@Havila: Muslims, the world over do not face the east. Muslims in West africa face east, the exact direction of Makka. The Muslims in America face a direction that Makka is located in. The Europeans will face a diffirent direction, but geographically, every muslim is facing the Ka'aba. I am sure from your statement, you have not seen the circumbulations of the Ka'aba before. When you see it, every one faces that Cubical. So people pray facing it from every direction.

About the star and the crescent and the fact that all Islamic events are organised on the Lunar calendar, this is the command of God. Unfortunately, the christians use the seasonal changes to observe the events of their religion. For example, they say that jesus was born on the 25th of december. This is absolutely false.

The time of the birth of jesus was more of Summer month, because it is the time that the Palm Date fruits. The fruit of the palm date was some of the fruits that Mariam the mother of Jesus (AS), eat during the labor/delivery of jesus. If this very essential fact in christianity is so distorted that it becames like a game, the question we should sincerely ask ourselves, is this; How far and deep are the distortions.

In 1999 to 2000, you have a baby jesus in Daiper! This was called Millenium Jesus. It is as if there are some people manufacturing fallacies and try them for size within the christian populace. If it is accepted, then it becomes the norm.

Mr. Havila, you see, the gregorian calendar is not correct and my proof is that you have a leap year every 4 years to correct the miscalculation, what occurred the previous 3 years. It is the moon circle that determines, in reality the age of a person, etc.

olabowale:

@Havila: Muslims, the world over do not face the east. Muslims in West africa face east, the exact direction of Makka. The Muslims in America face a direction that Makka is located in. The Europeans will face a diffirent direction, but geographically, every muslim is facing the Ka'aba. I am sure from your statement, you have not seen the circumbulations of the Ka'aba before. When you see it, every one faces that Cubical. So people pray facing it from every direction.

About the star and the crescent and the fact that all Islamic events are organised on the Lunar calendar, this is the command of God. Unfortunately, the christians use the seasonal changes to observe the events of their religion. For example, they say that jesus was born on the 25th of december.

Quite interestingly, I kind of like you Olabowale because most of your posts are not only self defeating but really funny
I am from Nigeria, lived in US before, now living in UK and always have cause to travel in the course of my work. Been to far east, middle east, americas australasia, other european countriesetc. (I am a public health professional/epidemiologist with an international organisation) and in all of my travels never have I seen muslims face anywhere else to pray other than the direction of sunrise- east. So carry your circumbulations of kaaba somewhere else.
I agree with you that the symbol of islam (crescent and star) and the organisation of your events around the moon are the command of the deity that you worship through the consterllations-allah with muhammed being the chief priest. That is why I said to all who care to listen that our God ,Jehovah, is not the same as allah and people should not be confused in the spirit of so called interfaith understanding. It is very clear in the bible where our God warned us not be involved in astrology or worshipping of the consterlation which was a common thing in the far east then.It was one of the various sins of Israelites in the era of old testament who got involved in astral worshipping due to trade and migration to and from the far east before the coming of Christ. Wether Jesus was born on 25th december or not is not the issue, the fact is that we choose to celebrate birth, death, resurrection and ascension to glory of our Lord and Saviour

@ Olabowale,
With due respect to your age sir, your posts are the most ridiculous, off point and most vague! The topic is clear that it is meant to discuss the COMMENTS OF THE POPE AND THE MUSLIM "DISPROPORTIONATE" OVER-REACTION"!
Having said that, back to your perambulations:

olabowale:

@Havila: Muslims, the world over do not face the east. Muslims in West africa face east, the exact direction of Makka. The Muslims in America face a direction that Makka is located in. The Europeans will face a diffirent direction, but geographically, every muslim is facing the Ka'aba. I am sure from your statement, you have not seen the circumbulations of the Ka'aba before. When you see it, every one faces that Cubical. So people pray facing it from every direction.

Since you are in America, can you kindly specify WHICH DIRECTION  you face when praying? We know those in West Africa face East, where do those in Europe also face?

olabowale:

About the star and the crescent and the fact that all Islamic events are organised on the Lunar calendar, this is the command of God. Unfortunately, the christians use the seasonal changes to observe the events of their religion. For example, they say that jesus was born on the 25th of december. This is absolutely false.

Even 2 yr old babies know that Christ was not born on Dec 25! Shepherds do not watch their flocks by night in the snow! The date is simply used as a remembrance of his birth and has no significance whatsoever. Unlike Islam, it is not a "pillar" of the faith. You can choose not to celebrate it, it would not stop you from going to heaven! Besides that event took place over 2000 yrs ago, he is no longer a baby in the manger, HE is LORD of HOSTS! Stop bringing irrelevancies into serious discussions.

olabowale:

The time of the birth of jesus was more of Summer month, because it is the time that the Palm Date fruits. The fruit of the palm date was some of the fruits that Mariam the mother of Jesus (AS), eat during the labor/delivery of jesus. If this very essential fact in christianity is so distorted that it becames like a game, the question we should sincerely ask ourselves, is this; How far and deep are the distortions.

Pray! Where did Mary get palm dates to eat? Is that in your own "original" gospel "sent down" and "confirmed" by one certain Allah? Where did you conjur that story? Was that Mohammed's favorite fruit?

olabowale:

In 1999 to 2000, you have a baby jesus in Daiper! This was called Millenium Jesus. It is as if there are some people manufacturing fallacies and try them for size within the christian populace. If it is accepted, then it becomes the norm.

Again of what relevance is this? What were you really trying to say?

olabowale:

Mr. Havila, you see, the gregorian calendar is not correct and my proof is that you have a leap year every 4 years to correct the miscalculation, what occurred the previous 3 years. It is the moon circle that determines, in reality the age of a person, etc.

Is the gregorian calender a christian invention or that of Rome? What is the relevance of the gregorian calender to the christian faith?
Pray! How does the moon circle determine the age of the person? Is that the reason the moon is most important idol in Islam today?

@Davidylan
The spirit of excellence and wisdom from our God Jehovah that fell upon Daniel will chase you, overtake you and overshadow you and it will make way for you in Jesus name, Amen.!!!!

no offence but i tire for these muslims and their easy grievance with Christians.

@Havila and Davidylan: Your knowledge of Islam, hence the Salah is limited. What is very interesting about Christians is really their lack of realization that God is limiless in power. The direction of Salah is Ka'aba itself. If you are in Makka, you are bound to face Makka.

If you are any part of Saudi Arabia or the Arabian penisula, you face Makka which is the city that Ka'aba is located. If you draw a straight line from where you are, assuming that you can see Ka'aba, that will be the exact direction you face. Since this is impossible you have a general direction frame of reference. Compass are developed with city and locality references on the Almanac of world locations. You will agree that the direction of ka'aba to every place on the earth is not the same.

If you are to travel and do not know the exact direct which Ka'aba in Makka is located, you can face a location, whereby the sun is just to your left face at the time of prayer. If you are going to pray without the sun as a means of reference, then you can face any direction, afterall, God describes Himself as the Lord of the two easts and two wests. So I could be funny to you. It does not matter, except that you do not know the truth, which makes it funny to you.

If you can carelessly change the true season of the birth of Jesus to just a season or time in the year that pleases you, then one wonder how painstakingly dedicated in the regard to religious facts and timing. Yet the birth of jesus is so crucial to christians. In Islam, you can not arrange the religious matter in just any way that pleases you. there is a set order. God and His Messenger (AS) have made the decisions as to all matters of religion. A true believer will simply say I hear and obey.

Morning prayer for example has its prescibed time. You truly, in normal circumstances do it at your own chosen time. So is Ramadan fast, Hajj and the likes. Allah is God in Arabic language. Even the Christian Arab know this and that it is name for God. They do not call jesus (AS), Allah.

@Davidlan: havila had asked me question about salah and star and crescent. Thats all. If you read his former entry you would have known better. Yet i will not fault you. Everyone is entitled to his/her opinion. afterall, its a free world, hence most of you want to bastardize Islam as the other religions have been made as a means of laughter, a jest.

olabowale:

@Davidlan: havila had asked me question about salah and star and crescent. Thats all. If you read his former entry you would have known better. Yet i will not fault you. Everyone is entitled to his/her opinion. afterall, its a free world, hence most of you want to bastardize Islam as the other religions have been made as a means of laughter, a jest.

Stop hiding behind your finger, no one has any problems with your other religions, i cant remember any thread on this forum on hinduism, judaism. It is only Islam, why?

@ all
when some one hits a part of you that you try so much to hide it hurts but when someone says something that so untrue you dont bother
By saying Moh'd brought evil to the world the Pope hit the Bullseye and they are aggrieved that he said the truth in plain words or why do every act of terrorism point to Moh'D or Allah is Great

At least seven churches have now been attacked since the speech in areas under the Palestinian Authority.

There was concern that the killing of an Italian missionary nun by gunmen in Mogadishu, Somalia, was in retaliation for the comments

The popes comment is just the perfect excuse needed to kill more infidels as infidels killed during Ramadan are three pointers that is have more weight than those killed in normal times in Al Janna and Ramadan starts Saturday

Olabowale being a peace loving person would be so ashamed of his brethren that kill "guilty" civilians including a 70 year old defenseless nun to protect the name of Allah or Moh'd

evrybody in Northern Nigeria particularly Christian pls tread with care this coming Friday as it has been declared a day of 'ANGER' I am sure you know what that means

Influential Qatari Muslim scholar, Yusuf al-Qaradawi, called for a day of anger on Friday, saying the Pope had not apologised.

The statement from Hamas leader that their christain brothers and sisters should not be attacked based on the comments of the Pope is very welcome.

The Pope has done what is right to do, apologize for the unnecessary statement.

We must respect other peoples religions even if we don't believe in them.

We should move away from the position of "they are over reacting" when islam is attacked to a position of not attacking any religion for that matter.

Saddam's deputy was a christain, Late Arafat married a christain, I have witnessed marriages between christains and moslems without either converting.

Let the hate game stop and let there be mutual respect for all.

Do Muslims really expect other religions not to be critical of Islam? Religions will always be in conflict doctrinely but this is no excuse for violence. The God I worship is big enough to defend himself without requiring the assistance of man's worldly lust for violent revenge that seems to be very much ingrained in the hearts of some Muslims. Will my statement provoke a desire for peaceful debate, or a desire for violent revenge?

I hope some moslems can give me an assurance that after the apology the killing would stop, but I doubt if any moslem would do that cos they tacitly support the killing and terrorism .

Uhmmmmm! na wah O!

We must learn to respect other peoples' religions.

You have stated what you believe, allow others to do same too.

I think we have a fundamental issue here, some of us believe a particular religion is bad and every arguement is geared towards proving that a particular religion is bad.

Even if someone decides to worship stone, that is the person's business and it will not be proper to abuse or insult the person because he has chosen to worship stone.

Who sets the standard for what is right and what is wrong? We cannot use a particular standard to judge everyone.

@Afam.
Am amaze at the level of your reasoning.
You are totally unable to grasp the point of the discussion.
Nobody is here primarily to prove that one religion is bad,the fact is that out of all the religions in the world,it's only one that is a menace to us,whether you are in Nigeria,Uk,Middle-East or Asia.How many people worry themselves about Hindus,Buddhists,Sikhs,Shintos,Christians,Jews,Pagans or agnostics and atheists?
The only one that have justification for people to blow up planes,ships,trains,burn churches,shoot tourists is ISLAM founded in the 7th century, on the same premise of violence,assasinations and banditry by MOHAMMED.
How many people here on this forum have shown disrespect to all the other faiths?
The reason is because ISLAM has contempt for everybody who is not a muslim and except you are one,your death warrant is contained in its pages.And any 'faithful' can dispense with your life and would be rewarded with 72 virgins in their paredise just in case he carries it out by suicide bombing.
That's why the Popes comment despite any apology is the truth,Mohammed has brought only oppression, evil and destruction to mankind.

whatever.

I am tired of religion arguments

@Davidlan: Tell me how many Hindus, etc are in Nigeria. Oh, you mentioned the thread, tell me one Hindu here on Nairaland. I will then tell you that you will soon see a christian starting up a thread about it. After all, it is now through the Missionaries; convertion is by a basket of food in one hand and the Bible in another.

The pseudo-christian countries on world stage are using force, their military might and the power of their monies to do the same. No sooner that bagdad fell than the Bible thumpers from America began their soldier's for Jesus skids. It is as if Bagdad did not know about christianity before America. The same story played out in Afghanistan.

Convertion is not by force. Whatever the state of your heart will lead you to the mercy of God or His anger. God knows the truth about every human.

I hear some people say that God is Love alone. But God hates association of any thing with Him.

@Pearl2; Before Zionizm and subsequently, the creation of the state of Israel by the England and the support of America and Europe thereby, Muslims in Palestine allowed the Jews to live among them. Infact the jews had properties, like lands and formed communities thereby.

It was very easy for you to forget the Crusades and Inquistions and Pogroms where by the Christians killed Jews and muslims without any regards. You will not remember the two world wars. IThe first one started when a Christian leader wsa assasinated by another brand of christianity. They dragged the whole world into it. Unfortunately, Africa was their slave, so it had no choice in the matter. It was led into it by the power that be, all of them christians. So was India led into it. It was the jewel of the British crown. You simply forgot the enslavement of the Africans by carting them away in chains. A larger portion died enroute to their bondage. Raping and starvation and illtreatment was very normal in this methodology.

I bet the African Americans, the Caribbean blacks and south American black, etc, will be happy that you know so much about christianity, yet you forgot these tidbits in its history. No wonder the Blacks rush into Islam when they know the truth.

The killing in Ruwanda, between the tribes, did you see what the christian Missionaries did when their people came for them from Europe. They left their service men and women, the blacks. Even just before the planes arrived, the same Africans have been the ones who were preparing the luggages of the white "I bring you the good news of Jesus" missionaries.

Now let me tell you about the Muslims. These black christians who have been so ungodly abandoned to be killed began to seek refuge within the small Muslim communities, here and there in the Mosques. The Muslims took every comer in. They formed a security group and through this effort, scores of people were saved from the mechetes. The ones wielding the mechetes were Christians, not muslims. Yet, i am not in no way accepting any encruochment or oppression of any person. Killing is unIslamic. Yet you have many people who professed that they are Muslims that will kill.

You have in islam that drinking is bad and the taking of toxic substance into the body is like killing, even though it will gradual death through sickness and unhealthiness, you have a lot of Muslims doing these. The point i am making here is that there are people who are born into Islam, continue to practice it, yet do not have a quanifiable elementary knowledge of it. Among the Arabs you have people who can not read Qur'an and only speak their dialect, not the Qur'anic Arabic. So if a person does not try to heal his/her own heart, correcting the ills of the heart, how do you expect that same person to care for another psoul.

The suicide bombing as a methodology was developed by the Tiger political group in Asia. Unfortunately, the Arabs adopted it in theuir so called struggle. All the Muslims I know decry  this tactics. You can struggle but not kill yourself and your future, senselessly. this is not Islam, in the true sense of it.

God is powerful to defend Himself, yet people must defend Him when others malign  Him. At least defend Him by your speech. People defend societies, nations, ideas, all are insignificant to God. But people will not even defend God, even with hating the evil deeds that are done against God with their hearts. How do you claim that you believe in God and yet you do not stand up for Justice and truth.

Concerning the topic above,i want us to have this at the back of our mind that
we 're not to judge or condemn any religion.There was this broadcast this morning
that the Pope has apologised for the utterance he made last week.
   
     I'm a christian and i've muslim friends,it's only GOD almighty that knows the religion
that is acceptable.
   
     For example, if there is a church and a mosque on a street ,i don't think there's any need for the church nor the mosque to utter provocative words.
   
     Fellow nairalanders,let's live in peace and harmony and avoid the use of words that
can aggravate anger.

CHEERS.

Afam
I am glad for this quote "[b]We must learn to respect other peoples' religions" Even if someone decides to worship stone, that is the person's business and it will not be proper to abuse or insult the person because he has chosen to worship stone[/b]and Moslems have shown total disregard for this or why are Americans and European not killing non Xtians in their midst in the west we have a very high number of other religion well represented and free to do their thing and convert to which one you want without declaring Fatwa e.g Moh'D Ali and Mike Tyson unlike the fate that awaits you when you do just that in the Moslem countries e.g Afghanistan

I have heard of Moslems killing a cow in India despite knowing that Hindus rever this animal does that qualify as provocation?

Jesus never waged a war on non beleivers (I stand to be corrected)in sharp contrast to Mohammed who ordered the killing of infidels and actually did the same and even promised rewards for those that can do so

Afam from your earlier assertions I quoted and the instances I have given you, which religion do you now think meet your advise

We should move away from the position of "they are over reacting" when islam is attacked to a position of not attacking any religion for that matter.

I hope this your quote holds for Hizballah and disproportionate response from Israel as well subtitute Islam for Israel and Religion for country in the above quote and how does it read?

@Dayodoku: Evidently you do not knw anything about Islam and the Europe you live in.

Have you ever heard of a military terminology called false flag? This is when the opposite side where the uniform of their opponent in order to deceive and do havoc which is then assumed that the opponents have done.

The English people, in order to foster hatred amongst the Indian Muslims and Hindu for example, they will go and dress up like a Muslim and at the same time another group is dressed up in Hindu gear. The one who is like a Muslim will seize a cow and slaughter it. The one who is like a Hindu will now cry out to alert the Hindu population that the Muslims have just slaughter their god. mainwhile, the one who is like muslim was given an opportunity to escape so easily that when the Hindu comes out, he only sees just a fading figure that may make believe that truly, the Muslims have committed this abomination.

It was also praciced in africa, pitting one tribe against another. This is a war to divide and conquer, in order to prolong their hold on the society.

My brother, say what you know. If you are not sure, leave it alone. I am not saying that Muslims are not doing that bring shame to the community of Muslims but the shame is not on Islam.

You think the west will allow the muslims to have peace of mind. No. They are even working so hard that the Muslims the world over do not have unity under a Khalifah. Unfortunately, you have cohorts among the muslims supporting this essential ingreadient of Islam. It was this that brought Lawrence of Arabia fame. One Muslim against the other. The culprit in this disunity is The west, being championed in the past by Britain, now America.

@olabawale.
I suggest you brush up on your history so that you can argue well with proper historical perspectives.
The story of Isreal as a nation did not start with 'Zionism' in 20th cent, with Arabs 'allowing' them to live in communities.
Let me remind you that David made Jerusalem the capital of Isreal 3000 years ago(by 1996), and Jews were driven out of Jerusalem in AD 70, and had the temple destroyed by the Romans.The dispersion lasted like Jesus prophesized it would be until the 20th century  when the Jews would return home,and it's happened in our life time and there's nothing the Arabs can do about it.
Your treatise on slavery is sordid with inaccuracies.I suppose you live in the U.S.Why not read up the history of America,slave trade,the civil war etc.One thing I would not gloss over is the way professed Christians,made attempts to justify the evils of slavery by the bible,but we all know that there's no justification whatsoever for their actions because we have the same bible.
But what most people choose to be blind to is the history of Abolition of slavery itself.Who were the personalities behind the abolition of the inhuman trade both in England and America?
What do you know about a book 'Uncle Tom's Cabin' by Harriet Beecher Stowe and President Lincoln's comment about it being the spark of the American civil war which was essentially a war fought by anti and pro-slavery divides.
This is info age,I challenge you to google up the Abolitionists and read up on those that fought with their lives to make sure that slave trade was abolished.They were not Arabs who were very much into slavery in East Africa,who had encouraging, explicit passages in Koran that justified their actions,but Christians who pursued abolition with the same religious zeal they used in preaching the message of Christianity.

So the Koran condemned the drinking of alcohol,how come the same Koran says suicide bombers would have 72 virgins to themselves in Paradise with a river flowing with wine?

Afam:


We must respect other peoples religions even if we don't believe in them.

We should move away from the position of "they are over reacting" when islam is attacked to a position of not attacking any religion for that matter.

Please read how this sounds: We should move away from the position of "they are over reacting" when Isreal is attacked to a position of not attacking any nation for that matter

Hypocrisy is so subtle.

olabowale:

@Davidlan: Tell me how many Hindus, etc are in Nigeria. Oh, you mentioned the thread, tell me one Hindu here on Nairaland. I will then tell you that you will soon see a christian starting up a thread about it. After all, it is now through the Missionaries; convertion is by a basket of food in one hand and the Bible in another.

The pseudo-christian countries on world stage are using force, their military might and the power of their monies to do the same. No sooner that bagdad fell than the Bible thumpers from America began their soldier's for Jesus skids. It is as if Bagdad did not know about christianity before America. The same story played out in Afghanistan.

Convertion is not by force. Whatever the state of your heart will lead you to the mercy of God or His anger. God knows the truth about every human.

1. it is not about the number of hindus on this thread or in Nigeria, there are millions of sango worshippers in Nigeria, neither they nor christians refer to themselves as apes or infidels neither do they issue fatwahs on themselves. Jihad is totally alien to them!
2. Conversion is not by force: Please stop making this quote in the light of several quranic verses that contradict these statement! Where you not told to kill the infidels? Is it not in your quran that those who leave Islam must be killed? What do you make of the recent threat from al queada to Americans to convert to Islam? what of Olaf Wig and the other journalist forced to convert to Islam at gun point?

olabowale:

God is powerful to defend Himself, yet people must defend Him when others malign  Him. At least defend Him by your speech. People defend societies, nations, ideas, all are insignificant to God. But people will not even defend God, even with hating the evil deeds that are done against God with their hearts. How do you claim that you believe in God and yet you do not stand up for Justice and truth.

Read yourself! God is powerful to defend himself yet he needs men to defend him? Is that not an incongrous statement? How do you defend God? By killing your neighbor?

In what way are muslims "standing for justice and truth"? By murdering 3000 innocent souls most of whom do not know the direction to Mecca and cannot spell Muhammad on Sept 11?

@ Olabowale
Jew, Christian ,Hindu, Atheist, Freethinker, Traditional religion worshipper, Shiite/Sunni (depending on the side you fall), American, Southern Nigerian, Southern Sudanese, Spainard, German and Indian on trains,  Kenyan and Tanzanian embassy workers, to mention a few provoke just one group of people(MOSLEMS)  thereby causing them to act violently and kill others!!

As regards the  false flag issue;
Maybe the west were the ones staging the kidnap of aid workers and journalist and subsequently beheading them in order to pit the muslims against the west?

And the west further went to Tanzania and Kenya to blow up U.S embassies,

and the west Launched Katyusha rockets from Lebanon to Israel to pit Lebanon against Israel,

and the west bombed a Shia holy place in Iraq to incite the Sunnis against the Shia

and the west blew themselves up as suicide bomber in Israel to pit Israel against Palestine

and the west blew its own twin towers of the world trade center to incite Americans against the Arab world

and the west Gassed kurds in Iraq to Incite the Kurds against Saddam

and the west Invaded Kuwait wearing Iraqi soldiers uniform so as to incite the world against Iraq,

and the Someone from the west Disguised himself as the president of ISLAMIC republic of IRAN and called for the total destruction of Israel to incite Israel against Iran

@Olabowale so conversion is not by force, ehn ehn I thought so too until I heard of people being forced to convert to islam at Gunpoint

I am sure we all know better
I want to beleive the way you spelt my name earlier was a slip of computer keyboard and I want you to correct that promtly else I may be provoked to namecalling too

@Davidylan,

The good thing about a public forum is that it will offer anyone the opportunity to self destruct if one chooses to.

Quote from: Afam on Today at 09:04:32 AM
God is powerful to defend Himself, yet people must defend Him when others malign Him. At least defend Him by your speech. People defend societies, nations, ideas, all are insignificant to God. But people will not even defend God, even with hating the evil deeds that are done against God with their hearts. How do you claim that you believe in God and yet you do not stand up for Justice and truth.

Read yourself! God is powerful to defend himself yet he needs men to defend him? Is that not an incongrous statement? How do you defend God? By killing your neighbor?

In what way are muslims "standing for justice and truth"? By murdering 3000 innocent souls most of whom do not know the direction to Mecca and cannot spell Muhammad on Sept 11?

How far can you go to manufacture lies and even twist other people's quotes to become mine.

Go through your last post and see how shameless your twisting of information has become. The text in italic above refers, I never made the statement even though you have criminally added Afam's name as the owner of the statement.

On the first part of your reply with the following

Quote from: Afam on Today at 09:04:32 AM

We must respect other peoples religions even if we don't believe in them.

We should move away from the position of "they are over reacting" when islam is attacked to a position of not attacking any religion for that matter.

Please read how this sounds: We should move away from the position of "they are over reacting" when Isreal is attacked to a position of not attacking any nation for that matter

Hypocrisy is so subtle.

Unfortunately, you have in your wisdom decided to see Hezbollah's attack as a first time attack and not as a response to Israel's campaign in Lebanon and imprisonment of about 10,000 Lebanese in Israeli jails.

My statement is valid and what it still shows is that if we start to do the right thing, if we stop using might to promote injustice things will be better.

Do yourself a favour and try to read an understand posts, being in a hurry to label Afam bad will only expose your intent which is very bad to say the least.

I hope you will find the courage to admit this mistake (if indeed it is one), it will be a better thing to do, far better than ignoring it and looking for diversion.

Don't you guys have other stuffs to do rather than Judging which religion is good or bad.

@ Afam,

Sorry the earlier italized post was from Olabowale and in reference to him only. I'm sorry if it had your name above. The error has been duly corrected.

I don't know why a man would put his hands in a cobra's mouth (May Steve Irwin's soul rest in peace).
Like someone said on this thread, there is a faster way to commit suicide than swallowing poison. The pope just did.

http://in.news.yahoo.com/060918/137/67ow6.html - death to the pope and his followers

http://in.news.yahoo.com/060918/137/67oym.html - rallies

But have at the back of our minds that this issue wouldn't generate that much attention had a prominent Islamic figure said that about Christianity, and unlike the "Muhammad" Cartoons this is more than Jihad.

Everyone, get ready. Like the Bible predicted, it's Armageddon! and I've just got maself a gun, Don't touch ma mama, or i'll start my own religion and call it "JIHARD" - NOt joking, I'm effin serious, I have all it takes to be a prophet, and i've got followers already

I miss Tupac.

@Davidylan,

My apologies for the harsh words. I thought it was delibrate.

Take care and let us agree or disagree on issues without personal attacks.

We may never see things the same way because of who we are and how we have developed in different environments and time.

More heartwarming reports from the slaves of the "religion of peace"!

Iraq's al-Qaida vows war over Pope comments on Islam
Al Qaeda militants in Iraq vowed war on "worshippers of the cross" and protesters burned a papal effigy on Monday over Pope Benedict's comments on Islam.
"We tell the worshipper of the cross (the Pope) that you and the West will be defeated, as is the case in Iraq, Afghanistan, Chechnya," said a Web statement by the Mujahideen Shura Council.
"We shall break the cross and spill the wine ,  God will (help) Muslims to conquer Rome ,  (May) God enable us to slit their throats, and make their money and descendants the bounty of the mujahideen," said the statement, posted on Sunday on an Internet site often used by al Qaeda and other militant groups.

As usual, Nigerians, Kenyans, Indians, Americans, Jews are not exempt from the wrath of the hoodlums thanks to a one line quote from a 12th century emperor quoted by the pope. Do these people remember that the pope does not speak for protestants, anglicans, Lutherans, methodists?

And pray! What has the "west" got to do with the words of the pope? Is he the EU leader? Are the words of the pope enough reason for jihadists to embark on a campaign to "conquer Rome" including innocent Italians and slit their throats? Since when did christians the world over suddenly become in danger of death simply by reason of a statement from the pope?

This is clear indication that the present terror campaign, far from being a war over "injustice and deepseated wounds" is really a religious crusade by muslims to conquer Europe and America, the earlier the world recognizes this the better. Until then we can continue playing the ostrich, trying to be politically correct by claiming Islam truly means "peace"!

Al qaeda and other militant groups do not represent all moslems so I will not take a position taken by a militant group to mean the opinion of all moslems.

I am sure that the Hamas leader is the leader of a group labelled a terrorist organisation and yet he stated on TV that no one should touch any of their christian brothers and sisters in Palestine.

Afam:

Al qaeda and other militant groups do not represent all moslems so I will not take a position taken by a militant group to mean the opinion of all moslems.

I am wont to agree with you except these "minority" muslims are really the ones who affect our daily lives. Thanks to this "minority", air travel any where in the world is no longer safe, subways could mean the fastest route to death by suicide bombing, we are more likely to have aircraft hijackings, we need to scan parcels before opening them for fear of bioterrorism!

Indeed these "minority" do not speak the mind of "ALL" muslims but unfortunately they seem to have held the whole world to ransom. It would be extremely foolish for any European or American leader to take such utterances from a millitant "minority" lightly! Now that Al qaeda have directly threatened France and now Italy, Europe is gradually begining to feel the heat America has been feeling since 1993!

its so sad that in this time and age people arent objective when they talk: many of the christians who talk about Muhaammad never read about his life story all they just know is that he was a sword brandishing man; that is not true if you want to know what motivated him who he really was i will refer you to read The Life of Muhammad by Haykal a truly inspirational book for any muslim or christain who really wants to know about the Man muhammad; secondly because muslims are at the forefront of wars every where now adays does not mean Islam is about violence saying that is just like saying the catholics of Nothern Ireland fighting for independence from the UK mmakes christianity a violent religion; one fact people are missing is that you have not really looked at Islam as a religion but are only looking at muslims who are the followers of the religion; i must be honest with u i support my brother olabowale who says Jesus was never a Christian nor a Jew well we could say he was a Jew by race but not by faith He never called himself a christain while alive and he never created any reliogion called christianity infact the word christians was first used long after he was dead; please do not use the followers of Islam to judge Islam because what people do not understand is the fact the followers are different people from many races who have many temperaments and way of life b4 becoming muslims. for example the killing between Sunnis and Shiites in Iraq is purely based more on tribal and personal affiliations rather than any religious motives; besides i suuport the person who said that the popes comments were uncalled for, what was the need to say that did any of teh terrorists? ever say convert to Islam or die many of them claim they want Palestine liberated from Isreal so where does forceful conversion come in; Please lets be fair b4 saying anything

We are certainly making progress.

Now, if we agree that Al qaeda does not represent all moslems then it will be ok for us to say that not all moslems support Al qaeda and naturally that means that all moslems do not have problems with the US or the West or even christians or jews or Israel.

If the statement and the attendant inferences are correct then it logically follows that islam is not at war with christainity and the followers of these religions are not at war.

If we all agree thus far then we may shift our focus to the militant groups like Al qaeda and try to know what their problems are.

What do they commonly cite as their excuses for attacks against the West? Palestine, occupation of arab lands by infidels according to them, Lebanon etc or generally middle east wahala.

Now, are these complaints real? Do we really have problems in this regions that can be tackled or solved? If yes, why not solve the problems now so we can take away the excuses that groups like Al qaeda readily use to launch attacks?

True, many may and will probably hide under injustices and use religion to wag wars against a people based on hatred. Put differently, the injustices (believe me, some are so real) now provides the catalyst for those that may harbour hatred to fight.

While the issue in the middle east and the solution to the problems there is not as easy or as simple as the paragraphs above, I believe that the world will make progress and move towards peace if the world decides to solve the problems in the middle east today.

While the problems may not be solved with any magic wand, a genuine attempt will go a long way in changing the direction things are taking right now.

Unfortunately, in Iraq today Bush has presented groups like Al qaeda a powerful reason for moslems to increase the hatred against the US to the extent that one could say that the US made the job of recruiting suicide bombers way to easy for Osama.