Monday’s ruling addressed a lawsuit filed by the leftist party Tagammu, which accused the Brotherhood of being a terrorist organization and of “exploiting religion in political slogans.” Laying out its decision, the court reached back to the Brotherhood’s founding in 1928, when Egypt was ruled by a British-backed monarchy, and argued that the organization had always used religion as a cover for its political goals....What is wrong with using religion as a cover for political goals? In the United States, we staunchly defend our right to do that.
The Brotherhood, which began as a social and religious revival movement, was tacitly tolerated for years despite being outlawed, growing into Egypt’s largest philanthropic organization, with a national network of clinics, schools and other charities helping to provide a partial social safety net below the rickety Egyptian state....
Ibrahim Moneir, a Brotherhood official who is still at large, called the ruling “totalitarian.”
September 23, 2013
"An Egyptian court on Monday ordered the dissolution of the Muslim Brotherhood and the confiscation of its assets..."
"The court ruling formalizes the suppression of the group..."
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Our religions tend not to blow people or things up for starters.
"What is wrong with using religion as a cover for political goals? In the United States, we staunchly defend our right to do that."
Yes, we do and it's dangerous. Fundamentalists of any stripe want to dominate. The Christian Dominance movement may scare me far less any Islamists, but they both feel they can use politics and laws to force their beliefs on secular people. Francis Schaeffer and his son Frank Schaeffer were the founders of the Religious Right. Frank Schaeffer has some deep regrets about what they did, read his book "Crazy for God".
I doubt the Obama administration will take any action concerning the Muslim Brotherhood initiatives it has running. Nor will Hillary.
Good times. Arab Spring! Good times!!
Ibrahim Moneir, a Brotherhood official who is still at large, called the ruling “totalitarian.”
So from his persepective what's the problem?
Exactly! Very few religions espouse the brutality and repression exemplified by Sharia Law. Nor do they advocate dismantling the Republic as we know it.
"What is wrong with using religion as a cover for political goals?"
I suppose it depends on the position of the particular religion in the specific society, and the goals at issue. A state religion (de jure or de facto) in a theocratic society is likely to raise different issues than those that arise in a secular society like teh US.
They are using their religion to bring totalitarian rule that violates even the Egyptian Constitution. They advocate war against their secular and even their Muslim opponents because their religion calls for it.
"Using their religion" should provide no cover for their violent, totalitarian ideology of conquest and barbarism.
In the United States, we object to using politics as a cover for our religious ends.
Yes. I remember the 1960 election very well, where the Vatican was trying to take over the US Government using Sen. Kennedy as their cat's paw. Thank goodness we elected the Quaker Nixon and avoided that trap.
"What is wrong with using religion as a cover for political goals? "
Mass murder Ann. Can't you figure that out?
Religion is granted a special immunity from state regulation in free countries. We decided that religion was not a real-world issue.
Thomas Jeffeson wrote "But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods or no God. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg."
When a religious body enters politics, however, it can do both. We tolerate a modest level of political activism by churches anyway.
The MB combines religion and politics. Their political agenda is to impose their religion and its rules on everyone.
I suspect that the battle in Egypt has little to do with religion. The majority of the Egyptian army are probably just as dedicated to Islam as the Muslim Brotherhood. If the United States sanctions the Egyptian army, I believe that Saudi Arabia (a strongly fundamentalist Muslim country), with Russian assistance, will step in and fill the void.
Erdogan in Turkey began as a democratically elected leader and gradually undermined the standing of the army in Turkish society by trying and jailing generals. This was a pattern which the Muslim Brotherhood seemed prepared to copy. The Egyptian generals probably realized that they were being boxed in, it was them or the Brotherhood but not both.
Because the Brotherhood were impatient to put their radical regime into practice, the Brotherhood undercut their own standing with the people. Under the Brotherhood, the Egyptian people were living on the brink of starvation. The tourist trade was greatly diminished and there were even rumors that the Brotherhood wanted to destroy the pyramids. Murdering Christians and burning churches did not help tourists feel safe.
Inga: "Francis Schaeffer and his son Frank Schaeffer were the founders of the Religious Right."
What evidence exists that validates this assertion?
Inga: "Francis Schaeffer and his son Frank Schaeffer were the founders of the Religious Right."
What evidence exists that validates this assertion?
The most dangerous faith is one that is unacknowledged and even actively denied. A secular predisposition which conflates science and philosophy has created a new religion. Actually, it's an old religion, which is masked by selective adherence to both natural and moral laws.
I strongly agree with Ann's final comment in her post. That's what should be, but is it true?
The largest domestic massacre of my lifetime says otherwise. Did the Branch Davidians really deserve to have the full paramilitary might of the United States deployed, and released, on their doorstep?
People tell me there are limits to the second amendment, including 9 very prominent Justices.
I see no reason that there shouldn't likewise be a limit on the first amendment's freedom of religion. If your religion endorses terrorism and commits the acts we've seen since at least 1979, then I say you do not have the right to practice that brand of religion.
This does not apply to all muslims, but for the fanatical sort, such as Al Qaeda or the Muslim Brotherhood, among many others, I hope we can someday do the same here if it comes to that.
They are rabid animals and need to be killed to protect us, because like rabid animals, they cannot be reformed. Seizing their assets seems appropriate. I have no pity or mercy for such murdering thugs.
"Some folks just need suppressin' ".
Will this work?
They will still exist. And it's doubtful they will go away.
As will any assets they have hidden.
Nobody in the Middle East with substantial assets fails to hide a large part of them.
On the other hand, they do repression very very well.
Here is not there.
Here is not there.
Igna: "Francis Schaeffer and his son Frank Schaeffer were the founders of the Religious Right."
The Schaeffers were hardly the founders of the religious right. Francis was a theologian and philosopher who encouraged Christian participation in politics, but who was harshly criticized by Christian reconstructionists because of his indifference to theocracy.
Frank is an opportunist who capitalized on his father's prominence and anti-Christian sentiment, like Igna's, to sell his book, "Crazy For God," written, naturally, after his parents' deaths. Many students of Francis who lived at l'Abri with the Schaeffers have refuted Frank's claims about his father and his own importance in the Christian community.
"Murdering Christians and burning churches did not help tourists feel safe."
Racists!
Inga said:
"Yes, we do and it's dangerous. Fundamentalists of any stripe want to dominate. The Christian Dominance movement may scare me far less any Islamists, but they both feel they can use politics and laws to force their beliefs on secular people."
The left are materialists / physicalists who believe the human mind is nothing but intricately shaped matter in motion completely explainable by the same laws which guide atoms. In other words leftists don't really believe in human freedom at all. Most Christians believe that humans are more than matter in motion and do accept human freedom.
Leftists are masters at projecting their own behavior on other people. If they accuse religious people of something you can rest assured that that very thing in on their own minds. Leftists are masters at manipulating other people's minds. The term brain washing was invented to explain the successful application of force on prisoners in China to change their belief system. Here in the US the left is using the university system and lower levels of education to force their ideas on sons and daughters of Christian parents.
Christians believe in a good God who has given humans freedom of choice to love him without force. Since God has given humans freedom of choice it is wrong for Christians to force other people to accept God. If anyone has questions about this issue, they should read the statements on human freedom at Vatican II.
For Egypt to be progressive we have to understand that there must be a military controlled government in place.
Freedom of religion is of course anathema to such a regime. This is especially true with certain religious folk who are also super political and will use a little violence.
What is it with those pesky Germans banning Nazis?
After all: freedom.
Drago, first read " A Christian Maifesto" by Francis Schaeffer, then read his son Frank Schaeffer's book, "Crazy for God". There you may find your answer. Do your own home work.
A review of "A Christian Manifesto"
Inga,
That review is one of the most demented things I've read in a long time. The only place that Schaeffer and Neuhaus come together with Rushdoony and Ellen G. White is in the writer's mind.
It's possible that Muslim Brotherhood people feel more comfortable being persecuted than governing. They know how to survive and prosper under persecution. They've lived that way for generations. Governing called for a skill set that they simply did not have. Now they can suffer nobly and maybe even gain a martyr's death. It's all part of God's plan.
Just in case others are tempted to follow Inga's link, here's the sort of gobbledygook you fill find:
"In a nation that describes itself in the rhetoric of religious freedom, a gradual but meteoric shift in the balance of power between church and state is now taking place. [emphasis added]"
Got that? Gradual but meteoric!
Kirk, perhaps the readers here can make up their own minds. As I said they really should do their own homework, don't take my word or anyone else's. Google is your friend, so is Amazon.
Early Inga: "Francis Schaeffer and his son Frank Schaeffer were the founders of the Religious Right."
I challenged this assertion.
Inga's response...
Inga: "Drago, first read " A Christian Maifesto" by Francis Schaeffer, then read his son Frank Schaeffer's book, "Crazy for God". There you may find your answer. Do your own home work."
I asked for evidence that Shaeffer and his son were the "founders of the Religious Right".
How about you do your own homework and present evidence for your own assertions.
Just because some character wrote a book does not make them "founders of the Religious Right".
Research Christian Reconstructionism and the connection between Rushdoony and Schaeffer. It may reveal a bit about the origins of The Religious Right movement.
Or don't, it's your choice. Glad we still have one.
Kirk Parker said...
"Just in case others are tempted to follow Inga's link, here's the sort of gobbledygook you fill find."
Good point. It appears that the link Inga provided calls itself an ecumenical site but is really a stealth site sponsored by the Seventh-day Adventist church. church.http://www.washingtonconference.org/article/270/ministries/religious-liberty
Seventh-day Adventists are good people in many ways but they are batty when it comes to other Christians. They are taught to dread all other Protestants and Catholics based on the writings of their prophet Ellen G White who prophesied that the Catholics and Protestants would unite to force everyone in the World to keep Sunday and would kill anyone who refused. Adventists really believe these things, not because of anything the other Christian churches have done, but because their prophet taught them to fear them. It is interesting that Inga has bought into their propaganda.
I'm just waiting for Inga to work in vapor trails and "fire can't melt steel" in her "EEK! A Xtian!" musings.
"Drago, first read " A Christian Maifesto" by Francis Schaeffer, then read his son Frank Schaeffer's book, "Crazy for God". There you may find your answer. Do your own home work."
Of course, Drago, you can be certain that Igna has read "A Christian Manifesto" and not just the crackpot review she linked. Lol.
"Research Christian Reconstructionism and the connection between Rushdoony and Schaeffer. It may reveal a bit about the origins of The Religious Right movement."
-- That's the sort of cop out "fire melts steel" people instruct me to do. You can do better; if you make an assertion, back it up.
And yes -- I picked that quite on purpose. The "religious right" are just the boogeymen of the left; like the "military-industrial complex," "the one percent," "the patriarchy," etc. Just another in a long list of vaguely defined, though seemingly omnipresent and completely obvious, menaces waiting to swoop in on the wings of Republicanism to trounce minorities and trample rights. This is just a conspiracy theory that is in vogue, like the fear of radical Tea Party militias.
Thomas Jeffeson wrote "But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods or no God. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg."
As far as I know, a majority of citizens in the USA still self-identify themselves as Christian.
But as a thought experiment, let's imagine a USA where a majority of citizens self-identify as Muslim.
In this counter-factual Muslim-majority country, would the U.S. constitution- including its bill of rights, of course- still be the law of the land as it is now?
If not, is Thomas Jefferson's point not universally true? In general, would Jefferson's point apply to religions that encourage the use of violence? Would an adherent of a human-sacrifice religion living next door to you make you justifiably concerned for your safety?
Surely we know from history that a mob- or a nation!- inflamed by religious zeal can be very dangerous indeed?
Still waiting for Inga to present her "evidence" which validates her claim that these Shaeffer fellows were the "founders" of the Religious Right.
Should make for some fascinating reading...
Inga,
That's my review of that other review. Admirably brief (i.e. spends the amount of time on the work it deserves) though not up to Ambrose Bierce standards (who once wrote a one-sentence book review: "The covers are too far apart.")
We do that here and it doesn't work.
Very few people nod along anymore when you say "we need to do X because the bible says..."
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