Monday, September 12, 2011

A Very Hard Christian Dilemma

You are a leader in a Christian church with a large parking lot. Your church is one of two situated next to or close by a very large mosque that the FBI has informed you about.  Its leaders are training and abetting radical Islamist terrorists, some of which were involved in 9/11 and that mosque actually counseled two of the 9/11 terrorists and helped them get housing, etc., in the area.

Question: Do you allow them to use your much needed parking lot on Fridays (which is not used much by you on that day)?

Both churches say "you do". The FBI and other groups seem not to be so sure. So what does the Bible say? Jesus did say "love your enemy" and much more along those lines. In fact, at face value, one could well argue that the Christian churches have no choice but to help out the Muslim neighbors.

I'm not so sure that is taking Christ's words or those of other parts of the Gospel in context. Looking at this from a different perspective, are these churches possibly instrumental in facilitating further acts of terrorism against the United States and in turn the rest of us? Perhaps.

At the very least, I would want to place very restrict conditions and terms under which I would allow the mosque to use the parking lot -- if those were found to be broken, then the assistance is off. We need to be willing to help our enemies, but we are not to be facilitating their wrong-doings. Corrie Ten Boom had, as a Christian, to feed the Nazi soldiers, but not to help them send Jews to the gas chambers. The Good Samaritan had to help the stranger that fell among thieves, but he didn't have to help him rob others to get even.

If you read the article carefully, you'll see that perhaps helping the mosque is more a matter of 'convenience' for these churches rather than being great examples of Christian neighbors -- there is a part in there that talks about "if we didn't, we'd be in more trouble", etc., or something to that effect. Fair enough -- but let's not pretend that the only thing to do here, from a Christian perspective, is to roll over and play dead, allowing them to have their cake (parking lot) and eat it too (allowing them train and move against America).

And by the way, it is most unfortunate that the churches are in a position to feel "trapped" -- damned if they do; damned if they don't.   If we had all done our jobs properly in the first place -- we wouldn't be in this mess.   Those are my thoughts; what are yours?

D.C. churches help 9/11 mosque grow

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