tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3387550.post110628266113187764..comments2023-07-01T08:55:59.065-05:00Comments on City of Brass: Christian missionaries and tsunami relief. what could go wrong?Aziz P.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11825546047253660903noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3387550.post-1106750296274943222005-01-26T08:38:00.000-06:002005-01-26T08:38:00.000-06:00All right Joe, I'll extend you benefit of teh doub...All right Joe, I'll extend you benefit of teh doubt and do my best to answer your questions in good faith.<br /><br />First, note that "other religions do it too" is not a defense of immoral actions. I hold that withholding of aid contingent upon religious conversion is immoral. Distributing literature along with aid is not as contentious (though I find it unethical). <br /><br />I think I detect some defensiveness on your part regarding Christianity. As I have taken pains to emphasise, I have not lambasted all of Christianity for the actions of these few. I wish more Christians were willing to extend the same courtesy to me and mine. <br /><br />Your questions:<br /><br />1)What religion is that (yours)?<br /><br />Dawoodi Bohra Muslims, an Ismaili branch of the Shi'a sect. More information: <br /><br /><A HREF="http://www.blogger.com/r?http%3A%2F%2Farchive.mumineen.org%2Fpublications%2Foup%2Fbohras.html">Bohras</A>2)How much help, generally, has it rendered to tsunami victims (countries that weren't hit helping countries that were)?<br /><br />See a partial list <A HREF="http://www.blogger.com/r?http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mumineen.org%2Ftsunami_relief.html">here</A>, submitted by various jamaats (congregations) around the world. <br /><br />3)How is that aid distributed?<br /><br />In partnership with local state and provincial governments, primarily. IN some cases the local governments have requested goods and materials rather than money, so we have complied. In others, they have requested monetary donations through specific official channels. Again, we comply. All aid is channelled only through official avenues and not disbursed privately except in those areas where we already have a congregation (such as Sri Lanka), where the local community members are themselves directly invcolved in relief efforts as part of the community. <br /><br />4)Does your religion participate in wide-spread charitable efforts on foreign soil?<br /><br />Yes. <br /><br />5)Is this charity (assuming it exist) carried out without the effort to proselytize?<br /><br />No prosletyzation efforts are made, whatsoever, in any shape or form. <br /><br />(I am assuming your qualifier about the charity existing is meant solely as a conditional and not as a snark). <br /><br />6)What actions (if any)have misguided members of your faith taken to convert others or that would cause suffering to those who would not convert?<br /><br />None.<br /><br />7)How is your faith in your religion shaken by those misguided actions and what are the leaders of your faith saying about those actions?<br /><br />Why would my faith be shaken? There are no misguided actions by misguided members, but if there were, those actions would be their responsibility and not therefore reflective of my faith in any way. <br /><br />8)From the above answers, do you believe your religion demonstrates better behavior than the Christian faith?<br /><br />"The Christian faith" ? Who is generalizing now? I do not presume to make value judgements between entire religions on the basis of the actions of their followers. If you choose to do so, that is your business. Nor am I interested in theological debates.<br /><br />I encourage you to read Mullahs on the Mainframe by Jonah Blank if you are genuinely curious about my comunity and what we believe and represent, and how we have successfully met the challenge of modernity without sacrificing our principles of faith. You can <A HREF="http://www.blogger.com/r?http%3A%2F%2Funmedia.blogspot.com%2F2002_11_21_unmedia_archive.html%2385605829">read my review of the book here</A>.Aziz P.https://www.blogger.com/profile/11825546047253660903noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3387550.post-1106578823912288362005-01-24T09:00:00.000-06:002005-01-24T09:00:00.000-06:00Joshua, your argument boils down to making excuses...Joshua, your argument boils down to making excuses. It's a ludicrous stretch, and you'd recognize that if it were aimed at Islam rather than Christianity. Unless you've got mind readig powers or something you're just hand waving, and pretty furiously at that.Aziz P.https://www.blogger.com/profile/11825546047253660903noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3387550.post-1106515090649715742005-01-23T15:18:00.000-06:002005-01-23T15:18:00.000-06:00I for one emphatically hope that any Christian rel...I for one emphatically hope that any Christian relief organization providing aid to victims of the tsunami do get explicit credit, at the very least the name of the organization on the packages if not official recognition by the local government. This builds cross-faith ties and fosters mutual human respect. Whether it leads a recipient to also question their faith and perhaps convert is a side issue of irrelevance - thats a personal decision and shouldn't be a concern.<br /><br />My beef here is the refusal of aid - and given the naked agenda towards prosletyzation of some of these groups, I don't find it as unthinkable as all that. There are likely to be some extremist groups under the missionary umbrella.<br /><br />When I hear the word nun, I think of Christianity in general, not Catholics or Protestants as sects. And I'm a native-born American. People of other faiths ,living in different cultures just are not going to have the same narrower understanding of the word "nun" the way you do. It jyst means "female priest". Heck, there arent even technically priests in Proestant faiths, correct? Those are actually "pastors" - but I use the terms interchangebaly. Laziness, perhaps, but its not a critical distinction for my purposes.Aziz P.https://www.blogger.com/profile/11825546047253660903noreply@blogger.com