"We felt that that would be a sign that God would want us to do it. The American people do not want the mosque there, and of course Muslims do not want us to burn the Koran.

"The imam has agreed to move the mosque. We have agreed to cancel the event on Saturday, and on Saturday I will be flying up there to meet with him."

Speaking after Pastor Jones's press conference, Imam Musri said he had spoken to Iman Rauf's wife but added that he had "no written guarantees".

"I think he is considering it," he said.

"We have the commitment of the office of the imam for a three-way meeting where myself and the pastor would fly to New York to meet with him to discuss the plan or ... moving that project to an ideal location that's not controversial."

But the claims about a deal were contradicted by Iman Rauf.

"I am glad that Pastor Jones has decided not to burn any Korans. However, I have not spoken to Pastor Jones or Imam Musri. I am surprised by their announcement," he said in a statement.

"We are not going to toy with our religion or any other. Nor are we going to barter. We are here to extend our hands to build peace and harmony."

"We don't know anything about it," Iman Rauf's wife Daisy Khan said.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/09/10/3007790.htm

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Gus: here I was — planning a toon where the koran, the bible and Aussie Tony's book were being burned together by the almighty him(her)self while quoting "Questions for Deepak Chopra" - Interview at the NYTimes:

If someone asks what religion you are, what do you say?
I say God gave humans the truth, and the Devil came and said, “Let’s organize it, we’ll call it religion.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/05/magazine/05fob-q4-t.html?

Thank god I am an atheist...

The pastor of a tiny Florida church has threatened to rethink his decision to abandon plans for a weekend Koran-burning event.

Hours after calling off the much-criticised ceremony to mark the anniversary of the September 11 attacks, Pastor Terry Jones backtracked and said it had merely been suspended.

"Right now we are just putting a temporary hold upon our planned event," he said.

The Dove World Outreach Centre pastor had earlier said his change of heart over the event was in exchange for a deal to relocate a controversial mosque project near Ground Zero in New York.

But the alleged deal was thrown into confusion when the imam leading the project for the Islamic cultural centre in New York, Feisal Abdul Rauf, quickly denied any such agreement.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/09/10/3008109.htm

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Thank god I am an atheist...

A renegade pastor and his tiny flock set fire to a Koran on a street corner, and made sure to capture it on film. And they were ignored.

That stunt took place in 2008, involving members of the Westboro Baptist Church from Topeka, Kan., an almost universally condemned group of fundamentalists who also protest at military funerals.

But plans for a similar stunt by another fringe pastor, Terry Jones, have garnered worldwide news media attention this summer, attention that peaked Thursday when he announced he was canceling — and later, that he had only “suspended” — what he had dubbed International Burn a Koran Day. It had been scheduled for Saturday, the ninth anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

Unlike the Koran-burning by Westboro Baptist, Mr. Jones’s planned event in Gainesville, Fla., coincided with the controversy over the proposed building of a Muslim community center in Lower Manhattan near ground zero and a simmering summerlong debate about the freedoms of speech and religion.

Mr. Jones was able to put himself at the center of those issues by using the news lull of summer and the demands of a 24-hour news cycle to promote his anti-Islam cause. He said he consented to more than 150 interview requests in July and August, each time expressing his extremist views about Islam and Sharia law.

By the middle of this week, the planned Koran burning was the lead story on some network newscasts, and topic No. 1 on cable news — an extraordinary amount of attention for a marginal figure with a very small following. On Thursday, President Obama condemned Mr. Jones’s plan, and his press secretary, Robert Gibbs, said that there were “more people at his press conferences than listen to his sermons,” in a bit of media criticism.

Mr. Jones’s plan, announced in July, slowly gained attention in August, particularly overseas. It became a top story in the United States this week after protests against Mr. Jones in Afghanistan and after the commander of American and NATO forces in Afghanistan, Gen. David H. Petraeus, warned that the Koran burning could endanger troops.

“Before there were riots and heads of states talking about him, it could have been a couple of paragraphs in a story about Sept. 11 commemorations,” Kathleen Carroll, the executive editor of The Associated Press, said Thursday. “It’s beyond that now.”

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Thank god I am an atheist...

Orthodox Jews set fire to hundreds of copies of the New Testament in the latest act of violence against Christian missionaries in the Holy Land.

Or Yehuda Deputy Mayor Uzi Aharon said missionaries recently entered a neighborhood in the predominantly religious town of 34,000 in central Israel, distributing hundreds of New Testaments and missionary material.

After receiving complaints, Aharon said, he got into a loudspeaker car last Thursday and drove through the neighborhood, urging people to turn over the material to Jewish religious students who went door to door to collect it.

Orthodox Jewish youths burn New Testaments in Or Yehuda

I am opposed to the building of the "mosque" two blocks from Ground Zero.

I want it built on Ground Zero.

Why? Because I believe in an America that protects those who are the victims of hate and prejudice. I believe in an America that says you have the right to worship whatever God you have, wherever you want to worship. And I believe in an America that says to the world that we are a loving and generous people and if a bunch of murderers steal your religion from you and use it as their excuse to kill 3,000 souls, then I want to help you get your religion back. And I want to put it at the spot where it was stolen from you.

There's been so much that's been said about this manufactured controversy, I really don't want to waste any time on this day of remembrance talking about it. But I hate bigotry and I hate liars, and so in case you missed any of the truth that's been lost in this, let me point out a few facts:

1. I love the Burlington Coat Factory. I've gotten some great winter coats there at a very reasonable price. Muslims have been holding their daily prayers there since 2009. No one ever complained about that. This is not going to be a "mosque," it's going to be a community center. It will have the same prayer room in it that's already there. But to even have to assure people that "it's not going to be mosque" is so offensive, I now wish they would just build a 111-story mosque there. That would be better than the lame and disgusting way the developer has left Ground Zero an empty hole until recently. The remains of over 1,100 people still haven't been found. That site is a sacred graveyard, and to be building another monument to commerce on it is a sacrilege. Why wasn't the entire site turned into a memorial peace park? People died there, and many of their remains are still strewn about, all these years later.

• 2. Guess who has helped the Muslims organize their plans for this community center? The JEWISH COMMUNITY CENTER of Manhattan! Their rabbi has been advising them since the beginning. It's been a picture-perfect example of the kind of world we all want to live in. Peter Stuyvessant, New York's "founder," tried to expel the first Jews who arrived in Manhattan. Then the Dutch said, no, that's a bit much. So then Stuyvessant said ok, you can stay, but you cannot build a synagogue anywhere in Manhattan. Do your stupid Friday night thing at home. The first Jewish temple was not allowed to be built until 1730. Then there was a revolution, and the founding fathers said this country has to be secular - no religious nuts or state religions. George Washington (inaugurated around the corner from Ground Zero) wanted to make a statement about this his very first year in office, and wrote this to American Jews.

If The 'Mosque' Isn't Buit, This Is No Longer America

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — Before a Koran was burned at his modest church here on March 20, the pastor Terry Jones held a self-styled mock trial of the holy book in which he presided from the pulpit as judge. The prosecutor was a Christian who had converted from Islam. An imam from Dallas defended the Koran.

Sitting in judgment was a jury of 12 members of Mr. Jones’s church, the Dove World Outreach Center. After listening to evidence and arguments from both sides, the jury pronounced the Koran guilty of five “crimes against humanity,” including the promotion of terrorist acts and “the death, rape and torture of people worldwide whose only crime is not being of the Islamic faith.”

Punishment was determined by the results of an online poll. Besides burning, the options included shredding, drowning and facing a firing squad. Mr. Jones, a nondenominational evangelical pastor, announced that voters had chosen to set fire to the book, according to a video of the proceedings.

Unlike the worldwide outcry that greeted the pastor’s plan to burn 200 copies of the Koran on Sept. 11, the event last week at the 50-member church was largely ignored by the national and local new media. As of 2 p.m. on Friday, the video of the Koran’s burning on the church Web site had been seen only 1,500 times.

“The local strategy of everybody was to ignore this,” said the Rev. Lawrence D. Reimer, pastor of the United Church of Gainesville. “It’s just a horrible tragedy that this act triggered the deaths of more innocent people.”

In the weeks leading up to Sept. 11, Mr. Jones had prayed about his plans to burn Islam’s holy text and eventually backed down. He acknowledged at the time that he was stunned by the potential consequences.

Some church members were surprised by the violent reaction in northern Afghanistan on Friday, in which at least 12 United Nations workers were killed, said Fran Ingram, an assistant at the church. She explained that it was decided in the weeks leading up to the burning that a jury of churchgoers and volunteers would hear both sides before deciding what to do.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/02/us/politics/02burn.html?hp=&pagewanted=print

DETROIT - Controversial Quran-burning Pastor Terry Jones was ordered taken to the Wayne County Jail after refusing to post a $1 peace bond. However, someone posted the bond on his behalf not long after he was taken into custody. 

The development came after a jury found a proposed protest by Gainesville, Florida-based Jones and his associate Wayne Sapp outside the Islamic Center of America, the largest mosque in the United States, was likely to breach the peace and incite violence.

The jury began debating the case at around 3:30 p.m. Thursday. The main issue of the one day trial was whether or not Jones's main purpose was to say or do something that would incite violence. They came back with their verdict shortly after 6:30 p.m.

Based on the decision Jones was required to submit a peace bond. The judge set the bond at $1. He also ordered that neither Jones nor his associate could enter the property of the Islamic Center of America or the area surrounding it for 3 years.

The judge then asked both men if they were prepared to post their bonds. Both men refused and were taken into custody. They were due to be taken to the Wayne County Jail until their bond was posted. It is not known who posted the bonds.

At the start of Friday’s trial, prosecutors presented their arguments before the jury. They argued that a protest outside the mosque would pose a significant safety issue. They also argued that there is concern from authorities that someone may get hurt.

http://www.abcactionnews.com/dpp/shared/WXYZ_quran-burning-pastor-terry-jones-to-arrive-in-metro-detroit-today1303736162276

By Michael Brendan Dougherty | May 11, 2011

Since the Reagan era, Republicans have described their political coalition as a “three-legged stool.” Fiscal conservatives, national security conservatives, and social conservatives together hold up the fortunes of the party. This rhetorical stool is often used like a prop in pro-wrestling: to bludgeon recalcitrant office-seekers into submission.

But the metaphor is also supposed to signify a division of labor: Fiscal conservatism is the purview of the Republican business class or libertarians, national security is handled by neoconservatives, and somewhere out in the hinterlands the religious right will hand out pamphlets about abortion and knock on doors come election time.

This picture is a lie.

In their activist fervor, their enthusiasm for the ideas, and their electoral clout, religious conservatives are the base of all three legs. White evangelical Protestants make up almost third of the total electorate, and four out of five of them vote Republican. The religious right is more convinced of American righteousness in the exercise of its military might than the neoconservatives are, and more invested than Wall Street in lower taxes.

The Tea Party, confusedly hailed by the media as a grassroots libertarian spasm, turns out on inspection to be the religious right wearing a tricorn hat and talking about Obamacare. Neoconservatives who call for confrontation with Iran, a closer relationship with Israel, and pressing the War on Terror are not echoed by religious conservatives—they’re drowned out by them. In economics and military matters, no less than in social issues, conservative evangelicals are more Republican than Republicans.

“I’m all three,” says Richard Land, the president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, political arm of the Southern Baptist Convention. “I’ve always believed in low taxes and a strong national defense.” Similarly, Jordan Sekulow, deputy director of governmental affairs at the American Center for Law and Justice, a Christian legal group, notes that for the evangelical right conservatism is a seamless garment.

http://www.amconmag.com/blog/crossing-the-tea/

worry, worry, worry... see toon at top

This weekend, hundreds of pastors, including some of the nation’s evangelical leaders, will climb into their pulpits to preach about American politics, flouting a decades-old law that prohibits tax-exempt churches and other charities from campaigning on election issues.

The sermons, on what is called Pulpit Freedom Sunday, essentially represent a form of biblical bait, an effort by some churches to goad the Internal Revenue Service into court battles over the divide between religion and politics.

The Alliance Defense Fund, a nonprofit legal defense group whose founders include James Dobson, the founder of Focus on the Family, sponsors the annual event, which started with 33 pastors in 2008. This year, Glenn Beck has been promoting it, calling for 1,000 religious leaders to sign on and generating additional interest at the beginning of a presidential election cycle.

“There should be no government intrusion in the pulpit,” said the Rev. James Garlow, senior pastor at Skyline Church in La Mesa, Calif., who led preachers in the battle to pass California’s Proposition 8, which banned same-sex marriage. “The freedom of speech and the freedom of religion promised under the First Amendment means pastors have full authority to say what they want to say.”

Mr. Garlow said he planned to inveigh against same-sex marriage, abortion and other touchstone issues that social conservatives oppose, and some ministers may be ready to encourage parishioners to vote only for those candidates who adhere to the same views or values.

“I tell them that as followers of Christ, you wouldn’t vote for someone who was against what God said in his word,” Mr. Garlow said. “I will,  in effect, oppose several candidates and — de facto — endorse others.”

Two Republican candidates in particular, Gov. Rick Perry of Texas and Representative Michele Bachmann of Minnesota, would presumably benefit from some pulpit politics on Sunday, since they have been courting Christian conservatives this year.

Participating ministers plan to send tapes of their sermons to the I.R.S., effectively providing the agency with evidence it could use to take them to court.

But if history is any indication, the I.R.S. may continue to steer clear of the taunts.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/01/business/flouting-the-law-pastors-will-take-on-politics.html?_r=1&hp=&pagewanted=print

see toon at top...

At least four people have been killed and 20 injured in Afghanistan after protests spread over the burning of copies of the Koran at a US airbase.

One person was killed in Kabul, one in the eastern city of Jalalabad and two in Parwan province.

US officials apologised on Tuesday after Korans were "inadvertently" put in an incinerator at Bagram airbase.

Officials at Bagram reportedly believed Taliban prisoners were using the books to pass messages to each other.

The charred remains of the volumes were found by local labourers.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-17123464

see toon at top...

Police in Pakistan have arrested an imam accused of planting burnt pages of the Koran on a Christian girl accused of blasphemy, officials say.

The girl was detained two weeks ago after a mob accused her of desecrating the Koran.

However, a witness at the same mosque as the imam says that he fabricated the evidence, local media reports say.

The case of the girl, named as Rimsha, who is said to be about 14, has sparked international condemnation.

A report by a government-appointed medical board seen by the BBC suggests the girl has a mental age of less than 14.

Earlier this week, a court extended Rimsha's detention at a maximum-security prison by a further two weeks.

Her father has said he fears for his daughter's life and for the safety of his family. He has called on Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari to pardon her.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-19454739

Ahmed Abdallah, a Muslim television preacher in Egypt, has been charged with blasphemy for allegedly desecrating a copy of the Bible.

Abdallah was videotaped burning the Christian holy book in a protest in Cairo earlier this month.

The preacher's case, along with cases of alleged blasphemy committed by Egypt's Christian minority, have led some to campaign for the country's laws to be revised to ensure the regulations are not being abused by lawmakers and prosecutors.

Al Jazeera's Jacky Rowland reports from Cairo.

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2012/09/20129305539769859.html

See toon at top...