Bulgarian Orthodox Church: Don't violate religious feelings, respect freedom of choice

Let's not forget the the Bulgarians still have five innocent nurses in a Libyan prison awaiting a re-sentence of death. For them, the cartoon mess could not have come at a worse time.

From BBC News:

"A town in Belgium has banned an artwork of Saddam Hussein for fear that it will put off tourists and offend Muslims."

The town of Middlekerke's stance on cartoons of the murderous tyrant is unknown.

Notice that the actual text of this statement is a carefully worded affirmation of the principles of freedom of conscience and respect for human rights. It does not mention the cartoons at all and can be taken as equally addressing Islam itself which denies all freedom of religious choice.

Considering that several Bulgarian women face death in Lybia, this statement is nothing to complain about.

OT,
El Cid, Friends from JW/DW,
You might find this interesting - the Polish daily "Reczpospolita" printed 2 of those cartoons on Saturday. The Polish Muslim Council not later than yesterday was threatening to take the paper to court (where are my peaceful polonized Polish Tatars gone? With the wind of Saudi Arabia, where they go to train themselves to be good Muslims!) unless the chief editor apologizes on the front page of his paper every day for a week in BIG BOLD letters! What cheeks! In fact he did apologize verbally, but only for "hurting" the feelings of the Muslims, but stating that he would do the same again and that his intention was Solidarity with Denmark, in other words he did it the JPost's dignified manner. Today the Polish Muslims started retreating - there was so much pressure on the government and media, people sighing petitions in defence of the newspaper etc. The editor was being pressurized to resign (by the co-op owning the paper), but he declared that he has no intention of doing so!

http://serwisy.gazeta.pl/kraj/1,34308,3151450.html
http://gospodarka.gazeta.pl/gospodarka/1,33181,3150673.html

(above and below is the brave editor Grzegorz Gauden under attack - he looks worried)

http://wiadomosci.gazeta.pl/wiadomosci/1,53600,3149750.html

From www.anglicansforisrael:

Dangerous Hypocrisy: World Reactions to the Danish Cartoons
by Roberta Seid, PhD and Roz Rothstein

Westerners are agonizing about whether the twelve Danish cartoons of Mohammed showed unforgivable prejudice against Islam. Enraged Muslims in Europe, the Middle East and Asia are rampaging in protest against the cartoons, demanding apologies, boycotts, blood and even beheadings. But in all this, the real outrage is overlooked: the sheer hypocrisy of these reactions.

These angry Muslims demand that the world honor Islamic symbols and sensitivities, but adamantly refuse to grant the same to other religions. They don’t just draw satirical cartoons or limit their insults to words and discriminatory laws. They have intentionally and regularly desecrated and destroyed religious icons, holy sites and houses of worship sacred to other faiths. Yet the world, including progressive democracies whose core ideal is tolerance, has remained silent about these assaults on other religions.

Why was there no effective protest when the Taliban destroyed pre-Islamic masterpieces, including the almost 2000-year-old 165-foot statue of Buddha? Where was the outrage when Muslims destroyed churches in Indonesia, Pakistan, India, Thailand, Iraq and Sudan, and 175 Nigerian churches in 2004?[1] Where was the indignation when armed Palestinian Muslim terrorists forced their way into the Church of the Nativity in 2002 for 38 days and shot bullet holes in the walls and used the pages of Christian holy books as toilet paper?[2] Why was there no outcry when Palestinian Muslims repeatedly attacked Jewish holy sites, such as Rachel’s Tomb, or when they destroyed Joseph’s Tomb, burned its prayer books, Bibles and religious articles and converted the age-old Jewish holy site into a mosque? Why was the world silent between 1948 and 1967 when Jordanian Muslims destroyed all 57 of Jerusalem’s ancient Jewish temples, libraries and yeshivas and used the sacred stones for urinals and sidewalks?

The world has been strangely silent, too, when Muslims have gone beyond attacking holy symbols and have persecuted and murdered men, women and children for the crime of not being Muslim. The Laskar Jihad movement of Indonesia has killed 5,000 Christians and made a half-million of them homeless. In Egypt, Copts are persecuted and dozens in el-Kusheh were killed in January 2000 alone. Muslim youth rampaged in Nigeria in 2002 and killed 100 Christians and injured 200 others.[3]

How can Muslims demand that their sensibilities be respected when they assault other religions and don’t even begin soul-searching to rethink their own intolerance and religious prejudices? Why aren’t Western democracies consistently denouncing this violent behavior? Is it because they have double standards and believe Islam must be treated differently than Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism and other religions? Is it because they have become so secular that they see no reason to defend or protect the historic religions of the West? Or is it because they are intimidated by the threats of violence against them if they speak out? Do they fear they will share the fate of the brutally murdered Theodore Van Gogh or the fate of Salman Rushdie who was forced into hiding after a fatwa was issued that condemned his novel and called for his execution.

But something far more profound and ominous has been exposed by the cartoon incident. The radical Muslim message is clear: We can insult your religions. We can desecrate and destroy your holy places and kill your co-religionists, but you cannot do something as trivial as publishing satirical drawings of our sacred symbols. Only our religion should be honored and respected. The world must defer to our rules and sensitivities. If you violate them, we will erupt in riots and violence and call for your deaths.

In short, the incident has laid bare radical Islam’s impassioned battle to dominate the West and impose Islamist values and a radical Islamist world order. They are trying to get us to respect Islam according to their rules not through persuasion but through intimidation and violence. Those who do not obey will be subject to a savagery and rage that radical Muslims will unapologetically justify in the name of Allah and Mohammed. Anti-Western governments like Iran and Syria and radical Islamists will cynically fan the flames.

We are face-to-face not just with hypocrisy, but also with radical Islamists’ stark bid for religious dominance. Let us hope that democracies and moderate Muslims have the clarity, self-confidence and strength to win this battle of the 21st century.

——————————————————————————–

[1] http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2003/002/36.82.html and http://www.asianews.it/view.php?l=en&art=4609
[2] “‘Greedy Monsters’ Ruled Church,” Times, May 15 2002, p. 1
[3] http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/10429.htm

Posted on Monday, February 6th, 2006 in Religion.

Romanian dhimmitude by President Basescu.

http://www.focus-fen.net/index.php?catid=126&newsid=82179&ch=0

This is why I never follow under religious figures. They are only FIGURES!!! Not God the Father. Islam is satanic, plain and simple. Look at how the follwers act compared to how Christians react when Jesus is mocked. Christian feelings are hurt all of the time by Muslims. We don't riot in the streets. We don't burn the Islamofeces flag. We don't kill or murder Muslims in the streets of our cities. But you mean to tell me that because of a few drawings, that they can't take it? That their feelings are hurt to the point that they have to riot in the streets of countries that they're just guests in!? Trying to boss the host counrty around!?
Give me a break!!! Instead of trying to force Islime on the host country, why don't they just go back to whatever Islamofecesland territory that they come from!!!
This "synod" needs to study the Bible more and talk less.

I'm Bulgarian. The Bulgarian orthodox church has never clearly cut off her relations with the former communist secret services. The head of the Bulgarian orthodox church is a colonel in those same secret services and everyone knows that. How can we reasonable expect a clear insight into the present conflict of people still indebted to their criminal communist past ? The shortcomings of the Bulgarian communist orthodox church are countless...

that is why I'm a Bulgarian evangelical. I fully support Danemark and all those who struggle for that so basic right - the right to tell the truth about mohammed.

Thanks for writing in, Polish Infideless. Keep us updated on goings-on in Poland. Your work here is invaluable.

Geoff
Retired Prophet

Polish Infideless:

Thanks for the AnglicansforIsrael post. One could speculate that there wasn't much hew-and-cry about Muslim outrages against other religions' holy shrines, etc., because most of us are too busy earning a living to participate in angry mob actions. A lot of the problem seems to be that the usual suspects don't have much of a life outside of "their faith".

Mohammed at Iraq the Model blogsite speculated some time back that the reason for the electoral successes of the Islamist party may be a function of history: the secular totalitarian regimes pretty much kept their hands off of the mosques unless directly threatened (a la Syria against the Islamist residents of Hamah or the Algerian government against FIS)so the mullahs and imams alone could cultivate followers in an environment were there were no other political alternatives, giving them one hell of a leg-up when elections were called.

I am Bulgarian, too, but I beg to differ. The Bulgarian Orthodox Church (BOC) may have a lot of shortcomings but it has always stood for human rights. During WW2, when most European churches tried to appease Hitler, BOC's Holy Synod openly spoke against the planned deportation of Bulgarian Jews. Some of its Bishops even declared that if the Jews are put in the train to Poland, they would lie on the rails before the engine.

The only "freedom of choice" will be:

Do you want your head sliced off starting from the back or the front?

More colossal fools in massive denial.

As Bob Dylan once sang:

"Even Jesus could never forgive what you do."

to highbg above :

"has always stood for human rights"? when is that always? your example goes back to WWII. the orthodox church in Bulgaria has been since seriously transformed into a communist section on religious affairs within the secret services. it is no more a moral and religious standard, it's a morass of corruption, and ecclesiastical egoism. do not forget that her leader is a colonel.
as for the saving of Bulgarian jews during WWII, the incentive came NOT from the Orthodox church but from Dimitar Peshev - a deputy at the time.
http://www.raoul-wallenberg.org.ar/Peshev/pesheveng.htm

ako jiveesh v bulgaria bi trjabvalo dobre da znaesh vsichko tova.