The Islamic Society of Basking Ridge, New Jersey, has faced considerable red tape from the city’s zoning board since 2011. Having to haggle over typical zoning issues like parking lot size and possible interference with a fire department across the street, the Islamic Society’s Mosque-building efforts have faced the typical bureaucratic complications not altogether uncommon for New Jersey suburbs. The Muslims involved have found unlikely allies, meeting currently in a liberal Presbyterian church and finding friends in the evangelical community to help lobby for their construction efforts. Two such friends are the Southern Baptist Convention’s Russell Moore and David Platt, whose organizations (the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission and the International Mission Board, respectively) have joined the lobbying efforts for the Mosque’s construction. Pulpit & Pen, the polemics website, has written on this extensively (source links).
Russell Moore, whose Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission’s stated mission includes four ministries that all begin with the words “Assist churches…” (source link, emphasis mine) is assisting Mosques in the name of religious freedom. And while we can certainly agree that religious liberty is indeed “a thing” constitutionally, and is indeed a long-held Baptist virtue, one wonders if the ERLC budget consisting of more than four million Southern Baptist dollars are being well spent to help the religion of Islam gain another center of worship for a false god, ironically perpetuating a religion that is widely juxtaposed against religious liberty and characteristically advocate hate and violence toward Jews and Christians. No doubt done for the purpose of his softer, kinder, politically correct and social justice-focused Christianity, the counterprouctiveness of Moore’s advocacy for the advancement of a worldview and religion that is set to undue the worldview and religion he is paid to advance can’t be overstated.
Fast forward several weeks since Moore and Platt’s advocacy for the New Jersey Mosque has been made public, and we see news that early Sunday morning, Islam has claimed 50 American victims in Orlando. Islamic extremist, Omar Mateen was already known by the FBI as a militant Muslim (source link). Mateen attended the Islamic Center of Fort Pierce, Florida. This Islamic Center, very similar to the one that the two Southern Baptist entity heads have lobbied to get built in New Jersey, claims to be moderate and promote peace. The imam at Mateen’s mosque has condemned his violence. And yet, there is no doubt that it was the religion of Muhammad that rode Mateen like the devil to commit these atrocious murders.
Mateen’s ex-wife and in-laws are New Jersey Muslims (source link), and although it is unknown if they are the Islamic group in New Jersey for whom Moore and Platt have advocated, Southern Baptists should be alarmed that the religion calling for Shariah Law and global Jihad are being bolstered by SBC officials.
Moore’s kinder, gentler, social-justicey Christianity certainly has double standards, and those double standards are evident in the lens of political correctness.
Consider what Moore has said of another hate-group, Westboro Baptist Church. Moore has called Westboro a “performance art of vitriolic hatred rather than any kind of religious organization” (source link). Moore condemns Westboro Baptist, denying their authentic religious credentials because “they believe that God delights in condemnation and damnation.” Moore calls Westboro an “ugly caricature of Christianity” (source link).
Question: Do you believe that Moore would lobby for the government to assert the First Amendment rights of Westboro Baptist Church? Do you think that Moore would sign a brief for a lawsuit on behalf of Westboro Baptist Church against a municipality ostensibly hindering their freedom of speech or assembly?
For the record, Westboro Baptist Church is an astonishing contradiction to Christianity, a soulless heap of anti-gospel wretchedness. I’m not blaming Moore for not sticking up for Westboro’s right to peacefully assemble outside funerals or spew their blasphemous stench against everything pure and holy on the airwaves. I’m not blaming Moore for not sticking up for Westboro Baptist ‘Church’ because Moore’s job is to assist churches, not anti-churches. But here’s something to consider.
Question: How many gay night clubs has Westboro shot up? In spite of their ‘God Hates Fags’ rhetoric, how many bullets has Fred Phelps thrown down range toward the objects of his angst?
Why does Russell Moore have such noticeable animosity toward those who say ‘God Hates Fags’ and so little toward those who are commanded by their holy book and sacred writings to kill homosexuals, and whose adherents carry it out?
Moore tweeted yesterday…
Christian, your gay or lesbian neighbor is probably really scared right now. Whatever our genuine disagreements, let’s love and pray.
Yes. Let’s love and pray and maybe have courage to quote Luke 13:3 in the face of this tragedy.
Also, let’s not assist the religion of death whose prophet taught vigilante capital punishment against homosexuals (al-Tirmidhi, Sunan 1:152). Maybe Moore, for the sake of our homosexual neighbors, shouldn’t be promoting a religion advocating for Shariah Law, that requires death rather than repentance for homosexuals (source link). Maybe Moore shouldn’t, for the sake of our homosexual neighbors, be promoting the religious freedom of clerics who issued a fatwa in 2012 that sodomy is acceptable so long as it is a method used to widen the anus enough to put in hidden explosives to kill the infidel (source link).
Arguing for the religious liberty of a cult that teaches totalitarian fascism, the destruction of personal liberty and the unjust taking of life as pillars of faith is like the old Onion article about the ACLU defending the Nazi’s right to burn down the ACLU headquarters. It’s political correctness in Jesusy language that defies logic and makes intellectual honesty into a dirty joke. The press may love it, but common sense is rolling over in its grave.
