrew. Now they claim they don’t know him.

They offer no guidance to men who take Wahhabism to its inevitable extreme. There is no authority among them who can rein in people who let their emotions or lusts inform their religion. No one among them takes responsibility for what they teach. If a follower becomes mentally ill, he will be scorned, perhaps accused of demonic possession.

Wahhabism or Salafism is the same Dr. Frankenstein that created the monstrous Islamic State, Boko Haram and al-Qaeda. It’s a politically motivated, pseudo-religious cult designed to extinguish the free-thinking liberality of moderate, traditional Islam. Salafism, fed by petro-dollars, teaches political obedience to Muslim rulers as a religious obligation.

Wahhabism is one of the vehicles by which ignorance is spread. Ignorance of Islamic history, Islamic law and modern politics fuel that vehicle. Ignorance should not be spread by religious leaders.

Here in Canada, religious teachers should be held responsible for what they teach and how their students interpret their teachings, especially when those teachings have led to the kind of chaos, strife and destruction Wahhabism has caused. Men like my son have taken sail on the ship of ultraconservatism, and his mentors have abandoned him and set him adrift. He was not a radical until he was radicalized.

And even when it does not lead to violence, extreme fundamentalism, in any religion, means living apart from society, with little or no integration.

My radicalized son chose the other Islam – The Globe and Mail.

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BBC News – Radicalisation risk at six Muslim private schools, says Ofsted

2014/11/24 Leave a comment

Ongoing issue in UK schools, this time at private faith-based Muslim schools:

At one school, inspectors found pupils did not know the difference between sharia and British law.

And they said the curriculum at Mazahirul Uloom School in Tower Hamlets “focused solely” on Islamic themes.

In a letter to Ms Morgan, Sir Michael said he was “extremely concerned about the large number of failings” in each of the six schools and was “not convinced” current managers were capable of making necessary improvements.

“I believe that, in all six schools, pupils physical and educational welfare is at serious risk,” he wrote.

“Given the evidence gathered from these inspections, particularly in relation to the narrowness of the curriculum, I am concerned that pupils in these schools may be vulnerable to extremist influences and radicalisation.”

BBC News – Radicalisation risk at six Muslim private schools, says Ofsted.

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Europe and Islam: Degrees of separation | The Economist

2014/11/19 Leave a comment

Interesting overview of some of the debates in Europe over the role, or not, of the state, in training of Imams:

In addition to all these ideological issues, there is a hard reality to consider. Being an imam in Europe is a rather thankless task. Of the 1,800 imams in France, about 1,000 offer their services for virtually no pay. Only 330 receive a decent, full-time salary—in most cases from religious authorities in their home countries, such as Algeria, Morocco or Turkey. Only 25-30% of the imams working in France have French citizenship. The idea of “home-grown” French imams, well-trained and correspondingly well paid, is an attractive one in principle—but poor Muslim communities seem unwilling or unable to finance such arrangements. And for the secular French state, putting imams on its payroll would be inconceivable.

Europe and Islam: Degrees of separation | The Economist.

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Book on apostasy in Islam earns writer the moniker Somalia’s Salman Rushdie – Religion News Service

2014/11/19 Leave a comment

Brave and courageous.

But it is a test within Islam between those more open believers and the literalists/fundamentalists:

Ismail said the book furthers the growing voice of Muslim scholars, intellectuals and prominent clerics worldwide who are increasingly rejecting the abuse of Islam by extremist groups such as the Islamic State, Nigeria’s Boko Haram and Somalia’s Al-Shabab.

“What we need are secular states where there is democracy, justice and equality for all,” he said. “Not theocratic ones where leaders rule by the name of God.”

Ismail’s concern is that Somali Islamic militants, clerics and other extremist groups in Muslim-majority countries are applying apostasy as a political tool, branding those with contrary opinions as apostates who need to be killed. He has watched Al-Shabab justify the deaths of those who oppose their hard-line interpretation of the Quran by branding them apostates. Somali civil servants, national army officers, local or international nongovernmental organization officials, are considered devil’s spies who deserve death, he added.

“I wanted to explain to my people the true meaning of apostasy in Islam,” he said.

A graduate of the Umm Al-Qura University in Saudi Arabia, Ismail, 50,  has written four other books on globalization and economics.

But he appears to have struck a raw nerve with the latest book, which he had hoped would stimulate a debate on religious freedom in Islam. The book also touches on other issues, such as gender equality and stoning adulterers to death in Islam.

“Apostasy is crime in Islam,” said Sheikh Abdallar Kheir, a religious scholar at Kenyatta University in Nairobi. “It is mentioned in the Quran and the traditions of the prophet. It is like treason.“

But there conditions and situations in which the rule is applied,” Kheir added. “It must be in an Islamic state, there must be dialogue and reasoning before it is applied, and it is applied if the person in the new faith causes disturbance to Muslims or the Islamic faith.”

Sorry, Sheikh Kheir, your conditions don’t cut it from a human rights and dignity perspective.

Book on apostasy in Islam earns writer the moniker Somalias Salman Rushdie – Religion News Service.

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Douglas Todd: The dangers of scapegoating religion: Karen Armstrong

2014/11/18 Leave a comment

Good interview with Karen Armstrong on her latest book, Fields of Blood:

Armstrong would not be content with the platitude that such and such a faith is strictly “a religion of peace.” She defends the need for countries to have responsible militaries and reveals how religious people have often been far from innocent, allowing their faith to be co-opted for destruction.

For instance, she notes that while Jesus was a near-pacifist, Mohammed was a powerful leader. When Mohammed was locked in open war with Jewish tribes, Armstrong judges his decision to slaughter 700 Jewish men and put their wives and children into slavery as “an atrocity that marked the lowest point in the Prophet’s career.”

Otherwise, she believes, Mohammed was a consensus builder and deal maker who respected Jews and Christians as “the people of the Book Bible,” adding, “Mohammed must be one of the few leaders in history to build an empire largely by negotiation.”

In discussing religion, in other words, we have to avoid stereotyping, but we also have to be realistic.

That requires acknowledging that religion around the planet, as many immigrants to North America will attest, is not all sweetness. It can be used to persecute minorities — and it frequently comes with scriptural literalism, patriarchy, intolerance of homosexuality and opposition to individual freedom.

Yet, with all the accusations flying around blaming religion for virtually all conflict and oppression, it’s more than valid to recall how religion has also long been an inspiration for peace and reconciliation.

“It is simply not true that ‘religion’ is always aggressive. Sometimes it has actually put the brakes on violence,” says Armstrong in Fields of Blood.

Douglas Todd: The dangers of scapegoating religion.

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Saudi Arabia Bulldozes Over Its Heritage

2014/11/15 Leave a comment

A reminder that our nominal allies in the struggle against ISIS have their own ISIS and Taliban-like tendency to obliterate history and anything that does not conform to their historical and cultural interpretation of Islam:

Over the last few years, mosques and key sites dating from the time of Muhammad have been knocked down or destroyed, as have Ottoman-era mansions, ancient wells and stone bridges. Over 98% of the Kingdom’s historical and religious sites have been destroyed since 1985, estimates the Islamic Heritage Research Foundation in London. “It’s as if they wanted to wipe out history,” says Ali Al-Ahmed, of the Institute for Gulf Affairs in Washington, D.C.

Though the Saudi rulers have a long history of destroying historical sites, activists say the pace and range of destruction has recently increased. A few months ago, the house of Hamza, the Prophet Muhammad’s uncle, was flattened to make way for a Meccan hotel, according to Irfan Al Alawi, executive director of the Islamic Heritage Research Foundation. There have even been rumored threats to Muhammad’s tomb in Medina and his birthplace in Mecca.

Saudi Arabia Bulldozes Over Its Heritage | TIME.

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