New York Times: Pope Should Apologize

New York Times: Pope Should Apologize

That's their editorial this morning and they appear to say that the apology should be made by Benedict personally: "HE needs to offer a deep and persuasive apology (emphasis added)." That is important language because it is also exactly what The Muslim Brotherhood has said.* The Times editorial board knows this. That was not accidental usage. To paraphrase the editorial, "The world listens carefully to the words of any New York Times editorial."

The Times begins its editorial with the sentence, "There is more than enough religious anger in the world," thus conflating all religions: all religions deserve respect, all religions have angry adherents, and all religious anger is bad. That conflation is wrong. Islam is alone in the extent, prominence, and virulence of hateful religious teaching. It is also alone in the extent to which that hate is translated into murder and war on other religions.

The Times says that the Pope should apologize for quoting a person who said in the 14th century that Islam is alone in sanctioning proselytization by the sword: "For many Muslims, holy war--jihad--is a spiritual struggle, and not a call to violence." That is wrong, as any casual follower of the news for the last forty years knows. For most Muslims as they practice their "religion" today and in our time, jihad means murderous, earthly, war.

Islam will get its apology because the Catholic church has no divisions, because like all impotents --e.g. the United Nations--its only source of influence is being friendly with those who are potent, and because, as its statements during the Danish cartoon controversy showed, it sees itself, as does The New York Times, as part of a unitary Religion that includes Islam and as such should be exempt from "insulting" free speech. That is too bad because the truth is that Benedict is a good person who never should be conflated with Islam's hateful mullahs. Neither should Catholicism as it is practiced today be conflated with Islam as it is practiced today.

Islam's war against America is different from anything we've ever experienced. For five years thinkers have struggled to define and understand it: Is it like an organized crime issue (the Democrats)? Something called "Terrorism?" Define that. Is the enemy a McVeigh-like small, nutty group? By now most people have come off those conceptualizations. It is now recognized that the problem is with some part of Islam. Is it with a mutant, psychotic strain of Islam (the Times view)? Is it with a "significant minority" of Muslims (Daniel Pipes), or is it substantially with the whole of Islam (the view here and of increasing numbers of others)?

The New York Times is struggling mightily with this issue. Its factual reports conflict with its editorials. Its columnists reflect a range of opinion, if only about 1-3 on the 1-10 scale. The paper was embarrassed by the work of some of its own reporters in the run-up to the Iraq war and furious that it unwittingly gave support to the Administration's case for w.m.d. Its attempt to make up for that, its cooing endorsement of John Kerry, produced snickers from observers. It then had to suffer through election night. It has been besieged even by other members of the Fourth Estate club. The Wall Street Journal has literally accused it of playing into the hands of the enemy. Its shrill, faux-macho responses produced winces that time.

The sum of all that the Times has been through is the exasperating realization of its temporary loss of influence. The pen is mightier than the sword only when it can influence people and events (The pen of this website for example is mightier than no sword on earth). The Times has not been able to do that since the attacks in its own home town on 9/11. To paraphrase today's editorial again, "There is more than enough political anger in the United States today." Like the rest of us, the writers for The New York Times want peace. They are wrong and much more than half of Americans have already concluded that they are wrong, but they should not be hated for being wrong.

Incidents like the Pope's speech and the Danish cartoon controversy are wonderful because they let the world see the reality of Islam and hear Islam in its own words. That is far more important than anything that the Pope or The New York Times says. This is Public Occurrences.


*And no, the implication is not that The New York Times and The Muslim Brotherhood are similar.