Skip to main content

Of pastors and sheep

I am sure there are tonne of blogs about this topic out there already. But it bugs me, so I shall write about it. Apparently, an alleged man of god, somewhere in Florida decided to burn a few holy Korans to make a point. Somehow, he equated Islam to terrorism and decided that September 11 would be a great day to set them alight on a bonfire. This man is a pastor of a tiny church, supposedly bringing the word of god to his parishioners. Except this man isn't applying many of the lord's suggestions. Like love thy neighbour. 

It is incredible that one lunatic person has managed to cause such a lot of trouble for so many people. I think I saw the American President talk about this whole book-burning-Islam-bashing event two or three times. It is sad that so many people take this man's threats to heart and believe that he is the voice of reason and representative of America. Because he's not. I am not American, but by all the gods, there are many that I know and they are not so petty.

America does not hate Islam. Nor does Islam hate America. It is really sad to see extremist bigots on either side of this argument use religion as justification to spread hatred. How is it that the nuts in Kabul and elsewhere not realise that this guy is nothing but a mirror image of themselves? All he is doing is using religion as a shield to spew his brand of hate? These two religions who have so much in common, of which Isa is a prophet for one (and the son of god for the other), how can their collective god allow one set of fools to hate another set of people based on the actions of a small minority? He's not.
America is not a Christian country in the strictest sense. The sane folks who wrote that constitution made sure of that. This was a country which was after all founded by a bunch of people fleeing religious persecution. Their money says, In god we trust. Not in the Christian version of god. Or the Islamic version of him. Just god. America is a country with a lot of people. People who believe in all sorts of things. Men who choose men as partners. People who are vegetarians. People who are new immigrants like me. While I may not agree with what some of them do, I could not imagine that the collective America was out to get anyone. Maybe their government is misguided from time to time, looking for imaginary weapons of mass destruction in the desert and causing lots of damage to their reputation as a result, but America is also the country that helps others. How many sacks of USAID wheat has been sent to various disasters around the world (including the floods in the Islamic Republic of Pakistan)? Is it Christian wheat? Did Jesus stamp the USAID logo onto it? No. Americans did. People did. People who felt the need to help their fellow man because of whatever compunction they have.

If there is a god and he/she/it reads my blog, here's my plea:
Please dear god, can you fix these people all around this green earth of ours who use your name to perpetrate the worst kind of nonsense out there? Feel free to smite them down with whatever you happen to have handy. Diarrhoea works. A swift kick in the ass works too. 

And if you're one of these cretins that is doing this, can you please stop? Lets try and worry about the stuff we need to worry about, not about who is going to burn what book. Burning books is stupid. Go burn some wood or something if you're bored. Books are meant to be read. And God is not some kind of football you use to kick around when you please and use as justification to tie suicide belts and blow yourselves up in.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Strange is one way to put it

Life has been a bit strange of late. I've gone from being incredibly happy to depressingly sad. I don't quite have the answers to why that is and I am not really sure I care to find out. I almost feel like its easier to give up than try and work towards some worthwhile conclusion to the problem. I love going on vacation. I hate coming back from there. Generally, when I get back from vacation, I go through a period of adjustment that starts with the lack of sleep (because I am usually not in the same time zone as my vacation destination was), self-pity and loathing at the state I left my place in, in my hurry to get out of here. It progresses to outright hatred of having to go back to work and dealing with the routine in general. I resolve to find better things to do in life, learn more, improve myself, lose weight etc etc. And eventually, I end up no further than where I was, where I've been for over 2 years. I can find any number of reasons and excuses to make this someone...

New computer

I am getting a new computer after 5 years. Oddly, I seem to be reversing trends in terms of pricing. My new computer will actually cost me more than my previous one. What am I going to do with the new one? Same sort as stuff as with the current one. I am going to install Linux on it and use it as my desktop. I will likely convert my current machine to a server to host files and who knows what else. So, what does it have? It has an Intel Dual Core processors clocked at 2.8Ghz, a really cool ASUS motherboard, an NCQ enabled Seagate hard drive, 2GB of DDR2 RAM running at 533Mhz, an LG 16x DVD burner, a 6600 LE MSI Video card (with DVI and TVO), one of those fancy floppy disks with multiple memory card readers and the kicker, a funky kick-ass case that looks like a critter from some game. It is called the NZXT Nemesis Elite and I have stolen a pic from a site and put it here: The eye of this case can be modified to change colours (wow!). I should get it next Saturday. My biggest surprise s...

The good, bad and where-the-heck-have-you-been fall edition

I've neglected my blog this summer. I'm sorry to whoever still reads it. Now that fall is here, I'll have more time to devote to it, I think. So, what the heck did I do this summer? In a word, lots! I did a fair bit of running, hiking, biking, swimming this year. I turned vegetarian. Well, a relapsing vegetarian. I attended a wedding, a lamb roast, bought furniture, went back to school, learned to cook new things. I watched a royal wedding, a state funeral and a royal tour of our fine land. I also watched as our hockey team went all the way to the Stanley Cup finals and watched in horror as some of our citizenry decided to set fire to parts of our city. School's back and I'm excited by it. I've also got back to reading. I missed my books. I have no idea why I stopped... but somewhere along the way, I forgot how peaceful it is to sit in a quiet corner somewhere and lose touch with the outside world and step into an imaginary (sometimes brutal) world whe...