Why Do They Hate Us?
Like the rest of the country, I’m reeling from news of the terrorist attack at the Boston Marathon and the follow-up spree of violence and subsequent manhunt. I keep flashing back to September 11, 2001, when I like most Americans sat glued to the television trying to absorb news that was unabsorbable. Now, almost twelve years later, the cloud of fear and apprehension has descended again on the United States.
I was in China the day of the marathon, on the last leg of a trip that took my wife and me first to Malaysia, then to Beijing and Shanghai. Friends and family were concerned about our safety in view of saber-rattling in North Korea and reports of a new bird flu epidemic in China. Little did we know that the U. S. was the more vulnerable place.
It’s a different experience, hearing about tragedy from another country, especially one like China which tightly controls the news and blocks access to Facebook. The Chinese press understandably focused on the graduate student from China killed in the bomb blast. To most of the world, what happens in the U. S. seems very far away. Three people died watching a race—meanwhile 42 died in Iraq bombings, scores died in Syria, and yet another mine collapsed in China. To those of us Americans, however, it feels like a kick in the gut, wherever we are, and waves of helplessness and fear wash over.
Like a bipolar magnet, the United States attracts and repels with equal force. While I was traveling, the Gallup organization reported that 150 million people would like to move permanently to the U. S., triple the number who chose either of the next two countries on the list (the U. K. and Canada). Yet the U. S. also attracts hostility that sometimes boils over into acts of terrorism. Why do they hate us so?
I heard a British historian answer that question with a shrug. “You’re the top dog. Look at the history of conquest and colonialism. Romans, Germans, French, Dutch, Italians, Spanish, Portuguese, Mongols, Persians, Russians, British—they all took turns ruling large parts of the world, and they all inspired hatred. It goes with the territory, especially if you’re rich.” Others have a more sinister view: a majority of the world and a huge majority in the Middle East and Central Asia blame “US policies and actions in the world” for inciting terrorist attacks.
Traveling overseas, I had plenty of opportunity to think about the strengths and weaknesses of my country. It occurs to me that both trace back to our love of freedom, the transcendent value that inspired our founders to pledge their lives, their fortunes, and sacred honor.
Much of the world views freedom with suspicion, focusing on its dark side. As they see it, Americans have the freedom to own assault rifles that kill innocent children; to pollute the Internet, magazines, music, video games, and movies with pornography and violence; to allow greedy bankers to wreak economic havoc; to proselytize anyone of another religion; to divorce and abort at will, undermining family systems; to gobble up natural resources while billions live in squalor.
A Muslim nation like Malaysia prefers control. Converting a Malay from Islam to Christianity is a serious crime. Movies are so strictly censored that on a Malaysia Airlines flight I watched a movie in which a statue of Cupid had its backside blurred out. “We are attracted to what we most fear,” said one thoughtful Muslim. “Imagine what decadent American culture represents to a young Muslim who, outside his family, has never seen a woman’s knee, or even her face.”
As for China, it seems caught in a schizophrenic transition, with its women wearing the latest mini-skirted fashions and the bright lights and seductions of consumer capitalism out-dazzling anything in the West, even as the government clamps down on Google and Facebook and continues to persecute Christians and other religions in the hinterlands.
Salman Rushdie said the true battle of history is fought not between rich and poor, or socialist and capitalist, but between what he termed the epicure and the puritan. The pendulum of society swings back and forth between “Anything goes,” and “Oh, no you don’t!” Radical Islam swings one way; what its advocates see as the decadent West swings another. On a beach in Malaysia I saw female Saudi tourists in full burqa garb, covered in black except for eye slits, strolling next to bikini-clad European tourists.
As an American, I felt better about our recent fractious election when I read the government-controlled newspapers in the buildup to Malaysia’s coming election. The same party has held power since independence in 1956 and newspapers had at least 40 pages of bald propaganda about how great the party is with scant mocking mention of the opposition. In China I had to read between the lines to guess at the truth behind the bird-flu scare and the perils of pollution (1.2 million Chinese die prematurely each year from exposure to outdoor air pollution). I get tired of all the lawyer ads on U.S. television, but wouldn’t trade them for a country that has virtually no consumer rights. And unless you’ve spent time in a country where corruption is endemic, you can’t really appreciate our ability to get a driver’s license, get accepted in university, or start a business without paying a substantial bribe.
The world increasingly faces the challenge of how to govern a pluralistic society in which some members cling to traditional values and find other subcultures positively offensive. Not so long ago, most Islamic nations were championing the ideal of a secular state. Now, fundamentalists are on the rise, vigorously resisting cardinal values of the West such as human rights, democracy, sexual equality, capitalism, a scientific worldview, religious pluralism. Witness the murders committed against health workers who are vaccinating children against polio or against girls simply trying to get an education.
Meanwhile in the U.S., counter-cultural Christians face the challenge of living in a secular society which trumpets contrary values and is growing increasingly hostile to those who oppose them.
Freedom has always been a risky proposition. It astonishes me that God entrusted us with that gift, in view of our appalling abuse of freedom throughout history–beginning in Genesis, continuing to the present dark day, and including even the killing of God’s own Son.
The United States shines as a beacon to those who lack freedom, even as it represents a threat to those who fear it. A few decades ago, just as China was emerging from the tyranny of Maoism, someone asked a Chinese general, “What is your opinion of the French and American revolutions?” He thought for a moment on his own nation’s tumultuous history, spanning 7000 years, and replied, “Too early to tell.”
God, bless America. We need it at such a perilous time.
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About Philip Yancey
For Yancey, reading offered a window to a different world. So, he devoured books that opened his mind, challenged his upbringing, and went against what he had been taught. A sense of betrayal engulfed him.
Hi, Mr. Yancey. I’m one of the people who posted a comment on your past article, “International grace” on 2/16/11. I looked back my posting and realized that what I’m struggling with hasn’t changed. My church life here in America has never been easy since. But I have been to church on and off.
American Christian churches’ seemingly general ongoing mixture of worshipping the Lord and the sate/esp. military can make me feel like suffocating. Almost no church members and pastors seem to question about this and see this as idol-worshipping so that it is sinful. Even some of them would see a person like me as unbiblical and would like to expel a person like me. But still they blindly believe they ARE the Christians.
As I wrote in my last post, they seem to be always right.
Because they are right and ‘faithful Christians,’ God is always on their side.
I think this is one of the factors why the world hates America.
I was shocked at yesterday’s service, when I assume so many preachers in the U.S. preached that Christians should respect and honor men and women in the uniform. But what shocked me was more than that. Our pastor repeatedly said in his sermon that the soldiers fought and died for American Christians’ freedom, freedom to read the Bible, freedom to come to church and freedom to spread the Gospel. My jaws almost dropped off. Are all the soldiers Christians? Does/Did the U.S. government order the troops to fight for the Christians’ freedom? It was so disappointing to hear such preaching.
I understand that I should tolerate so many unpleasant, ‘ungrace’-kind of things to hear in this secular world. But what I struggle with is I have to hear something that doesn’t accord to what Jesus wants us to know, be and do from church leaders, relishing with Word of God or even in the name of God.
Somehow many people in this country (maybe in other countries, too) seem to believe in a religion called America. Just like other religions, this religion seems to bear ‘un-grace’ while Christianity reveals grace. Whether those who believe in this are Christians or not, they often seem blindfolded and they do not care about what the rest of the world sees them and still see themselves always righteous. Already being a top-dog, the U.S. may have some more reasons to be unfavored by rest of the world.
Thank you, Mr. Yancey, for understanding and kindness in response to my comment. I have my “soapbox moments” and the writing gets messy, like life. I appreciate your kind apology, the pain (physical aside) in hearing this type of preaching cuts me deep inside, but not for myself as much as for what the church in this country seems to be, for the harm it is doing in the world, for the lies about who God really is; how vast and big and incomprehensible our God really is.
Here I am, Sunday morning, I have been awake since 4am. I want to go to church. I don’t want to go to church. I want to go, and worship God without demanding a healing, without reminding Him of the ways He is supposed to behave, without the preacher preaching their ideas and doctrine and theology and being so unaware that it is an icon . They tell me I want the perfect church, I don’t think so. I want to worship with people who know how BIG God is, how small we are. I want a church that introduces people to our living God, one that allows Him to do His work in us; one not afraid to say that sometimes life stinks, it hurts, I hurt, I don’t have the answers but here…here…is God. I want a church that does not try to define Him in 3 points, a church that does not attempt to diminish God to my understanding or elevate me to His level (I am a friend of God…repeat 22 times and call it a worship song), but one that points to Him, and, as C.S.Lewis writes of, encourages me to invite the great iconoclast to work in my live life.
For starters, this is what I want.
It is this God alone that will sustain us and give us joy when we live with poverty and abuse and abundance and everything in between the two and when our child dies and when our spouse experiences flashbacks of war, and when our daily life is pain. Ask me how I know. It is this God, the big one, the Creator and Redeemer I seek, and know that even then, my understanding is an icon!
OK, soapbox over, I step down! Thanks for being a pointer to Him, your writing is a hand to hold along the way.
I have been trying for several days to write you in a way that would communicate the experience I am, once again, living through. This may not be appropriate for your comments here, no harm by not approving it.
I am just short of my 60th birthday and have not had a day without some amount of pain in at least 15 years. My spine, cervical to sacral, has decided to wage war against me living a normal life, I am now deciding on having my 5th and 6th surgeries, or stopping here. Each one helps for a bit, each one causes further damage. There are people worse than me, I am worse (pain wise, but not limited to pain!) than others.
I am a Christian, though that word has become harder for me to admit to, not because of fear of identification with Christ, but instead, with the religion.
I am reading your book on pain for about the 5th time. “Where is God When It Hurts?” has been a lifesaver, a warm comforter to curl up with, a friend to sit by me and encourage me since a pastor shared his battered copy with me 9 years ago.
Quite bluntly, I have to fight resentment and even hate feelings **gasp** frequently at the Christianity being promoted in our country. I love my country, I love the Lord, but I have to tell you I am about fed up with walking in churches with my walker (which I am so blessed to be able to run into a discount store and purchase and have mobility!) and being looked at as though it is a symbol of sin in my life, as happened as little as 2 weeks ago. The preacher stood there and said God wants to heal everyone and if He is not healing you it is because of something standing in the way, that in his experience, people who are not healed are grumblers and complainers who need to get over it so God will step in and heal. It was a long walk to the exit. I felt the weight of the eyes of judgement and speculation added to the weight of my body!
He also went on to proclaim that God wants everyone to be rich, prosperous and blessed financially so we can go out and bless others. He stated he is not a prosperity preacher, he is a truth preacher.
Why does every denomination and most preachers seem to think that they have the REAL understanding of the Bible? If you disagree with me, you disagree with God and His Word? It is not just my God that I want you to know, it is not just Jesus Christ, and Him crucified that I am sharing, it is my understanding and I understand everything and what I understand is the truth and if you don’t agree with me you don’t agree with God and His Word.
What is the response when this teaching goes to China, and Peru and all over the world as is the plan of this man (please understand, this is my latest encounter, not my only, with this teaching.) and his wife? Is this really the message we are to bring around the world? Are we really supposed to be preaching our culture and thoughts and values to people who have need of a Christ we can cling to even when (especially when) there is no healing and prosperity and relief of pain or even a drug store to walk in and buy a new set of wheels?
So now I can move on to another church, maybe the one with the split between the pastor and the assistant pastor..oh, now I have two choices..and the same split divided families because only sinners went with the pastor according to the asst. pastor, and only visa versa. Because, of course, each on had THE TRUTH. I could go on, I won’t.
I agree with you that we are NOT supposed to have all the answers. No one has all the truth. We live in a world full of broken and fallen pieces and the question is not as much “why”, as what will I do with it? Telling the world that their poverty and sickness and lack of wealth and healing is a sign of their sinfulness is a great way to spread hate, don’t you think?
America was founded on the Godly ideals of freedom and equality as reflected in the Declaration of Independence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Four score and seven years later, Abraham Lincoln famously revisited the theme. America’s founding fathers had, he said, “brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.”
These ideals are, of course, good—but they are so easily twisted into something that isn’t good at all. Whilst the freedom that America seems to embody is in many ways tantalising, I respectfully suggest that it is a distorted version of the original. It isn’t the kind of freedom symbolised by the garden within which Adam and Eve were free to roam; that freedom was to be enjoyed in the context of God’s welcome company and providential care. Rather, it appears to be a counterfeit freedom focused on self as a substitute for God—a freedom represented by the forbidden fruit of which Adam and Eve took lustful bites to their (and our) harm.
The Bible teaches that real freedom is freedom from self to love God and neighbour, not freedom for self to the exclusion of God and neighbour. It seems to me that Life, Liberty and Happiness are not to be pursued as ends in themselves. No, God is to be the focal point of our pursuit—and life, liberty and happiness are to be received gratefully as by-products of that pursuit. America’s founding ideals have this wrong. Though they are derived from God, they effectively oust God in the name of a false, godlike Self whose chief end is Life, Liberty and Happiness. God is invited along for the ride—“God bless America!”—but only as the enabler of America’s quest for a fully actualized, even divine, Self.
One of the results of this elevated self-view is, frankly, arrogance on the international stage. There is much to like about America, but its deep-seated belief that it is, in President Obama’s words, “the last, best hope on earth,” probably isn’t among its most likeable characteristics. Too many Americans have a swagger about them. Americans are known the world over as “loud.” Hand-on-heart pride in one’s country is fine, but chest-thumping, condescending egotism is just plain unattractive—and ungodly. Maybe this super-confidence has something to do with why people who hate America do so with such conviction? I hasten to add, I’m not one of them.
I think God yearns to bless America, but is America willing to lay down its quest for an aggrandized Self, clothe itself in humility and start pursuing God as an end in himself? Life, liberty and happiness are abundantly available in God, the only true Source of freedom in the universe.
The Old Testament Attitude to Homosexuality
Gordon J Wenham *
Expository Times 102 (1991): 259-363.
[Reproduced by permission]
Back
* The College of St Paul and St Mary, Cheltenham
That the Old Testament condemns homosexual acts is well known. Why it does so is a mystery. Various suggestions have been put forward. Driver and Miles[1] for example held that it was a development parallel to that in Mesopotamian law. The older Laws of Hammurapi do not mention the offence, whereas the Middle Assyrian laws condemn it. They suggested that a similar development occurred in Hebrew law. The earlier laws do not discuss homosexuality, while the latest (P) texts demand the death sentence for it (Lev 18:22, 20:13). Similarly Coleman[2] tries to derive the biblical attitude from the attitude of other nations, specifically the Egyptians. Indeed he suggests there was a common Semitic consensus opposing homosexual practice.
Now it cannot be ruled out a priori that the Old Testament shared its neighbours’ attitudes to homosexuality. There does seem to have been a large measure of agreement in the ancient world as far as heterosexuality was concerned. Marriage law and
[p.360]
customs, for example, the repudiation of pre-marital intercourse and adultery, the acceptance of polygamy and divorce, seem to be much the same throughout all those Near Eastern cultures for which evidence is available.[3] The most obvious difference between Israel and its neighbours as far as heterosexual morality is concerned lies in the area of incest. Here the Old Testament rules,[4] forbidding union with consanguines and affines of the first and second-degree, go much farther than their neighbours, who sometimes even countenanced unions of consanguines of the first degree, e.g. brother and sister. So it could be that in repudiating homosexual practice the Old Testament is simply adopting the attitudes of surrounding nations.
However the evidence at present available suggests that this is not the case. The Old Testament rejection of all kinds of homosexual practice is apparently unique in the ancient world. Most of the ancient Near East adopted an attitude to ….. [excess content removed]
[…] on the tragedy in Boston, Philip Yancey points out that Western worldviews run counter to those of Islamic fundamentalism: “The pendulum […]
This is an excellent blog with a fine analysis of a multivariate problem. Looking at this as an American who has lived in Ecuador for more than a decade, I can say that on an individual level the U.S. is quite popular as a place most Latins would like to visit or live. Many have relatives who live in the U.S. and look on America with a smile.
However, on a political level the U.S. is quite unpopular in Latin America. There are many reasons for this (e.g., trade imbalances, U.S. military presence, or pollution from American companies’ irresponsible oil drilling practices, to name but three) but there is also the politically useful truth that there is nothing that can unite a fractured society or group of countries like a common enemy.
Americans used to roll their eyes at Hugo Chávez, for example, when he tried to blame the U.S. for the earthquake in Haiti in 2010 and accused the U.S. of wanting to invade and militarily occupy Haiti, or when he hinted in 2011 that the U.S. gives cancer to South American leaders (like himself), or even that first capitalism, then imperialism, had arrived and dried up water on the planet Mars, but those comments (and others) were intended to be politically useful.
In a less ridiculous fashion (but with great Latin fervor), Ecuador’s president Rafael Correa has referred to the U.S. as Imperialist Yankees and has repeatedly taken the opportunity to criticize the U.S. to the press. From a political standpoint, such South American leaders find the U.S. government to be a very convenient scapegoat, for again, a common enemy to blame for one’s ills is an effective political tool for uniting people.
Historically, it strikes me that every country around the globe, both now and down throughout history, has always had the goal of working towards self-interest. That is simply human nature. So if that means that one nation takes advantage of another, so be it. If the tables of fortune were turned, and the underdog became the top dog, the new top dog would take advantage of the old one. That’s how things go.
Thus the British historian quoted is quite right that the top dog is always hated – it goes with the territory.
When the top dog is knocked off by another, the new top dog becomes the target of envy and hatred. After all, do old former top dogs like Rome, Egypt, Greece or the Ottomans still inspire the same hatred and envy today that they must have inspired when in their prime so many moons ago? Look at what happened a half millennia ago in what is now Mexico: the Aztecs were widely hated by their subjugated neighbors, but when the Spanish conquistadors destroyed the Aztec empire (with the help of many who were only too happy to dethrone the Aztecs), the conquistadors became the new bad guys.
When the day comes that the U.S. is no longer the top dog or perhaps not even in the top group (and it will happen, if history is any guide to the fate of nations), I suspect that politically the U.S. will cease to be such a political whipping boy in many countries.
BTW, I enjoyed not just the fine article but reading the informed comments by others living abroad in response to it…
Excellent read, loved the post. As usual, you stretch the mind and educate. While we must take responsibility for our flaws and how they affect the world around us, the best answer I’ve heard as to why Radical Islam hates us came from Bin Laden himself;
“We love death. The US loves life. That is the difference between us two.”
Nice article Philip. Boy, big question. I must admit, I think the guy who said it’s because we’re the top dog is pretty close to accurate. Why does a teenager hate loving parents? Everyone who is miserable seeks to find someone to blame for his or her misery. The US is hardly perfect, but we are hardly to blame for all the worlds ills. I am continually incredulous at the level of irony in the writings of those who would blame America for being clumsy, self-interested, arrogant, judgmental, etc, as many have done in responding to your article. These people judge a time and place in American history (e.g. Philadelphia, circa 1789) far more harshly than they would blame Islamic terrorist for blowing up the world trade center. They fail to realize that their are many ways to read history. Sure you can say that America was built on the backs of slave labor and that our forefathers failed when they did not set the slaves free when they wrote the Constitution, and perhaps you would be correct. But you can also say that our forefathers, through the founding of this nation based on the principles of freedom, laid the foundation for the ultimate freeing of the slaves, women’s suffrage, and an unprecedented level of prosperity that has extended to a significant portion of the world. And you can judge Truman for dropping the bomb on Hiroshima. But it wasn’t your son or husband or brother who was going to die trying to invade the Japanese homeland. My goal here is not to justify anyone; I certainly am not trying to defend slavery! I guess what I’m saying is, judge not, let you be judged! Jesus didn’t say it’s okay to judge the rich and powerful, just make sure you don’t judge the poor and weak. He said, don’t judge. I’m not sure the important question is why they hate us. We should always seek to improve as a people and a country regardless of why they hate us. However, I’m not sure that we should be guided by the question of why they hate us to determine how we should improve. A parent should always seek to be the best parent possible and yes we can look at our kids to a certain degree to get a gauge on how we’re doing, but we might be great parents and still have kids that hate us. They hate us because Christ is not yet all, in all and their is still evil in the world. And as long as that is the case, there will always be hatred in the world. Yes we have much to improve upon as a nation, but the hatred of other nations and peoples is hardly a barometer for determining how we’re doing. Christ was perfect and yet he was hated. The best thing we can do is not hate them back.
Amidst all of these tragedies, I keep remembering Jesus’ words about how ‘they will know you by your love’ and how rarely that happens, in terms of the news media.
They hate us because we do hateful things, all the while declaring our virtue.
Wonderfully written. However, misses a few small things. Such as, how American ‘freedoms’ have always come at others’ expense, beginning with native peoples from whom the continent was stolen, violently. Secondly, the continuing over-valuing of ‘American lives’ as against lesser humans. And you forgot to mention the 30 nobodies blown up in Mogadishu on the same day. Are ‘free’ people just worth more than the rest of humanity? That alone might serve to explain “why they hate us”.
Hi Philip,
I’ve lived outside of the US for 12 years — in Japan, a strong US ally. At the same time, I’ve mingled with a lot of foreigners from English-speaking allies (Brits, Aussies, Kiwis, etc.). Possibly most important, I was overseas during most of the years G.W.Bush was president.
“Why do they hate us?” I would answer with a quote I heard somewhere, that “The US doesn’t have friends, it has interests.”
It may sound harsh and is probably difficult for us to recognize (let alone admit), but a lot of the world feels this very acutely. Even among allies.
Here in Japan there is the witness of Hiroshima & Nagasaki, as well as the loud presence of war machines in Okinawa that makes many on the island feel like the occupation never ended for them. Others remember the immense pressure Bush put on Primer Minister Koizumi after the 9/11 attacks to come to the US and pledge financial support, and later even military support that stretching the legal limits of Japan’s pacifist constitution — a document itself ironically drafted by the American occupation — and thus bolstering the Japanese rightwing nationalism that angers the rest of Asia.
The bottom line? It seems to be that for Japan, the principles that America helped Japan re-build upon were less important than getting support for America’s military interests under the Bush administration. And again, there is the ever-present shock and pain when we hear Americans defend the atomic bombing by saying, “It saved millions of American lives.”
America was built on great written principles, but the world sees that these are often set aside if it is in America’s interest. Supporting “friendly” dictators who oppress their own people. The covert wars of the CIA. Drone strikes. Economic sanctions and uneven trade agreements.
America’s own internal history bears the same witness. King spoke of how he wanted America to “cash the check” the forefathers had written but had never paid to black people. And perhaps more than any other people, Native Americans exist as living proof that we simply cannot allow the lofty speech of the founding fathers to get in the way of our own pursuit of life, our own liberty and our own happiness. (I wonder how many who have studied about the Trail of Tears are able to stand seeing Andrew Jackson’s face on the $20 bill?)
Since the beginning, as a nation we have had great ideas and great words, and sometimes as a nation we act on them… if it’s in our national interest. Our ideas versus our interests underline not only the injustices the nation was founded on (against Blacks and Native Americans), but the same disharmony also underlines the Revolutionary War: lofty words spoken about freedom and tyranny, but fundamentally the issue underneath was about money (high taxes). Even Jefferson would have left Christ’s “Give unto Caesar” teaching in his cut-up gospel, but for the sake of the national interest in money, he and the other founding fathers set aside Christ’s teaching and decided that high taxation was reason enough to take up arms and take lives (even British Christian lives).
Most of the world clearly sees the disharmony between our ideas and our actions… even while being seduced by our prosperity. And when they can’t see it, often they can feel it. Sometimes there is a rational understanding, and other times there is an irrational hatred. But even in the latter case, often it is borne out of pain — such as American drone strikes killing 176 children in Pakistan.
My hope and my prayer is that the church will remove the garment of the Old Glory from herself (because it is not righteous) and wear only the righteousness of Christ instead. I pray that the church can be an intercessory force, people standing in the gap to be peacemakers, identifying with the suffering, but also identifying with the guilty and repenting as Daniel did to God for his people’s idolatry. I take comfort in reading that the “two witnesses” of Revelation prophesy to the nations “clothed in sackcloth”– in the garments of repentance.
Bless you in His grace,
Ramone Romero
Osaka, Japan
As an Indonesian who lives abroad, I somehow got the impression from other people of my country as a violent, dangerous, poor and sort of primitive, which is no wonder as the news hovering outside are only the negative ones, on how the radical Moslems terrorize our country with bombs, violence as well as open confrontations in public or media. Living as a Christian in the biggest Moslem country in the world is never easy, but again, since when is living as a minority ever easy? Regardless the fact that Indonesia acknowledges 5 officil religions, however the minority religion practicians never really stand too much a chance to enter politics, or even honest open debate on how we are wrongly discriminated in any aspect of life. However, regardless the increasing heat on religious and racial differences in Indonesia, we are still grateful for the opportunity to practice our belief, go to church regularly and celebrate Christian holidays. Currently living in abroad in a country with less religion strictness, somehow I am relieved, yet worried at the same time. Relieved that I see less “terrorism-related” bad news, yet worried of other aspect. Now I realize, what scare me the most is not the terror from other religious beliefs. I’m more terrified of the state of Godlessness that I see day to day. I’m horrified imagining the society and the culture that my children will have to live in, where people are rude, violent, selfish and Godless. Somehow, I suddenly miss Indonesia…
Spent time living in Israel many years ago. Surrounded by Islamic states. Read the book “O, Jerusalem” in Jerusalem. Aware of the militant aggressiveness that led to many mistakes in dealing with their neighbors–BUT aware of the fundamental clash of cultures/ideologies there. Peace sure seems unlikely and that powder keg keeps the entire world on edge. Throw in the US support of Israel and the other issues Yancey mentioned and we will NEVER be secure from terrorist plots.
This resonated with me particularly as we lived overseas for a number of years and were overseas when 9/11 occurred. We had the same response from relatives – “aren’t you coming home?” My reply was, “The US is where this is happening. We’re as safe here as there.” And that is the new reality. There is no safe place on earth. Our only safety is in being where God wants us and leaving our lives in his hands.