In a large balcony above the beautiful main hall at Regent’s Park Mosque in London – widely considered the most important mosque in Britain – I am filming undercover as the woman preacher gives her talk.
What should be done to a Muslim who converts to another faith? “We kill him,” she says, “kill him, kill, kill”¦You have to kill him, you understand?”
Adulterers, she says, are to be stoned to death – and as for homosexuals, and women who “make themselves like a man, a woman like a man … the punishment is kill, kill them, throw them from the highest place”.
These punishments, the preacher says, are to be implemented in a future Islamic state. “This is not to tell you to start killing people,” she continues. “There must be a Muslim leader, when the Muslim army becomes stronger, when Islam has grown enough.”
A young female student from the group interrupts her: the punishment should also be to stone the homosexuals to death, once they have been thrown from a high place.
These are teachings I never expected to hear inside Regent’s Park Mosque, which is supposedly committed to interfaith dialogue and moderation, and was set up more than 60 years ago, to represent British Muslims to the Government.
I applaud the British press for continuing to investigate British mosque preachers and expose the extremism. Where is the U.S. press? Why don’t we have reports on which mosques in the U.S. feature medieval Islamic law in their preaching and teaching? To pretend that American mosques don’t have this kind of thing is dangerous.
Wait.
Islam is the religion of peace.
Clearly, that guy isn’t a Moslem believer.
Because . . . Islam is a religion of peace.
And I am appalled at the “shrill and negative discourse” from this journalist. This story is “divisive, disrespectful, and inflammatory”. We need to find “friendship and shared values with” such clerics.
These journalists “have been behaving childishly” and have not focused on “our commonalities” which “centred on issues of peace.”
Furthermore “the level of ignorance by Christians and Muslims about each other’s religions has been extremely unhelpful in extending positive dialogue between these two great monotheistic religions”.
Surely these journalists understand that “a new 21st century understanding of Track II diplomacy, initiated through theological diplomacy, must go hand-in-hand with the formal diplomatic search for the peace that has always been at the centre of the Holy Books of both Christianity and Islam.”
And furthermore . . . Islam is way cool, because Bishop Chane says so.
I hope that clarifies everything for the proletariat.
NB to Jeffrey John: Don’t send a resume’ to the Regent’s Park Mosque.
Very alarming to read!
The strong impression I get from this and other articles on the subject is that Muslim extremism will be pushed as far as local authorities allow. When confronted, Muslim activists (and authorities, it seems) back down, apologize, temporize, etc., presumably because they have to at this stage of the game. But Islam is apparently not a religion content to stay quietly within the limits it has been assigned.
And, are there mosques in the United States where such conspirational threats with the intent to commit murder are being uttered?
Are there Muslims who are challenging such violent utterances?
If they challenge these utterances, they might be accused of challenging the word of Allah, and therefore subject to a fatwa, which might result in a death sentence.
Anyone for a serious discussion on the compatibility of orthodox Islam and a representative republic? I dare say there will not be any since the voice of Islam, at least the one I hear publicly, harkens to the ‘glory days’ of the 7th & 8th centuries. It is certainly not an Allah, lover of peace and concord.
You know who could really enlighten us on this item is Rev. Ann Holmes Redding; you remember? The Episcopalian priest/Muslim? I mean, this is just up her alley. By the way, what *ever* happened to that one year to think it over her bishop gave her? Not a word…
LeightonC, I think that’s a good question and a serious one. Islamic law trumps secular law for orthodox observant Muslims. If a Muslim ran for high office in the USA, I would want to know affirmatively that he accepted the American constitutional system.
A little looking produced this update on Redding:
http://www.sevenwholedays.org/2008/06/24/an-update-on-the-revd-ann-holmes-redding/
As might have been expected, nothing has or will be done. Extension till 9/15. Don’t hold your breath. Since there is no understanding of what Christians *or* Muslims believe, let alone ought to believe, the Rev. Redding will likely remain Rev. I pointed out a few months ago the article from “Cathedral Age” I saw when I was in high school, probably in 1975 or so. An ecumenical service included the Muslim call to prayer from the “National Cathedral” pulpit. I said then and say now, Muslims here and in Britain must be saying to themselves “This is going to be alot easier than we thought.”