Two stories have been sitting on my lap-top waiting to be written up, then today, Presidential candidate Rick Santorum helped me to realize that the two stories are same, just the players are different.
Story number one: Yousef al-Khattab is a radical Muslim who believes that killing “infidels,” AKA non-Muslims is a religious obligation. He has described
suicide bombers who have murdered innocent civilians including children as hero’s for Allah and Islam. Al-Khattab wasn’t always a hate ridden religious fanatic, in fact, until a few years ago, he was a Jewish boy named Joseph Cohen.
Joe was a chassidic boy from Brooklyn who transferred his religious passions from one brand of provincial extremism, to another. While living in Israel with his wife and children, Cohen was enlightened to the “ultimate truth,” the true path to God, by a fanatical mullah who challenged Joe to defend the beliefs and faith of his people. To this day, Yousef al-Khattab is trying to validate his new Islamic faith by promoting hate and violence towards all non-Muslims in general and the Jewish people and Israel in particular.
So what’s newsworthy about another ‘crazy’ Muslim fanatic? Al-Kahattab, who has returned with his obedient Muslim wife and children to the America, has launched a hate-ridden website called, Revolution Muslim and endorsed Republican Presidential candidate, Ron Paul.
Story number two: Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel called upon the most talked about Mormon in America today, Republic presidential candidate Mitt Romney to condemn the Church of Latter Day Saints’ (LDS) ongoing efforts
to posthumously convert victims of the Holocaust to their faith. Wiesel recently learned that not only have deceased relatives of his own family been converted, but he himself is on list of living people who are to be converted upon death. Since Wiesel made this plea, the world has also learned that the LDS Church has also posthumously converted Anne Frank and her family.
For the record, the organized Jewish community has time and again asked the Church of Latter Day Saints to desist from their practice of converting dead Jews in general and Holocaust victims in particular. Time and again, LDS officials have promised to stop the practice. Time and again, people working for the Salt Lake City based Church have reported that such posthumous conversions continue.
Converting a dead person without permission is no different from desecrating the person’s grave. Such conversions are nothing less that a public proclamation that the deceased lived an improper life. It’s tantamount to saying, “this person made poor choices in life, so we have correct their mistakes in death.” It’s denying the right of the deceased to have lived his or her life they way they wanted to.
Why does the Church of Ladder Day Saints feel compelled to literally impose their truth on everyone else? Sure, they’ll tell us it’s their divine mission to save souls. In fact, the truth is more selfish than noble. Does anything make us feel more sure of who we are and what we believe in than when someone says, “I’ve been listening and learning so much from you, I’m going to make your beliefs mine.” Indoctrinating others to your beliefs is the ultimate act of self-validation. Emotionally and intellectually immature people have been doing it since people have lived in caves.
Ever wonder about the Christian doctrine that teaches that only believers in Jesus Christ get into heaven? If that hasn’t proven to be the most effective tool for religious proselytization in human history, I can’t imagine what is. “If you accept as truth my truth, then I know I’m right. And how I get you to accept my truths is immaterial; the end justifies the means.”
People who lack the capacity to reconcile their own ideas and beliefs with a pluralistic world will inevitably turn into fanatics who must get others to share their beliefs and copy their lifestyle. The number one enemy of a fanatic is an idea that challenges their core convictions. If you can’t accept that other people have different ideas, you must discourage independent thinking, control knowledge and the free flow of information and do whatever is necessary to impose your dogma on everyone else.
Mormon’s will convert you in death if they can’t do it in life. Their way, is the right way, always; end of discussion. The hundreds of millions of dollars the Roman Catholic Church and the Church of Latter Day Saints have poured into political campaigns against marriage equality and the reproductive rights of women is indicative of a simplistic but very authoritarian strategy for imposing their doctrines on others and insuring their own survival.
So why did Al-Kahattab endorse Ron Paul? Because Ron Paul’s “libertarian” beliefs are anti-community; anti-society; anti-people sharing resources and living together in a complicated world that requires everyone to adhere to boundaries and limitations that make free civilizations possible. As I’ve written in the past, Ron Paul is simply polishing up the “leave me alone” preferences of rednecks and hillbillies who want NO part of organized society. Al-Kahattab has zero interest in living in a civilized world that celebrates community, diversity and mutual responsibility.
And how did Rick Santorum show me today that the story about the LDS Church converting dead Jews and the story about Al-Kahattab endorsing Ron Paul are one in the same? For at least the third or fourth time in as many weeks, the virulently social conservative Santorum derided President Obama’s promise to make college education accessible to all Americans. The candidate who wants to outlaw abortion, gay marriage, contraceptives and pre-natal care told a cheering crowd that, “college isn’t for everyone! Obama is a snob who should stop trying to make all Americans college educated like him.”
You know what Rick Santorum, Al-Kahattab and LDS Church? You are free to believe whatever you want but I’ll put my life on the line to make sure you can’t legislate your religious beliefs; defile the spiritual legacies of people who in life followed different paths to God or let you promote hate and bigotry. And you know how I’m going to make sure you don’t succeed in your immature, selfish endeavors? By doing exactly what the President of the United States is doing, promoting your biggest enemy: education and knowledge.
Tent of Abraham 