April 30, 2008 | 5:52 pm

What traveling to Mecca does to Muslims

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

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Last December, more than 2 million Muslims from around the world converged on Saudi Arabia to participate in the Hajj, the annual pilgrimage to the holy site of Mecca. The Hajjis spent a month performing religious rituals, mingling with Muslims from all walks of life, and, in some cases, taking part in communal chants of “Death to America” led by Islamic extremists. This was understandably unnerving to the 10,000 or so Americans who made the pilgrimage, not to mention those who didn’t. Such behavior raised concerns that the Hajj is a breeding ground for anti-Western sentiment—or worse.

Then again, the spirit of friendship and community that typically prevails during the Hajj has also been known to promote tolerance and understanding across peoples. Malcolm X famously softened his views on black-white relations during his pilgrimage to Mecca, where he witnessed a “spirit of unity and brotherhood that my experiences in America had led me to believe never could exist between the white and non-white.”

So does the Hajj open minds, or does it expose Muslims to radical views that unite them against the non-Islamic world?

That is an important question asked in this Slate article. The Hajj is a Pillar of Islam, up there with daily prayer, giving to the poor and fasting during Ramadan. It is a pilgrimage to Mecca that every able-bodied Muslim is expected to participate in, and therefore its influences are profound. Three researchers recently set out to answer that question. In a yet published study, they found that the Hajj made its pilgrims more moderate on a range of issues, religious and nonreligious, “suggesting that the Hajj may be helpful in curbing the spread of extremism in the Islamic world.”

April 30, 2008 | 5:30 pm

Parish donates $1.5 million to abuse victims

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

The Catholic clergy sex scandal has caused not just physical but also financial pain, only the victims are different. (Much of the cost was absorbed by insurers and religious orders.) The L.A. Archdiocese recently sold its headquarters to offset a $660 million—!—settlement, a payout for which Cardinal Roger Mahony was reportedly assaulted. And now one of the cardinal’s parish in my old ‘hood has stepped forward to help foot the bill.

St. Bernardine of Siena Parish in Woodland Hills has donated nearly $1.5 million of its savings to the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles to help fund last year’s multimillion-dollar settlement of clergy sex abuse cases.

The donation is unprecedented in the archdiocese, which has called on 101 churches with identified savings of at least $1 million each to help offset the more than $660 million payout to victims of clergy sexual abuse, according to archdiocese spokesman Tod Tamberg.

“While it may not sit well with everyone in the parish, it is an extraordinary gesture of community and family on the part of St. Bernardine Parish,” said Tamberg, who called the gift “emotionally moving.”

This story from the LA Daily News is moving, as Tamberg says; it’s encouraging to see the church body step forward and support its leaders. If only those leaders had supported the church body when the seeds of this sorrow were being sown.

(Hat tip: LAObserved)

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April 30, 2008 | 1:47 pm

Rev. Lee blasted in Wall St. Journal

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

L’affaire Ziman-Lee made its way today onto the op-ed pages of the Wall Street Journal. Seriously. The focus of the piece was on the historic friendship between Martin Luther King Jr. and Jews, and the author, who was King’s attorney, says the great civil rights leader would have been sickened by what the Rev. Eric Lee supposedly said.

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April 30, 2008 | 9:44 am

Fauxmemoirist likens gangsters to suicide bombers

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

This video turned up today on Gawker of “Margaret B. Jones,” the James Frey of Gangland whose real name was Margaret Seltzer and real life was that of a well-off white girl from the San Fernando Valley. In the video, “Jones” rambles about how hardcore it is in the hood she didn’t grow up in.

It’s like being a Palestinian suicide bomber. When you are borne into it and you are caught up in it, and your ego and your pride, it makes perfect sense.

Someone at my paper went looking for Seltzer after the scandal broke because they were under the impression that, instead of being a half-white, half-Native American foster kid from South Central, she was actually a Jewish kid from Sherman Oaks. I, however, could find only that she attendy pricey Campbell Hall, an Episcopal prep school.

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April 29, 2008 | 11:42 am

Changing the National Day of Prayer

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Every year it seems certain religious organizations, namely those who feel excluded, ask that the National Day of Prayer be a more ecumenical event. (I’ve written this story at least once.) Two thousand eight is no different, as this report from the DMN religion blog notes:

We mentioned days ago a Jewish group’s complaint that the National Day of Prayer had been “hijacked” by the Christian right.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations has joined with that group, Jews on First, to call for inclusive celebrations on Thursday, the day of prayer.

Here‘s a news release from CAIR. It urges all people of faith “to contact governors and other elected officials nationwide to ask that any government-sponsored ‘National Day of Prayer’ observances on May 1st be representative of our nation’s religious diversity.”

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April 29, 2008 | 9:39 am

‘Does science make belief in God obsolete?’

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

The Templeton Conversation has returned, this time asking major scientists the question posed in this headline: “Does science make belief in God Obsolete?” As expected, there was not a uniform answer. Some said “yes,” others “no, and yes” and two “of course not.”

One of the “of course nots” is from Ken Miller, whom I have quoted here before. Here’s what he told Templeton:

Science itself does not contradict the hypothesis of God. Rather, it gives us a window on a dynamic and creative universe that expands our appreciation of the Divine in ways that could not have been imagined in ages past.

As an outspoken defender of evolution, I am often challenged by those who assume that if science can demonstrate the natural origins of our species, which it surely has, then God should be abandoned. But the Deity they reject so easily is not the one I know. To be threatened by science, God would have to be nothing more than a placeholder for human ignorance. This is the God of the creationists, of the “intelligent design” movement, of those who seek their God in darkness. What we have not found and do not yet understand becomes their best–indeed their only–evidence for faith. As a Christian, I find the flow of this logic particularly depressing. Not only does it teach us to fear the acquisition of knowledge (which might at any time disprove belief), but it also suggests that God dwells only in the shadows of our understanding. I suggest that if God is real, we should be able to find him somewhere else–in the bright light of human knowledge, spiritual and scientific.

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April 28, 2008 | 7:37 pm

‘First Drafts of the Parables of Jesus’

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

At the LA Times Festival of Books Saturday, I stopped by the McSweeney‘s booth. I’ve never read the magazine but I did indulge in Dave Eggers in college, and though I may be no hipster, I am arguably a writer. One plus one, minus one, plus one, minus another ... it seemed like I should at least take a look.

In current issue of the quarterly journal, I found this article titled “First Drafts of the Parables of Jesus.” It assumes that the Bible, or at least the Gospels, was not simply a great piece of literature but, in fact, fiction. The red-letter text is same, but the “first drafts” include extraneous details that any good editor would remove. The first from Luke 11 and the second referenced in Matthew 21 and Luke 15. This is clearly satire, not suggestion.

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April 28, 2008 | 4:53 pm

Many of Texas’ FLDS teen girls pregnant, mothers

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

More bad news regarding all those children taken into Texas custody when their parents’ polygamist ranch was raided earlier this month. From AP:

SAN ANTONIO - More than half the teen girls taken from a polygamist compound in west Texas have children or are pregnant, state officials said Monday.

A total of 53 girls between the ages of 14 and 17 are in state custody after a raid 3 1/2 weeks ago at the Yearning For Zion Ranch in Eldorado. Of those girls, 31 either have children or are pregnant, said Child Protective Services spokesman Darrell Azar. Two of those are pregnant now, he said; it was unclear whether either of those two already have children.

“It shows you a pretty distinct pattern, that it was pretty pervasive,” he said.

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April 28, 2008 | 3:28 pm

Rev. Wright is Mr. Wrong

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

I was amazed last month when I was speaking with the ZOA’s Mort Klein, and he mentioned the Rev. Jeremiah Wright in the same sentence as the Reverends Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton. (Klein has taken to Wright for his own reasons.) I find it hard to believe that before Barack Obama began his presidential bid, anyone outside of Chicago even knew who Wright was. But the more attention Obama’s former pastor has received for his contested brand of Christianity, one that emphasizes black liberation, the more sought after a speaker he has become.

Now on the speakers’ circuit, Wright spoke this morning at the National Press Club. Continuing to dog Obama, Wright joked that he would be open to serving as vice president.

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April 28, 2008 | 11:15 am

A closer look at Islamophobia

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Andrea Elliott won a Pulitzer last year for her amazing series “Imam in America.” In today’s New York Times, she tells another powerful story about American Muslims. Her subject is Debbie Almontaser, who last year started an academy that would teach Arabic to its students, Arab American and those of other ethnicities.

Weeks before classes even began, though, Almontaser resigned as its founding principal. Here’s why:

Ms. Almontaser, a teacher by training and an activist who had carefully built ties with Christians and Jews, said she was forced to resign by the mayorâ€(tm)s office following a campaign that pitted her against a chorus of critics who claimed she had a militant Islamic agenda.

In newspaper articles and Internet postings, on television and talk radio, Ms. Almontaser was branded a “radical,” a “jihadist” and a “9/11 denier.” She stood accused of harboring unpatriotic leanings and of secretly planning to proselytize her students. Despite Ms. Almontaserâ€(tm)s longstanding reputation as a Muslim moderate, her critics quickly succeeded in recasting her image.

The conflict tapped into a well of post-9/11 anxieties. But Ms. Almontaserâ€(tm)s downfall was not merely the result of a spontaneous outcry by concerned parents and neighborhood activists. It was also the work of a growing and organized movement to stop Muslim citizens who are seeking an expanded role in American public life. The fight against the school, participants in the effort say, was only an early skirmish in a broader, national struggle.

“Itâ€(tm)s a battle thatâ€(tm)s really just begun,” said Daniel Pipes, who directs a conservative research group, the Middle East Forum, and helped lead the charge against Ms. Almontaser and the school.

In the aftermath of Sept. 11, critics of radical Islam focused largely on terrorism, scrutinizing Muslim-American charities or asserting links between Muslim organizations and violent groups like Hamas. But as the authorities have stepped up the war on terror, those critics have shifted their gaze to a new frontier, what they describe as law-abiding Muslim-Americans who are imposing their religious values in the public domain.

Mr. Pipes and others reel off a list of examples: Muslim cabdrivers in Minneapolis who have refused to take passengers carrying liquor; municipal pools and a gym at Harvard that have adopted female-only hours to accommodate Muslim women; candidates for office who are suspected of supporting political Islam; and banks that are offering financial products compliant with sharia, the Islamic code of law.

The danger, Mr. Pipes says, is that the United States stands to become another England or France, a place where Muslims are balkanized and ultimately threaten to impose sharia.

“It is hard to see how violence, how terrorism will lead to the implementation of sharia,” Mr. Pipes said. “It is much easier to see how, working through the system — the school system, the media, the religious organizations, the government, businesses and the like — you can promote radical Islam.”

Mr. Pipes refers to this new enemy as the “lawful Islamists.”

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April 28, 2008 | 10:12 am

Wheaton professor fired over divorce

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

Wheaton College is an evangelical school outside of Chicago. Like many colleges cut from conservative Protestant cloth, its students and faculty must uphold a stricter standard of conduct than they would at, say, Florida State. One of those rules for married faculty is remaining so. Divorce is grounds for dismissal unless your circumstances fit the biblical exemption, which generally is limited to an unfaithful spouse.

The problem for Kent Gramm is he doesn’t want to talk with Wheaton administrators about why he and his wife are separating. So they’re letting him go.

For him, he says, it didn�(tm)t seem appropriate “to subject your personal life to the judgment of the college administrators.” However, he told his students of his reasons for leaving �” first reported in Wheaton�(tm)s student newspaper, The Wheaton Record �” to offer them an alternative model of Christian living. Gramm, who teaches literature, fiction and nonfiction writing, has his master of divinity degree in addition to his M.A. and Ph.D.

“I think the students can be given a false picture of what the proper Christian life should be,” Gramm says. “Whereas many of these students come from households that have been broken by divorce, and if they conform to the overall population, half of them themselves will be going through divorce. And if they are shown that God doesn�(tm)t abandon you if you are divorced and they�(tm)re shown that this is a part of life and that sometimes it can possibly be the right thing or the best thing, not necessarily the desirable thing, to do, then I think that might help them in their future lives.”

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April 25, 2008 | 6:09 pm

Redux: ‘The true meaning of Passover’

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

In case you missed David Sackman’s thoughtful comment here about the Rev. Eric Lee and the true meaning of Passover, his words were reprinted today as an op-ed in The Jewish Journal. To refresh:

I am Jewish, of European ancestry; my wife is black, with Chinese and Native American ancestry included. What shall we tell our son this Passover, when we retell the tale of how his Jewish ancestors were freed from slavery in Africa?

Shall we trade accusations against each other? The statement reputed to have been made at a fraternity event, that some Jews in the entertainment industry exploited and profited from black performers, is probably true. It is also true that Jewish union leaders, lawyers and agents in the entertainment industry have fought for better wages and working conditions for blacks and others in the industry. Many Jews played crucial roles in the struggle for civil rights, and undoubtedly there were some on the other side as well. We can go back farther to trade accusations. Were there Jews who owned slaves and were involved in the slave trade? Probably so; and yet there were also Jews fighting for abolition. Does it matter whether those on one side outnumbered those on the other?

To be honest, I must tell my son that his African ancestors were on both sides as well.

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