Correspondence: Whose Islam?...
CORRESPONDENCE To the Editors Well written Brian Doyle's "Flagrant Foul" (December 7) was most touching. I finished it with eyes a bit wet and a prayer in my heart for Tom Crotty. It is a...
...Because Tilley discerns that both Weigel and Cornwell are overwrought in their views, he himself may be a crypto-Anglican...
...If he does not like this designation, he should beware of creative tensions...
...Well, we weren't attacked by yeshiva students or members of the Christian Coalition...
...Why, then, finger Islam for special treatment, without pausing to query how that tradition reads its inflammatory texts...
...The author replies: A not very close reading of my column will show that I do not in fact call the writings I excerpted "exemplary" of Islam, but rather of a type of Islam...
...MARY M. DOUGLAS Saint Paul, Minn...
...Many do draw that conclusion, we know, but I suspect John Garvey would not...
...Yet most telling of all is his innocent observation that "the Bible contains bloody passages and justifications for murderous acts, but I know that this is not Judaism or Christianity...
...What makes theology so interesting is that the Holy Spirit keeps moving her markers...
...The Reverend Sun Myung Moon has done something similar in our time...
...As I reached the obituary section, I scanned the names (my habit since I work for my church) and the name of my inseparable and best friend from high school screamed out at me...
...MARGIE GUADAGNO Lansing, III...
...I hope Mr...
...How many yeshiva students of a certain stripe are treated to a steady diet of Joshua and Judges, with scant attention to the prophets...
...It is a pleasure to come across something so well written...
...ROY DARCUS Alberta, Canada...
...Once the holiday season winds down, I always look for some good books to curl up with...
...Jesus showed us the face of the Father...
...Not to mention how my son would enjoy hearing his mother recite previously unknown dinosaur facts from another book Mr...
...I identified quite personally with it...
...Vieux Anglicans tend to say yes and nouveaux Romanists tend to say no-absolutely...
...We had become separated by time and family commitments for many years, but at that moment I was once again an innocent fifteen-year-old who looked forward to nothing more than the next school dance and which boy had recently caught my eye, and sharing all of that with my friend...
...john garvey Who needs Oprah...
...How many evangelical Christians fail to distinguish God's unequivocal promises to the people Israel as God's own from the heavily conditioned ones regarding the land-so freighted with stipulations that it becomes problematic for any believer to rest easily in eretz Israel...
...One Sunday morning several years ago, I sat with my freshly poured cup of coffee (happy that I had attended Saturday evening Mass) and read through our town's newpaper...
...I do not deny the cultural richness or the spiritual depths that can be found in Islam, but I do think the Qur'an has more in common with the Book of Mormon than with the Bible, though it is more interesting...
...Why not presume the same for the rich tradition of Islam...
...PATRICK V. AHERN New York, N.Y...
...So if scriptures can be used to direct inhuman behavior against others, should we conclude, as Garvey does for Islam, that this "unfortunately, has a lot to do with" each of the traditions that claim these scriptures...
...Whether it is a sorrow for the loss of our friend or the sudden impact of our own mortality, or just the shock that someone once so vital and funny and full of life is no longer with us, it is a part of ourselves that has died along with them...
...Crypto-Anglican In his review of recent books by George Weigel and John Cornwell ("Opposites Detract," November 9), Terrance W. Tilley criticizes Weigel's adulation of the papacy, but wonders if Cornwell is recommending "the neo-Anglican path, with well-done liturgy and laxity in doctrine and morals...
...Thank you, Brian Doyle, for so eloquently sharing a story that to me certainly seemed gleaned from my own memories and feelings...
...It touched me very deeply...
...Kane enlightens us with other recommendations-I'm anxious to read what is next on his list...
...Cromwell murdering the Irish and Luther calling for the slaughter of rebellious peasants were sure that they were about God's (Continued on page 4) CORRESPONDENCE (Continued from page 2) work, and could point to justifying biblical passages...
...Garvey's Islam The insouciance with which John Gar-vey comments on an Islam which he confesses not to understand offers a telling commentary on our presumed superiority ("Making Nice with Muslims," December 7...
...From John Adams to conjoined twins-interesting indeed...
...As a paleo-Anglican, I can state that we do not seek laxity in doctrine and morals per se, but regard faith as a creative tension between what we can know and what we cannot know...
...MOST REV...
...DAVID B. BURRELL, C.S.C...
...Kane recommends...
...I abhor all fundamentalisms, including the Jewish and Christian varieties, and do in fact draw the conclusion that the bad behavior they might inspire has a lot to do with Jewish and Christian tradition...
...As far as our "presumed superiority" is concerned, I confess I do find Christianity superior to Islam...
...From someone whom I have known and respected, and read with profit over the years, this column testifies to the way "even the mighty can fall" in attempting an assessment of Islam while failing to grasp the moment of self-reflection-a fair description of much American media coverage but hardly expected from John Garvey...
...Part of us died I just read Brian Doyle's "Flagrant Foul," in the December 7 issue of Commonweal...
...Six centuries later Muhammad found this inadequate...
...A word for the Amalecites, please...
...Can one be passionately dedicated to truth and still distrust various pretensions to infallible certainty...
...I was moved by the diversity of subject matter he reads...
...Or to present verses plucked from the Holy Qur'an as justifying hating Jews or Christians is to overlook canonical Muslim ways of subordinating certain verses to others...
...I felt as if someone had punched me in the chest...
...To take as exemplary of Islam the kind of tract he does is tantamount to presuming that anti-Catholic diatribes reveal typical Protestant attitudes...
...Normally, I am not one to write to publications, particularly over a simple book review, yet I was quite impressed with a review written by Paul Q. Kane ("Christmas Critics," December 7...
...Notre Dame, Ind...
...Or why not ask how many Jews or Christians know what to do with these passages...
...Why single out Islam...
...And how many Christians have read these narratives to countenance holy wars, like the Crusaders' systematic extermination of Jews, Muslims, and Orthodox Christians when they took over Jerusalem...
Vol. 129 • January 2002 • No. 1
