Many
in the west fear the threat posed by political Islam. But there is a more
ominous menace closer to home.
August 2007
After every terror attack by Islamists, fears
are raised in conservative circles about the “Islamisation”
of our culture with the presence of hundreds of thousands of Muslims in the UK and millions across Europe.
Despite what the selective reading of some surveys
might suggest, most western Muslims share the same liberal values as the rest
of society and radical Islam appeals only to a small minority. Political Islam
can and does pose a threat to secular values – but in Muslim countries, not
here. In Europe, we need to look west for our
religious menaces.
As the creationism debate clearly demonstrates,
the USA
is home to a well-organised and motivated movement with intelligent designs on
power. It is becoming increasingly difficult to write off Christian fundamentalism
and other conservative Christian groups – aka the
Christian right – as some kind of loony fringe as its agenda “Christianises”
the mainstream. It is no accident that just about every single presidential
hopeful in the US
has asked God to endorse his or her campaign.
The vision of marrying church and state and
constructing a “Christian nation” – every bit as contrary to modern secular
values as Islamism – may still seem remote, partly thanks to the tough
constitutional protections against such an eventuality, but it is surprisingly
enduring.
“We have a Biblical duty, we are called by God
to conquer this country,” thundered Randall Terry, religious activist and founder of
the anti-abortion group Operation Rescue. “We must have a Christian nation
built on God’s law, on the Ten Commandments, no apologies.”
And what would a “Christian nation” be like to
its citizens?
Well, it wouldn't be very friendly to atheists,
homosexuals, secularists, women and non-Christians. “No, I don’t think that
atheists should be considered as citizens, nor should they be considered
patriots. This is one nation under God,” George Bush Snr
once remarked.
“Aids is not just God’s punishment for homosexuality;
it is God’s punishment for the society that tolerates homosexuality,” concluded the late televangelist Jerry Falwell. “This vile and satanic system will one day be utterly
annihilated and there’ll be a celebration in heaven.” This is also the man who
saw the creation of Israel
in 1948 as the greatest “single sign indicating the imminent return of Jesus
Christ”. The ongoing violence in the Middle East – stoked by the US invasion of Iraq – was also seen by him as part
of God’s apocalyptic designs.
And how about those foreign
“heathens”?
According to Ann Coulter, writing after the September 11 attacks: “We
should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to
Christianity.” She added for good measure that: “Congress could pass a law
tomorrow requiring that all aliens from Arabic [sic] countries leave.”
It would be folly to dismiss these voices as a
lunatic fringe, particularly given the string of victories Christian
fundamentalists have scored over the last quarter of a century or so. After
all, the current US
president famously claimed that he was told by God to fight al-Qaida and invade Iraq.
Even as late in the day as 1979, few saw Iran’s Islamic revolution coming and Iran
was wrongly viewed as a stable and secular society by many in the west. Could
we similarly be ignoring telltale and worrying signs from across the Atlantic?
Interestingly, while the world’s attention was
drawn to Tehran, a quieter religious revolution
was set in motion in the United
States.
Televangelist Pat Robertson boasted during the 1980 election
that: “We have enough votes to run this country.” A Gallup poll at the time seemed to give some
credence to his view: a third of American adults described themselves as “born
again” and half believed the Bible was inerrant, i.e.
perfect or above question.
If these trends continue and the US succumbs increasingly to its Christian right
while Europe secularises, what kind of rift
could that create in transatlantic relations? Even if it does not directly
affect official policy, how about at the grassroots: could we start seeing a
more aggressive transatlantic alliance between American Christian extremists
and the European far right?
Of course, there is always the classic argument
to dismiss worries about Christian fundamentalism: they may be mad, but they’re
not bad – at least, they don’t go around killing people.
That is true only up to a point. Christian
fundamentalists do their violence abroad by proxy and, in America, they are not persecuted, unlike many of their equivalents
in Muslim countries.
In the Muslim world, it took one disgruntled
intellectual, Sayyid Qutb, and one book, which he
produced while in political detention being tortured, to transform the benign
grassroots movement of the Muslim Brotherhood as conceived by Hassan
al-Banna into the deadly ideology of takfir in which all Muslim
societies were declared heathen and worthy of violence.
Could this happen in Christianity?
Well, the idea that mainstream society is
hedonistic and ungodly is a common refrain among Christian fundamentalists in America. Their
earlier response, as in the 1950s, was usually to withdraw from society. The
civil rights movement and sexual liberties of the 1960s brought them out of
hibernation. And the subsequent liberalisation and secularisation of society
has terrified them. Some, such as anti-abortion activists, have taken the law
into their own hands.
Pro-lifer Paul Hill of the Army of God murdered an abortion doctor
in 2003 and was executed for his crime. “I expect a great reward in heaven ...
I look forward to glory,” he said on the way to his death.
Could the Army of God be a precursor of worse
to come on other contentious issues as we throw off the shackles of tradition,
science takes us into uncharted frontiers, the religious become more embattled
and the world appears to become a more dangerous place? It is hard to say. But
it raises the important point that our obsession with Islamism in the west is
distracting us for other worrying trends, mainly because it is dressed in a
familiar skin.
We should not stigmatise or further marginalise
religious extremists, as the strident atheists seem to be encouraging, but we
should dialogue with them and show them that their fears are exaggerated and
misplaced.
“It is important that we understand the dread
and anxiety that lie at the heart of the fundamentalist vision,” Karen
Armstrong writes in The Battle for God, “because only then will we begin
to comprehend its passionate rage, its frantic desire to fill the void with
certainty, and its conviction of ever-encroaching evil.”
July 2007 – British-born ‘jihadis’
have been wreaking havoc at home and abroad for generations, lured by a heady
mix of idealism, romance and rebellion. Read on
The Muslim faithless
July 2007 – Ridiculing and questioning Islam,
Muhammad, the Qur’an and religion in general is an
ancient tradition in Muslim countries. Read on
A war on error
June 2007 – It is time to dispel the myths
surrounding Muslims – namely, that we are all terrorist anti-feminist
teetotallers. Read on
A war on error (2)
June 2007 – It is time to dispel the myths that
conservative Muslims often propagate about 'the west'. Read on
Conversion is not a crime
December 2005 – Muriel Degauque has the dubious
distinction of being the first white European female suicide bomber. Shocking
as this is, suggestions that we have reached a dangerous turning point and that
converts are brainwashed fanatics and their partners are comic-book villains
are unfair to the vast majority of converts and to non-converts married to
Muslims.Read on
A revision of Salman Rushdie’s vision –
We need ijtihadis, not jihadis
September 2005 – Salman Rushdie’s proposed
Islamic Reformation touches on the urgent need for reform in most Muslim societies.
But his vision needs serious revision if it is to work. Read on
Islam and Europe:
Clash and mash
April 2005 –
Khaled Diab and Katleen Maes examine the myths driving anti-Islamic fervour in
the EU. Read
on
ã2007 K. Diab. Unless otherwise stated, all the content on this website
is the copyright of Khaled Diab.
