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Katharine Jefferts Schori: A failed mental state

Katharine Jefferts Schori: A failed mental state

By Alice C. Linsley
Special to VIRTUEONLINE
www.virtueonline.org
November 27, 2015

Katherine Jefferts Schori has opined that Islam, Judaism and Christianity are "Abrahamic faiths" and are therefore on an equal footing. However, Islam claims that it is not like Judaism and Christianity. Consider this teaching of Islam: "Asserting one's religion does not mean that you simply leave people to worship whatever they please without comment, like the Christians and the Jews do. It means that you must clearly and plainly disapprove of what they worship, and show enmity towards the disbelievers; failing this there is no assertion of Islam." (From Al Wala' wa'l Bara by Muhammad Sa'eed Al Qahtani) Al-wala' wa'l-bara is an Arabic term meaning "loyalty and disavowal" and it refers to Islamic loyalty toward fellow Muslims, and enmity toward Non-Muslims.

Katharine likely never heard about that in the politically correct educational environments where she earned her degrees: Stanford University, Oregon State University, and the Church Divinity School of the Pacific in Berkeley. On paper and in practice, Schori is 100% politically correct... and dead wrong when it come to her understanding of Islam.

Under Schori's leadership the Episcopal Church sought to embrace diversity. This extended to equality for homosexuals and partnerships with Muslims. The GLBT agenda received full support from the President. In a December 2011 press release, the White House Press Secretary wrote, "The struggle to end discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) persons is a global challenge, and one that is central to the United States commitment to promoting human rights."

Jon Stryker, one of Obama's top bundlers for his 2012 re-election campaign, created the Arcus Foundation as a way to promote LGBT rights. Among the recipients of Arcus grants was the Episcopal Diocese of Chicago's Chicago Consultation. In March 2014, it announced plans to use funding to build LGBT understanding and acceptance by organizing a third gathering for LGBT activists and high-level Anglican leaders from Africa and elsewhere. Another Arcus recipient was the Yvette A. Flunder Foundation which seeks to build a "coalition of 20 LGBT-inclusive clergy" in Rwanda, Zimbabwe and Kenya. Flunder is the black lesbian founder of Refuge Ministries and the senior pastor of her church in Oakland, California.

In addition to the LGBT agenda, the Episcopal Church has encouraged conversations about immigration. In February 2009 faith leaders gathered in Washington D.C. to urge the U.S. government to reform immigration. Among them were the Rev. Simon Bautista Betances, Latino missioner of the Episcopal Diocese of Washington, and Remziya Suleyman. Suleyman is the director of public policy at the American Center for Outreach, a Tennessee-based organization that seeks to build stronger connections between the government and the Muslim community, while also supporting immigration reform and religious freedom. She organizes against anti-Sharia state laws and offers support to Muslims seeking to build mosques in locations where they have encountered opposition. In 2012 Suleyman's work at the American Center for Outreach played an important role in getting out the vote among the estimated 63,000 Muslims living in Tennessee.

The Episcopal Church also initiated non-evangelistic outreach through "partnerships" with Muslims. In 2010 the former building used by the Church of the Good Shepherd in Binghamton, New York was sold to local Muslims for $50,000. This amount was three times less than what the departing Christians had offered to pay for their building. As soon as they took possession, the Muslims used a crane to remove the cross and erected a sign that reads, "Islamic Awareness Center." The mosque's website proclaims this: "The Holy Prophet (May Allah's peace and blessings be upon him) has said that he who purifies himself in his house and then walks to one of the houses of Allah for performing an obligatory act, one step of his will wipe out his sins and another step will exalt his status in paradise."

In 2014 the Episcopal Diocese of Connecticut (ECCT), under the direction of Bishop Ian T. Douglas, sold one of its church properties to the Farmington Valley American Muslim Center, Inc. (FVAMC) for $1.1 million. The net income from the sale will be returned to the Missionary Society of ECCT. Douglas, wrote, "The initiation of this partnership with the Farmington Valley American Muslim Center is an incredible gift to us a Christians, because when we come into conversation with the religious 'other' it helps us to speak even more clearly about our own faith in the Triune God." The initiative of the Diocese of Connecticut includes refugee resettlement and partnering with interfaith coalitions.

The Episcopal National Cathedral in Washington, D.C. hosted Muslim prayers on the 100th anniversary of the last Caliph's call for Jihad against non-Muslims. The co-organizers of the event at the National Cathedral included the Council on Islamic-American Relations (CAIR), the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), the Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC), and the All-Dulles Area Muslims Society (ADAMS) Center. All of these group have ties to the Muslim Brotherhood. A prominent leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, Yusuf al-Qaradawi, has said that the "killing of apostates is essential for Islam to survive."

Jefferts Schori's Phony Gospel

Schori does not believe Romans 10:9: "because if you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved." She does not believe that Muslims need the Gospel of Christ. Speaking of Hindu, Buddhist and Muslim spiritual leaders she has said, "If I deny they have access to God...then it is a sin against the Holy Spirit." How very PC! Yet the Gospel makes it clear that all have access to God through Jesus Christ, the long-awaited Righteous Ruler who overcame death. The expectation of his coming is older than all these religions. It was the "monomyth" of the archaic world, to use Joseph Campbell's term.

Though Messianic expectation was preserved in the Hebrew Scriptures, it is older than Judaism. The core of the Christian Faith can be traced to the Messianic expectation of Abraham's Proto-Saharan ancestors (c. 5000-3000 BC). Paul expressed the true nature of the Abrahamic faith in Romans 4: "Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness." What was it that Abraham believed? He believed the Edenic Promise (Genesis 3:15) that God's son would be born of a woman of his own people, and that Son would be offered up and would overcome death by death. This ancient expectation of the Habiru (Hebrew) Horites is the very heart of the Christian Gospel.

Hinduism, Jainism, Buddhism, Daoism, Zoroastrianism and Judaism emerged in the Axial Age (approximately 900 - 200 BC). It was a time of radical change that swept the globe from Japan and China to Iberia and Gaul, and from the Alps to North Africa. The authority of "deified" (divinely appointed) rulers was questioned. Criticism arose of the nobility's abuse of the populace. Daoism emerged with its tendency toward carefree anarchy, laissez faire government, and sympathy with the common man. The Indo-Aryans were by now fully entrenched in northern India. Babylon was conquered by Cyrus the Great whose policies of religious tolerance encouraged new developments in Judea. Castes remained, but instead of being itinerant, as many of the lower castes (tanners, potters) were, they settled on the outskirts of cities. Many ancient gods were replaced by urban gods, such as the "city god" Ch'eng Huang, who presided over civic affairs. The older henotheism survived but under the guise of Hebrew monotheism. Non-theistic religions appeared, as did atheism among some of the Pre-Socratic philosophers, such as Heraclitus. In India, the earlier Horite foundation of the Vedas, with it messianic message, was submerged under an increasingly complex polytheism.

Islam began as a secret cult around 622 AD and it can be argued that Mohammad would never have succeeded in imposing his religion had the Axial Age not happened. The time was right for the overthrow of the traditions of the Arabian peoples and the casting down of their long-established ruling lines. After capturing Mecca in 630 A.D., Mohammad delivered this speech:

"Bear in mind that every claim of privilege, whether that of blood or property is abolished...I reject all claims relating to life and property and all imaginary honors of the past, and declare them to be baseless... A Muslim is the brother of another Muslim and all the Muslims are brothers of one another and constitute one hand as against the non-Muslims." (From The Message, by Ayatullah Ja'far Subhani)

Quran 61:9 states, "He it is who has sent His Messenger (Mohammad) with guidance and the religion of truth (Islam) to make it victorious over all religions even though the infidels may resist."

The Quran contains 109 verses that call Muslims to war against non-Muslims in order to advance Islamic rule globally. Some include commands to chop off heads and fingers. Terrorist acts are encouraged Quran 8:57 commands, "If thou comest on them in the war, deal with them so as to strike fear in those who are behind them, that haply they may remember."

Jefferts Schori plans to continue preaching apostasy

Many Anglicans were thrilled when Schori announced her decision not to seek re-election. However, as a retired bishop her intentions are to "continue to engage us in becoming a more fully diverse church, spreading the gospel among all sorts and conditions of people, and wholeheartedly devoted to God's vision of a healed and restored creation." Her words echo the Charter of the United Religions Initiative (URI), founded in 1995 by Episcopal Bishop William Swing. In its Charter, the URI describes itself as "a growing global community dedicated to promoting enduring, daily interfaith cooperation, ending religiously motivated violence and creating cultures of peace, justice and healing for the Earth and all living beings..."

As with the leaders of the URI, Schori consistently overlooks and excuses Islamic violence. At the same time she finds it necessary to portray Jesus as a Hell's Angel "Gang Leader" and describes encounters with God as experiences of being choked. (See http://www.virtueonline.org/pb-jefferts-schoris-violent-images-god-son-god-hells-angel) She would have us believe that Christianity is no better than Islam and that Christians also commit acts of terrorism. She casts Christianity, Judaism and Islam as "Abrahamic" and she belittles Abraham. At a 2009 interfaith conference in Omaha Schori was asked who Abraham was. Mary Ann Mueller, reporting on this event, recorded Jefferts Schori's response. She said that Abraham offered his wife Sarah to the king rather than get in trouble himself. That's it! Nothing more. Her response stunned and baffled many in the crowd.

Schori labels Judaism, Christianity and Islam as "Abrahamic faiths" on the most superficial basis possible: what she calls "a broad vision" of peace and justice (shalom or salaam). She insists that peace happens when Muslims and Christians alike are submitted to God, but she fails to make the important distinction between Allah and the God and Father of Jesus Christ. Islam teaches that Muslims are to kill for the sake of Allah. Islamic extremists regard themselves as the true practitioners of Islam because they are willing to sacrifice their lives to destroy Western civilization in order to replace it with Islamic rule. Consider these words of the Islamic theologian Syed Abul A'ala Maududi:

"Islam wishes to destroy all states and government anywhere on the face of the earth which are opposed to the ideology and program of Islam regardless of the country or the nation which rules it. The purpose of Islam is to set up a state on the basis of its own ideology and program."

The God and Father of Jesus Christ reveals the true path of peace through reconciliation with our Creator through the blood of Jesus. "And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy. For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross." (Colossians 1:18-20)

Alice C. Linsley teaches World Religions and Philosophy at Midway University in Central Kentucky

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