Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Because Islam does not work that way. You either accept Islam or you reject it. There is no half way. You either embrace the barbarism, or you are not a Muslim.

This is BS. If you believe that embracing barbarism is necessary to being a Muslim, you really do deserve to be described with some of the negative terms being discussed in this thread.

Barbarism is a value judgment. But the PP is correct in a sense that calling yourself a follower of a particular religion means you embrace it in toto, both beautiful as well as unlovely bits. If some of it appears barbaric to the outsiders, well, OK.

Then all Christians should be expected to embrace the barbarism committed by such groups as the Lord's Resistance Army, abortion clinic bombers, and the Christian Identity Movement? Do mainstream Christians embrace the hate of the Jonesboro Baptists?

Your statement is actually ludicrous. Most members of a religion cannot even agree on what the religion itself embraces, let alone embrace all of it. If there were one true Judaism, why would there be Reform, Conservative, Orthodox, etc. Is a reform Jew embracing every practice of a Hassid?

My point was exactly that there are different branches of Christianity and most DO NOT embrace those kinds of beliefs. There are different ways of being a Christian. Why are there not different denominations of Islam? How can any religion be taken at its word for any length of time and still be relevant in modern society? It can't.

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Because Islam does not work that way. You either accept Islam or you reject it. There is no half way. You either embrace the barbarism, or you are not a Muslim.

This is BS. If you believe that embracing barbarism is necessary to being a Muslim, you really do deserve to be described with some of the negative terms being discussed in this thread.

Barbarism is a value judgment. But the PP is correct in a sense that calling yourself a follower of a particular religion means you embrace it in toto, both beautiful as well as unlovely bits. If some of it appears barbaric to the outsiders, well, OK.

Then all Christians should be expected to embrace the barbarism committed by such groups as the Lord's Resistance Army, abortion clinic bombers, and the Christian Identity Movement? Do mainstream Christians embrace the hate of the Jonesboro Baptists?

Your statement is actually ludicrous. Most members of a religion cannot even agree on what the religion itself embraces, let alone embrace all of it. If there were one true Judaism, why would there be Reform, Conservative, Orthodox, etc. Is a reform Jew embracing every practice of a Hassid?

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Muslima is annoying. You need a new spokesperson.

^ this!

It is annoying to me when an anonymous poster takes personal shots at someone with a user name. Login for a month or so and let's see how people feel about your posts. I doubt either one of you could take the criticism.

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:
I don't know you are directing this post to me. I have not called you a Christian-Evangelist-Crusader-Racist-Islamophobe. There are a lot of posters in this thread and it's a bit to tell one anonymous poster from another. But, there are clearly posters here who appear primarily committed to spreading negative information about Islam.

I think when someone picks a topic such as slavery or concubines and attempts to convey that this is an accepted and non-controversial practice that is unquestioned within the religion, when in fact very few adherents actually believe such a thing and there is quite a bit of debate among scholars, that poster is attempting to spread negative perceptions of Islam. If the poster was solely interested in providing broader perspective, the poster would not completely ignore common practice.

Islam, like any religion, is an easy target for criticism. It is fair to question its practices. But, just as I illustrated here with the example of Hagar, most posters here are not willing to subject mainstream Western religions to the same scrutiny. That suggests a certain basic lack of fairness.

Common practice has nothing to do with the letter of religious law. Polygamy in Muslim countries isn't common practice, either. Yet you'd be hard-pressed to find a Muslim scholar who'd call it banned.

Mainstream Western religions contain as many vile bits as Islam. You'd get no argument from me. Start a thread on that, and I'll be your guest.

Anonymous wrote:
It's uncommon in the sense that it is practiced by a small minority of Muslim men.

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:
I don't know you are directing this post to me. I have not called you a Christian-Evangelist-Crusader-Racist-Islamophobe. There are a lot of posters in this thread and it's a bit to tell one anonymous poster from another. But, there are clearly posters here who appear primarily committed to spreading negative information about Islam.

I think when someone picks a topic such as slavery or concubines and attempts to convey that this is an accepted and non-controversial practice that is unquestioned within the religion, when in fact very few adherents actually believe such a thing and there is quite a bit of debate among scholars, that poster is attempting to spread negative perceptions of Islam. If the poster was solely interested in providing broader perspective, the poster would not completely ignore common practice.

Islam, like any religion, is an easy target for criticism. It is fair to question its practices. But, just as I illustrated here with the example of Hagar, most posters here are not willing to subject mainstream Western religions to the same scrutiny. That suggests a certain basic lack of fairness.

Common practice has nothing to do with the letter of religious law. Polygamy in Muslim countries isn't common practice, either. Yet you'd be hard-pressed to find a Muslim scholar who'd call it banned.

Mainstream Western religions contain as many vile bits as Islam. You'd get no argument from me. Start a thread on that, and I'll be your guest.

You keep saying that common practice is irrelevant. I think differently. Each of us is allowed to make our points. I think it matters particularly because Islam has no "letter of religious law". As for polygamy, I don't know on what basis you believe it to be uncommon, but I have certainly encountered it in both the Middle East and Africa. Another poster in this thread who has lived in a Muslim country seems to have had the same experience.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:millions of christians live (or lived) in the middle east and not one of them has blown themselves up to kill other people. Same environment, same economy, same time period.

ISIL
Al Qaeda
Taliban
Boko Haram
al-Shabaab

What is the common denominator? All Islam based, All Kill Infidels.

Christian Terrorist groups that kill Infidels??????

This is NOT Racism, it is factual observations. And we are preparing for the next world war because of these groups.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QxzOVSMUrGM

i think the question is why do all these groups have common denominator of Islam? I don't understand it but it seems like it is a key component and significant factor.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
I am the OP and I am also the one who made the statement about Islam's growth and conversion rate. I am not close to Muslima and I do not know her offline. I have never communicated with her before all this began. But I agree with her for the most part. She's represented well on this and the other Islam thread. She is very knowledgeable and, just as a good Muslim should be, she never lost her temper. Too bad I'm not so good. lol But I stand behind my statements about conversion. I thought we addressed this on the other thread pages and pages ago. Yet here we are again, revisiting this topic.

Here are the reasons why I believe Islam IS the fastest growing religion on earth and why I think it's by conversion:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Growth_of_religion
Footnote 68/69 are the sources for the claim that Islam is the fastest growing religion by conversion. This is validated by the Guinness Book of World Records as well as the Carnegie Endowment for World Peace. Only the PEW people refute this and simply because they can't validate the numbers. The other groups seem to have no issue making this claim.

http://www.ibtimes.com/shamrock-crescent-islam-irelands-fastest-growing-religion-1557033
Islam is the fastest growing religion in Ireland. Immigration and population are mentioned but so is conversion as the reason.

Here is another report stating the same, that Islam is the fastest growing religion by conversion:
ww.cnn.com/WORLD/9704/14/egypt.islam/

And yet another source that exposes organizations that refute this statistic often turn out to be Christian missionary groups or Christian funded groups:
http://www.answering-christianity.com/yahya_ahmed/islam_fasting_growing_religion_world.htm

The UK reports that Islam is the fastest growing religion there too.
And even if you do not accept it's the fastest growing religion by conversion, apparently Christians are worried it's growing too fast and too many are converting, as evidenced by this report: http://www.cbn.com/spirituallife/onlinediscipleship/understandingislam/why_are_westerners_converting.aspx

As someone who works with numbers, I have to point out that comparing rates of worldwide conversion Islam vs. other religions does not speak to the question of whether Islam's growth in the US is due more to conversion or immigration, i.e, the relative rates of conversion vs. immigration in the US.

Also, your Wikipedia source actually reads as follows: "By 2030 Muslims are projected to represent about 26.4% of the global population (out of a total of 7.9 billion people).[67] Several sources believe that this increase is due to conversion and reproduction.[68][69]" which raises a point we've overlooked, about birth rates, but again says nothing about immigration to the US.

(Also, why all the cites to Christian sources? Nobody asked for those and they're tangential at best. It simply looks like you perceive yourselves to be in some huge rivalry with Christianity.)

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:
I don't know you are directing this post to me. I have not called you a Christian-Evangelist-Crusader-Racist-Islamophobe. There are a lot of posters in this thread and it's a bit to tell one anonymous poster from another. But, there are clearly posters here who appear primarily committed to spreading negative information about Islam.

I think when someone picks a topic such as slavery or concubines and attempts to convey that this is an accepted and non-controversial practice that is unquestioned within the religion, when in fact very few adherents actually believe such a thing and there is quite a bit of debate among scholars, that poster is attempting to spread negative perceptions of Islam. If the poster was solely interested in providing broader perspective, the poster would not completely ignore common practice.

Islam, like any religion, is an easy target for criticism. It is fair to question its practices. But, just as I illustrated here with the example of Hagar, most posters here are not willing to subject mainstream Western religions to the same scrutiny. That suggests a certain basic lack of fairness.

Common practice has nothing to do with the letter of religious law. Polygamy in Muslim countries isn't common practice, either. Yet you'd be hard-pressed to find a Muslim scholar who'd call it banned.

Mainstream Western religions contain as many vile bits as Islam. You'd get no argument from me. Start a thread on that, and I'll be your guest.

Anonymous wrote:millions of christians live (or lived) in the middle east and not one of them has blown themselves up to kill other people. Same environment, same economy, same time period.

ISIL
Al Qaeda
Taliban
Boko Haram
al-Shabaab

What is the common denominator? All Islam based, All Kill Infidels.

Christian Terrorist groups that kill Infidels??????

This is NOT Racism, it is factual observations. And we are preparing for the next world war because of these groups.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QxzOVSMUrGM

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Given that your children are Muslim and, according to you, Islam condones slavery and concubines, can we assume that your children are being taught that their religion condones slavery and concubines?

You can assume that what my children are being taught will never be a part of this discussion.

Perhaps you'd like to bring some sources that Islam bans concubinage?

Someone already posted one above and you even commented on it.

jsteele wrote:
I don't know you are directing this post to me. I have not called you a Christian-Evangelist-Crusader-Racist-Islamophobe. There are a lot of posters in this thread and it's a bit to tell one anonymous poster from another. But, there are clearly posters here who appear primarily committed to spreading negative information about Islam.

I think when someone picks a topic such as slavery or concubines and attempts to convey that this is an accepted and non-controversial practice that is unquestioned within the religion, when in fact very few adherents actually believe such a thing and there is quite a bit of debate among scholars, that poster is attempting to spread negative perceptions of Islam. If the poster was solely interested in providing broader perspective, the poster would not completely ignore common practice.

Islam, like any religion, is an easy target for criticism. It is fair to question its practices. But, just as I illustrated here with the example of Hagar, most posters here are not willing to subject mainstream Western religions to the same scrutiny. That suggests a certain basic lack of fairness.

Anonymous wrote:
I am the OP and I am also the one who made the statement about Islam's growth and conversion rate. I am not close to Muslima and I do not know her offline. I have never communicated with her before all this began. But I agree with her for the most part. She's represented well on this and the other Islam thread. She is very knowledgeable and, just as a good Muslim should be, she never lost her temper. Too bad I'm not so good. lol But I stand behind my statements about conversion. I thought we addressed this on the other thread pages and pages ago. Yet here we are again, revisiting this topic.

Here are the reasons why I believe Islam IS the fastest growing religion on earth and why I think it's by conversion:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Growth_of_religion
Footnote 68/69 are the sources for the claim that Islam is the fastest growing religion by conversion. This is validated by the Guinness Book of World Records as well as the Carnegie Endowment for World Peace. Only the PEW people refute this and simply because they can't validate the numbers. The other groups seem to have no issue making this claim.

http://www.ibtimes.com/shamrock-crescent-islam-irelands-fastest-growing-religion-1557033
Islam is the fastest growing religion in Ireland. Immigration and population are mentioned but so is conversion as the reason.

Here is another report stating the same, that Islam is the fastest growing religion by conversion:
ww.cnn.com/WORLD/9704/14/egypt.islam/

And yet another source that exposes organizations that refute this statistic often turn out to be Christian missionary groups or Christian funded groups:
http://www.answering-christianity.com/yahya_ahmed/islam_fasting_growing_religion_world.htm

The UK reports that Islam is the fastest growing religion there too.
And even if you do not accept it's the fastest growing religion by conversion, apparently Christians are worried it's growing too fast and too many are converting, as evidenced by this report: http://www.cbn.com/spirituallife/onlinediscipleship/understandingislam/why_are_westerners_converting.aspx

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Given that your children are Muslim and, according to you, Islam condones slavery and concubines, can we assume that your children are being taught that their religion condones slavery and concubines?

You can assume that what my children are being taught will never be a part of this discussion.

Perhaps you'd like to bring some sources that Islam bans concubinage?

Anonymous wrote:


I am the OP and I am also the one who made the statement about Islam's growth and conversion rate. I am not close to Muslima and I do not know her offline. I have never communicated with her before all this began. But I agree with her for the most part. She's represented well on this and the other Islam thread. She is very knowledgeable and, just as a good Muslim should be, she never lost her temper. Too bad I'm not so good. lol But I stand behind my statements about conversion. I thought we addressed this on the other thread pages and pages ago. Yet here we are again, revisiting this topic.