One gratifying thing that came out of Terry Jones’s much-publicized plans to burn Qurans on September 11: The world, including the Muslim world, saw all of Christendom stand up and speak with one voice universally rejecting this provocation against Muslims.
Most significantly, of course, the Vatican condemned Quran burning as “outrageous” and “grave”—language that was repeatedly reported by Qatar-based Al Jazeera. The Arab-language news agency also ran a photo of Pakistan’s National Council of Churches marching with banners condemning Jones’s threat.
The Vatican’s denunciation was echoed by Catholic leaders around the world. In India, the archbishop of Mumbai and president of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of India, Cardinal Oswald Gracias, not only condemned Quran burning, he also put together a joint statement by Christian and Muslim leaders mutually rejecting the proposed act as “contrary to the teaching of Jesus Christ.”
In Indonesia, members of the Catholic bishops’ conference met with the radical Islamic Defense Front to stress the mutual respect between Christians and Muslims. Gratifyingly, the Islamic Defense Front reportedly released a statement excluding retaliatory violence against Christians or Americans not involved in Quran burning, noting that “it is by the sacrilegious act that they are stained, and not because they are Americans or Christians.”
Other Catholic leaders in the West as well as in Muslim countries have condemned the book burning. In the US, USCCB committee chairmen Archbishop Wilton D. Gregory (Committee on Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs), Bishop William F. Murphy (Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development) and Bishop Howard J. Hubbard (Committee on International Justice and Peace) released a joint statement. In Iraq, Chaldean Archbishop Louis Sako of Kirkuk and Bishop Shlemon Warduni, the auxiliary of Baghdad, denounced Quran burning. So did Archbishop Lawrence Saldanha of Lahore, Pakistan, president of the Pakistan Catholic Bishops Conference.
The Eastern Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem, Theophilos III, strongly condemned Quran burning as an assault on religion. Protestant leaders also spoke up. The National Association of Evangelicals released a statement objecting to the plan, as did the president of the Baptist World Alliance, John Upton.
Some of Evangelical Protestantism’s most prominent voices in the United States have spoken against Quran burning. Franklin Graham, son of the legendary evangelist Billy Graham, who has described Islam as a “very evil and very wicked religion,” not only released a statement saying “It’s never right to deface or destroy sacred texts or writings of other religions even if you don’t agree with them,” but even attempted to intervene personally, repeatedly trying to contact Jones.
California megachurch pastor Rick Warren, the author of The Purpose Driven Life, called for the “separation of church and hate,” adding, “Book burning is a cowardly act by those afraid that their beliefs aren’t strong enough to attract people if they are allowed a choice.” Charles Colson called it “foolish and contemptible,” and endorsed the conclusion of Dr. John Rankin, president of the Theological Education Institute, that such acts cause the Gospel to be slandered.
Among countless other examples that could be cited, one worth highlighting is an interfaith statement signed by Catholic, Orthodox, Evangelical, mainline Protestant, Jewish and Muslim leaders.
The overwhelming response from Christian leaders of all stripes is clear: The Christian world rejects burning the Quran.
That’s the good news.
What’s the bad news? More to come.
P.S. If you know of other prominent Christian statements on Quran burning, please let me know in the combox!
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I think we should notify Hugh Hefner that all copies of Playboy (and all those other filthy publications) will be bought and destroyed to save souls from being morally corrupted.
I condemn LRoy’s plans to burn pornography as outrageous and grave. Pornography burning is a cowardly act by those afraid that their beliefs aren’t strong enough to attract people if they are allowed a choice. Also, it could incite retalitory violence on the part of the world’s disenfranchised hand lotion manufacturers.
Um. While burning girlie magazines and porn is eminently appropriate, I see several problems here.
1. Buying girlie magazines and porn in order to destroy them is self defeating. Demand will be no less, so with their increased profits they’ll just print more. They’d be delighted to increase their production in order to sell copies earmarked for burning. Buy enough of them and you can probably get them to print them with special “For burning” labels on the cover.
2. Burning girlie magazines and porn in order to save souls from corruption seems ... unlikely to succeed. The main avenue of porn today is probably the Internet. You can’t burn the Internet. Nor should you, since the Internet also serves communication that saves souls as well as communication that corrupts.
3. Pragmatically, book burnings and other public protests only provoke anti-censorship counter-demonstrations, often on a larger scale, affirming the material in question. Stage a public porn burning and likely enough there will be porn-positive giveaway events. This is another one of those seeming perverse win-wins: The anti-porn people are happy because they took a stand against porn. The porn industry is happy because they sell actual dead-tree magazines and get controversial publicity of the best, most moralistically disapproving sort. The porn users are happy because they get to assuage their guilt by hating on censorious prudes. The anti-censorship crowd is happy because they feel relevant and righteous. All opposites reinforce one another in their views. Most of all, the media is happy because they get a controversy to stoke and report on.
The losers of course are those actually corrupted by porn, those they hurt, and those victimized by the porn industry itself.
Is burning a koran a venial or mortal sin,or a sin at all?
The world, including the Muslim world, saw all of Christendom stand up and speak with one voice universally rejecting this provocation against Muslims.
I wish. In many parts of the Muslim world, they received news that some Christian pastor was about to burn the Koran. They never received the news that he didn’t, though.
I will try to explore this question in an upcoming post.
In many parts of the Muslim world, no doubt. Al Jazeera did report Jones’s “suspension” of the burning, but I can’t verify that they have yet reported that he canceled it altogether. (Of course I can only comment on the English version of Al Jazeera.) More importantly, they did report, as noted above, on the Vatican’s condemnation of Quran burning. Also, Christian denunciations within the Muslim world, and sometimes in cooperation with Muslim leaders were seen. In Pakistan, I’ve read, Muslim leaders as well as government authorities spoke against retaliatory violence against local Christian communities, which they said were peaceful. Even the radical Islamic Defense Front, as noted above, declared that only those who actually burn the Quran should be held responsible for that act. At the very least the message “Many Christians don’t support Quran burning” is getting through, even if the full scope of Christian repudiation isn’t.
The local bishop (Diocese of St. Augustine) and the Archbishop of Miami also made statements.
The local bishop (Diocese of St. Augustine) and the Archbishop of Miami also made statements. I think Bishop Galeone’s statement preceded any Vatican statement. (I removed the link because it triggered the spam filter.)
Addendum: Looks like Al Jazeera HAS reported on the finality of Jones’s cancellation of the Quran burning, although it’s somewhat buried in the story:
If the pope says burning the Koran is a “grave” sin, then wouldn’t this imply that burning the Koran is a mortal sin? On the other hand if, like Billy Graham says, “Islam is an evil religion”, then isn’t there also a problem with calling it a “sacred text”? Does the Catholic Church believe that the Koran is a sacred text? If it’s an evil text, then seems like it’s okay to burn it. What’s the grave matter then?
Is a grave sin the same as a mortal sin? What gives? And how a man invented koran is “sacred” is nonsense.
@Jeff and @tonymixan:
“Is a grave sin the same as a mortal sin?”
Yes.
“Does the Catholic Church believe that the Koran is a sacred text?”
No.
“If it’s an evil text, then seems like it’s okay to burn it.”
Not so fast.
“And how a man invented koran is “sacred” is nonsense.”
I’ll explain. But not today.
The point, of course, is that it is perfectly appropriate to burn a Quran under certain circumstances.
You may do it privately, as a convert from Islam to Christianity, as an act of rejecting the errors of the devil. That would be appropriate.
You may do it to prevent it being sold secondhand to someone who might find parts of it compelling.
But all that is private. A public book-burning is for Nazis.
I don’t think the Nazi comparison fits, exactly, since the Nazis were trying to censor certain books whereas the Koran-burners are after something slightly different. Burning a Koran—and only one Koran—is not intended as an act of censorship but as an act of protest, similar to burning a flag.
Mr. Greydanus, I love how you took two jokesters’ silly comments and applied your brilliant logic to them in a way that proved their silliness. This is another reason in a very long list of reasons why I never miss an article or a movie review of yours. The two top movie websites that I check regularly are RogerEbert.com and DecentFilms.com. You make life better!
Hey! I’m no jokester! :-(
I’m looking forward to your follow-up article Steve. I’m not quite buying the argument that one act in private is fine while the same act in public is a mortal sin. Unless you’re talking about sex, I suppose.
Thanks, Jeff. It’s coming very soon (but the next post won’t be the end of the story!).
FWIW, it’s not quite my argument that an act is fine in private but sinful in public. Rather, certain acts are by nature public, and cannot be performed in private as the same act. Scandal, for instance.
The next step.
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