Zen Koan of the Day.

MU!

One God

Recently, Dom (of villageidiotsavant ) recommended that I check out a blog called christian cognition.The writer, Mike Lee, is a police officer living in Jackson, MI (birthplace of the Republican party).

Currently, Mike is having a "weekly challenge" with another blogger (Alex).

I want to comment on something Mike wrote in his answer to their question of the week. "President Bush also said Christians and Muslims worship the same God (you know my position on that one)"

I felt it was more appropriate to put my comment here rather than in the comment section of his blog; I intend to have a rather lengthy comment and I don't want to monopolize Mike's space.

First of all, I've only recently begun reading his blog, so, I don't know his position viz a viz Bush's statement on Christians and Muslims worshiping the same God. I'm assuming, from the tone, that he doesn't agree with Bush on that.

Not a few Christians are uncomfortable with the idea that Muslims might worship the same God we do.We worship God, not Allah, they'll say. We believe in the Trinity....Father, Son and Holy Spirit...and the Muslims don't. How can anyone believe our God and theirs is one and the same?

But, look in the Quran, and you'll find stories of Adam, Moses, Jesus and even the Virgin Mary.
Our understanding of the God we worship in Christianity comes from the Jewish tradition in what we call "the Old Testament". Our God is the God of Abraham.

Muslims, like Jews and Christians, also worship the God of Abraham, although the traditions in each religion differ in many details. In Judaism and Christianity, it was Issac who God asked Abraham to sacrifice;  in Islam, it is believed that the son Abraham was to sacrifice was Ishmael- who they also believe to be an ancestor of Muhammad.

Many Christians will argue that Muslims do not believe in the Triune God, therefore, Allah is a different deity. Jews do not accept the Trinity either, yet, no one will deny that we worship the same God as the Jews.

I don't want to gloss over the disagreements. Christianity and Islam are different. Our world views are light years apart....so far apart that it would be impossible for both religions to be right. But, there's no denying that both religions have a common root.
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Thoughts on The U.S. Religious Landscape

The Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life has released their U.S. Religious Landscape Survey as well as a number of articles analyzing the survey.
One such article ( Study Finds Americans Fluid in Their Religious Affiliation ) gives the breakdown of Christians in the USA as -Evangelical Protestant: 26 percent -Mainline Protestant: 22 percent -Catholic: 24 percent.....pointing out that Evangelical Protestants outnumber Catholics in America.
This is a bit misleading as the Catholic Church is the largest denomination in the country.
If you go to the survey and examine the breakdown, you'll find that the Evangelical Protestants get that 26% number because that group comprises more than 50 different denominations. The largest denomination in that group is the Southern Baptist Convention which makes up less than 7% of the population.
The, so called, Mainline Protestant group (22%) contain nearly 30 denominations; the largest being United Methodists at less than 6%.
When you look at the actual breakdown of the denominations by percentages, the fact that Catholics make up one in four American is impressive indeed.

The Obama "Dressed" Photo.

Someone connected to Hillary Clinton's campaign found a copy of this 2006 photo of Barack Obama and,of course, that "someone" made sure the photo made it's way onto the Internet.
Obama's campaign accused Clinton's people of "shameful offensive fear-mongering" for releasing the photo.
I don't quite see the point of that reaction.
Sure, Obama looks pretty ridiculous in the Somali costume, but does anyone really think he's a secret Muslim or something?
It's long been a practice among politicians to find and publish unflattering photos of their opponents. Not even the candidate's relatives are immune from having the same treatment.
Does anybody really care? Is a photo like this going to change anyone's opinion of a candidate?
Politicians will do just about anything; dressing up in a weird, local costume is standard fare for pols traveling abroad.
Maybe that's why we don't see too many of them traveling to Scotland.

A Crock of Apple Butter.

The photo above shows a crock filled with apple butter.General Motors Corp Vice Chairman Bob Lutz recently dismissed global warming as being a crock of something other than apple butter which could, never the less, be very close to apple butter in appearance.
This isn't the first time Lutz has made controversial statements in the area of 'autos versus the environment'. The article linked to above notes;
" As part of a campaign against higher fuel economy standards, Lutz wrote in a 2006 blog posting that forcing automakers to sell smaller cars would be 'like trying to address the obesity problem in this country by forcing clothing manufacturers to sell smaller, tighter sizes.' ".
Maybe Lutz was on to something. As I mentioned in a previous post, (More Dangerous Than Terrorism) there are "experts" claiming that governments need to spend more money on the problem of obesity.
I guess, we could just have the government provide coupons for skimpy clothing with monthly food stamps.