Tag Archives: Muslim

Is Islam a Religion of Peace?

In light of the war that appears to be coming between Iran and Israel, this is an interesting–and urgent–subject for debate. Can Israel reasonably risk a nuclear Iran? Should it? And is there any way that Israeli and Iranian leaders … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Youcef Nadarkhani: Christian Pastor Sentenced to Death for His Apostasy from Islam

If normative Islam is, indeed, a religion of tolerance and peace, I would like to hear from American and other Muslims on a recent death sentence handed down, by an Iranian court, on a Christian pastor who refuses to recant his … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

American Imam Kamal Al-Khatib, Thomas Jefferson, and the Constitution of the United States

Kamal Al-Khatib is an American imam with a congregation and school in northern Los Angeles County, and in an interview conducted at his mosque late last year (now up in its entirety on YouTube), I asked him about Thomas Jefferson. The question clearly … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

An Agnostic Interviews an Imam: The Imam Takes Me on a Mosque Tour

The below clip took place in Palmdale, California in northern Los Angeles County, on Wednesday, October 6, 2010. After I had introduced the imam, Kamal al Khatib (see the opening clip here), he then brought me into the mosque. We removed … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Eight Things Jonathan Elliot Learned from Having a Meal with a Muslim

On the theory that maybe we should strike up conversations with our Muslim neighbors and not matches for burning their Qurans, Jonathan Elliot in New Zealand found a Muslim to have lunch with this past month, and recounts how he did … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

What I Believe, and What Islam Teaches

On Wednesday, I’m scheduled to interview an American imam. But I’m a member of the doubting community, not any faith community, which means that I trace my intellectual lineage to people like these: Rene Descartes. Descartes made the first principle of his life, … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 15 Comments

Is Muslim/Non-Muslim Dialogue Valuable?: Juanita, a Christian, Shares Her Opinion with Santi, an Agnostic, on a Balmy Sunday in Lancaster, Ca.

And Joseph, a Muslim, was behind the video camara:

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

The First YouTube for International Have a Meal with a Muslim Day (September 17, 2010)

Yesterday, Joseph, a Muslim, and I, an agnostic, sat down outside a restaurant on Lancaster Blvd. in Lancaster, California and laid out our game plan for International Have a Meal with a Muslim Day. We’ll be having coffee, and perhaps a bite … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 8 Comments

Saudi Woman Links to International Have a Meal with a Muslim Day (Sept 17, 2010)

At her Twitter feed, the brave Saudi feminist, Eman Al Nafjan, who blogs at SaudiWoman, linked to International Have a Meal with a Muslim Day, which I take as an endorsement. And I’ve also been informed that an imam in Baltimore … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 7 Comments

Instead of “Burn a Quran Day,” how about an “International Have a Meal with a Muslim Day”?

In response to the “Burn the Quran Day” Florida pastor, I’ve decided to promote a counter day: The First International Have a Meal with a Muslim Day Or coffee. Initiate dialogues, not bonfires. And so The First International Have a Meal with a Muslim … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 146 Comments

Three Casualties of the Ground Zero Mosque: The Enlightenment, the American Constitution, and the Bill of Rights?

It has hit me forcefully this past weekend that the United States is facing a challenge to the very character of its existence: will we continue to be an Enlightenment-based Jeffersonian nation committed to treating people as individuals with universal reason and … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

A lesson in growing up: I know that you are offended—and no, I won’t be apologizing or adjusting my language to match your sensibilities

I’m here. I have unorthodox views. I’m expressing them directly. Deal with it. Philip Pullman asserts his right to set the rhetorical tone and intellectual content of the messages that he sends and the right of people to give them attention … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 5 Comments

Sherry Marquez Bait: a Man from Catholic Brazil Decapitates His Mother

This today from a Latin American news service: Police in the northeastern state of Bahia are looking for a 22-year-old man accused of decapitating his mother and fleeing with her head, the news Web site G1 said Tuesday. I await … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

A New Harris Poll asks “What do Republicans believe about Barack Obama?”

The answers that the Harris poll yielded are alarming. Here are four of the findings: 24% of Republicans think that Obama “may be the Antichrist” 38% think Obama is “doing many of the things that Hitler did” 57% think that … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

The Muslim sisters of Rosa Parks: they won’t go to the back of the mosque

Muslim American women are starting to engage in acts of feminist civil disobedience against mosque gender segregation. This is what an assertion of subjectivity, humanity, dignity, equality, and conscience looks like: Here’s Asra Nomani on the recent act of civil disobedience … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Lancaster Councilwoman Sherry Marquez Finds a Vocal Local Ally: Audie Yancey, Pastor of First Baptist Church, Quartz Hill

Lancaster city councilwoman Sherry Marquez has dug in on her essentialist remarks on the true nature of Islam (it is a violent religion dominated by violent people who are properly exemplified by the recent beheading of a woman by her Muslim husband … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 9 Comments

President Barack Obama’s Afghanistan Speech (December 1, 2009)

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

A Muslim Imam Who Once Advocated Violence Now Renounces Terror

The heart intervenes. This today in Spiegel: In 2001, imam Mohammed El Fazazi of Morocco preached that it it is a Muslim obligation to “slit the throats of non-believers” in a Hamburg mosque. Among his listeners and star pupils were … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Get out of Afghanistan Now?

That’s former NY Times foreign correspondent Chris Hedges’s advice in an essay posted yesterday at TruthDig.com. Chris Hedges thinks that we’re in a quagmire in Afghanistan, and that we are, by meeting violence with violence, creating more problems for ourselves … Continue reading

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Yes He Can

No, he will not yield the mic, nor will he sit down, until he has spoken his peace: President Obama, in pushing his own agenda, could learn a thing or two from this defiant and courageous Iranian. Know hope. Here and there.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment