The Path Back to 9-11

So I watched The Path to 911. It appears that whether the general drift of the story is correct or not, some of the details were not. This is unfortunate, because the inaccuracies become the focus and any central truths get lost. Reaction from the left was predictable, and I believe Dennis Prager hit the nail on the head. Clinton administration defenders who decry the film are being hopelessly narcissistic. The film was NOT about them. It was about the terrorists and the fact that we as a nation, collectively, were inexcusably blind to the threat, including the early days of the Bush administration.

What the film portrayed accurately was that Islamic radicals attempted and failed to destroy the World Trade Center in 1993 and continued through the entire eight years of the Clinton administration to plot and execute terrorist attacks. It did document the acknowledged fact that numerous inadequacies made the attacks possible, from lack of communication and outright competition between agencies as well as clueless indifference. It also documented that there were opportunities to get Bin Laden, though the details may have been condensed and “fictionalized" in the film.

As I watched, my one hope was that people would remember who the enemy is. My hope was that folks would understand once again that there is a significant threat from individuals and groups who wish to see a Taliban-like regime instituted worldwide, with Sharia law as the norm and they are willing and ready and willing to commit mass murder to see this goal accomplished. That was my hope. I fear it is a false hope.

Reading today that Rosie O'Donnell can compare Christian fundametnalists to the Islamic terrorists on network television was disturbing enough, though nothing surprises me anymore.
Her specific words included,

“Radical Christianity is just as threatening as radical Islam in a country like America where we have separation of church and state."

“…as a result of the attack and the killing of nearly 3,000 innocent people we invaded two countries and killed innocent people”

When challenged that Christians are not threatening mass murder on anyone here or abroad, she continued “…we are bombing innocent people in other countries. True or false?"

Reading the words online was maddening. Watching the clip was worse. Because the studio audience applauded! Significant numbers of Americans apparently agree that “radical Christianity” is equivalent to radical Islam!

Clearly, there is no clue out there what the war on terror is really about. Yes there have been isolated cases of folks who claim Christianity doing destructive things like bombing abortion clinics and killing abortion doctors. But there is absolutely nothing else that comes close to a comparison between Islamic terrorism and Christianity. There are no Christian church leaders that I am aware of advocating mass murder. Nor does the U.S. Government or the U.S. Military target civilians and no major Christian leader of ANY denomination would dream of advocating such things. That such a point even needs to be made is infuriating. The terrorists behind 9-11 intentionally targeted civilians with the intent of killing as many civilians as possible. Nothing in anything any legitimate Christian group teaches or represents compares to this. In the 9-11 attack, there was no distinction between the killing of women, children, men or military personnel, white, black, Arab, European, multi-ethnic, gay or straight. Any death was seen as a victory for Allah. This in no way compares to any American military action or the support of the war by conservative Christians.

In many places across the world those Muslims who did not participate in the attacks, supported, cheered and celebrated them. Almost no one in the Muslim community, particularly among the Muslim clergy have been willing to publicly repudiate the goals or methods of the terrorists.

There is no evidence or even any rational reason to believe that any civilian deaths caused by the war in Iraq or Afghanistan by our military were intentionally targeted, deliberate, or celebrated in this country. And the fact that the terrorists make a point of not identifying themselves by uniform as military combatants, and instead hide among civilians and use them as shields demonstrates both that they have no regard for human life that would resemble anything we have long held dear and also that they are counting on the fact that we won’t target civilians to make such hiding places effective.

What in the world is behind this moral equivalency lunacy? What is it that Rosie and others on the left fear from Christianity?

The answer, I think, is absolutes. More precisely, absolutism. Those who crave absolute (!) pluralism fear any viewpoint that suggests it is true and all other views false. They fear that anyone who believes in absolute, objective truth will eventually, inevitably resort to violence, coercion, force, and state power to make sure that everyone else accepts that view. I guess they really believe that conservative Christians want to establish a militant theocracy, (which we don’t) and that we, like radical muslims, want to murder anyone who disagrees with us, which is ridiculous.

Christianity, as I have argued here before, balances absolute moral standards with compassion and forgiveness. High standards, plus unlimited grace. Christianity also values free will, even in the most Calvinist circles. Individuals are responsible and cannot, must not be coerced. Faith that is coerced is not faith. Protestant Christianity, in particular, fears absolute power as much as any other worldview in history. The fears Rosie spews are completely unfounded.

And even then, why would Rosie or anyone else fear Christianity even half as much as the extreme form of Islam, which treats women as a fraction of the value of a man, which doesn’t merely disagree with homosexuals but would execute them, and which would tolerate not a whit of the pluralism and free speech she uses to its full extent? I don’t understand how such blindness can be held with such fervency. But I guess rationality is out of style these days.

But the end result, I fear, is that we as a nation will not have the will or the understanding to defend ourselves against this threat that is more dangerous than communism or Nazi ideologies. Communists were willing to kill for their cause. Islamic radicals are willing to commit suicide for their cause. I fear 9-11 will be repeated. The terrorists will continue to be emboldened. Pluralism and multi-culturalism will continue to bend over backward to be fair to the

Khatamis of the world and will insist that pluralism and democracy mean a place at the table for Sharia law. I fear everything Western Civilization has been for centuries may well disappear within the lifetimes of our children.

There was much furor over the “Path to 9-11” For all the wrong reasons. And the main point of the film, that there is a real enemy out there and it is not our own government, has already been lost.