Does the Catholic Church Really Have An 'Islamophobia' Problem?

Out of India this week comes the harrowing story of T.J. Joseph, a professor at a Catholic college and member of the Syro Malabar Church, an Eastern Catholic Church in communion with Rome.

Ten years ago, Joseph was accused of blasphemy, whereupon a Muslim group attacked him and severed his hand. In the ensuing years, the Syro Malabar Church, aghast not at the attack but at Joseph’s alleged “Islamophobia,” fired him from his job and excommunicated him. The day after that story came out, one Jordan Denari Duffner of Georgetown University’s Hamas-linked Bridge Initiative, published a piece in the Religion News Service (RNS) claiming that Catholics have an “Islamophobia” problem. Ask T.J. Joseph what he thinks of that, Ms. Duffner.

Duffner piece focused upon the case of the Rev. Nick VanDenBroeke, about which I wrote here at PJ Media. VanDenBroeke landed in hot water when he called Islam “the greatest threat” to Christianity and the U.S., and was subsequently forced to recant and apologize by his boss, Archbishop Bernard Hebda.

“The whole incident,” says Duffner, “is reflective of a deeper problem,” which is unlikely to be something she would say about the excommunication of T.J. Joseph. No, Duffner is more worried about what she characterizes as “the discrepancy between the church’s positive official teaching on Muslims and the Islamophobia that often permeates U.S. Catholic communities and discourse.”

Duffner reminds us that “in its 1965 ‘Declaration on Non-Christian Religions,’ issued during the Second Vatican Council, the Catholic Church begins by declaring its high esteem and respect for Muslims.” She apparently would have us believe that VanDenBroeke, by identifying a threat from the religion that preaches warfare against and the subjugation of unbelievers, is demonstrating a lack of esteem and respect for Muslims. For “the most important aspect of the church’s statement about Muslims,” she says, “is the first line — the teaching that we are to treat Muslims with respect and hold them in high regard. In other words, as Catholics our default attitude toward Muslims is to be a positive one.”

Back in the real world, however, the real problem the Catholic Church has is not the spurious neologism "Islamophobia," but a fantasy-based Islamophilia that denies obvious reality and is ruthlessly enforced, as the outrages the Church committed against T.J. Joseph demonstrates, and of which Duffner’s article is an example.

Duffner is either spectacularly naive or outrageously deceptive or both; in all her writings, not just this one in RNS, she completely ignores the reality of jihad violence and the violent exhortations in the Qur’an and Sunnah. She continuously writes as if Muslims were victims of widespread discrimination and harassment in the U.S., which they are not and should not be, and that any examination of the motivating ideology behind that jihad violence is tantamount to inciting violence against innocent Muslims.

In her book Finding Jesus among Muslims: How Loving Islam Makes Me a Better Catholic, Duffner even laments the “Islamophobia” of a Christian family in Jordan she stayed with as an exchange student, claiming they picked it up from Christian television channels and not from their lived experience, which she assumes would have given them a positive impression of Islam: “Despite the fact that they lived among Muslims — who are the vast majority of the population in Jordan — my Christian host family bought into these Christian TV channels’ negative portrayals of Islam.”

Duffner also indulges in the familiar conflation of criticizing Islamic teaching or opposing jihad violence with failing to respect or esteem Muslims as human beings. The effect of this articles and the others that the Bridge Initiative churns out by the pound will be to inhibit (even more than it is already) honest discussion of the motives and goals of jihad terrorists, and of the nature of Sharia, and to stigmatize all resistance to it.

A personal note: Duffner identifies me in her RNS article as one of the “popular voices who write about Islam for Catholics.” I don’t. I write about Islam for anyone and everyone, and am relieved and grateful to say, in this fantasy- and lie-ridden age when the likes of Pope Francis and Jordan Denari Duffner are in the ascendancy, that I am not a Catholic.

“Leave them; they are blind guides. And if a blind man leads a blind man, both will fall into a pit.” (Matthew 15:14)

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Lawmakers in 9 States Move to Protect Children From LGBT ‘Transition’ Agenda

Conservative lawmakers have decided to become proactive about the transgender epidemic infiltrating the nation’s youth.

In the past couple of months, Republican lawmakers in at least nine states have introduced legislation to ban medical providers from helping boys and girls undergo a medical transition via surgery and/or hormone replacement therapy before they turn 18.

Some of the bills would make it a felony to prescribe hormones or perform related surgeries for minors.

In South Dakota, state Rep. Fred Deutsch, a Republican, spearheaded the effort. The South Dakota Legislature passed its version of the bill just this month.

If Gov. Kristi Noem, a Republican, signs the bill into law, doctors who offer medical transitions in the form of hormone replacements or surgery to children under 16 could receive a one-year jail sentence or a hefty fine.

Colorado, West Virginia, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Missouri, Florida, Illinois, and Kentucky all have similar provisions in the works, although the details vary.

In a tweet, Deutsch said: “The world is upside-down that protecting children from sterilization and mutilation is causing a firestorm.”

In a statement emailed to USA Today, he said:

Every child in South Dakota should be protected from dangerous drugs and procedures. The solution for children’s identification with the opposite sex isn’t to poison their bodies with mega-doses of the wrong hormones, to chemically or surgically castrate and sterilize them, or to remove healthy breasts and reproductive organs.

Sex reassignment surgery—a phrase the LGBTQ lobby hijacked and changed to “gender reassignment surgery,” a subtle but important difference—has had enough success and failure for lawmakers on both sides of the political aisle to use to their advantage.

Or so they think. A USA Today article, which is rather thorough, paints GOP lawmakers as interventionists who suddenly want to get involved in people’s “personal” lives. It cites professionals who voice disdain for lawmakers who would keep today’s youth from living as their feelings dictate.

These lawmakers face an uphill battle because of LGBTQ backlash and public relations. Reputable medical groups such as the American Medical Association and the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry have come out in favor of providing surgical and hormone replacement transitions as appropriate treatment for children struggling with gender dysphoria, despite little evidence it cures the dysphoria.

In fact, while little evidence exists either for or against medical transitions, because it’s such a new phenomenon, statistics show that some people who transition experience regret.

Fortunately, conservative lawmakers who propose these bills come from a place of education, combined with empathy and caution.

Because this is optional surgery, and not a life-or-death medical procedure (such as neurosurgery following a stroke), Republican lawmakers propose banning the surgery for teenagers, to err on the side of safety.

Although a speckling of success stories are told by medically transitioned teens and adults, more tales of failure, and horror, are out there.

These stories abound, though critics of the proposed bills seem to ignore them entirely.

In a powerful essay published by The New York Times in 2018, a writer who was born a man and was about to medically transition to a woman admitted, as the headline stated: “My new vagina won’t make me happy.” But the writer wanted to go ahead with the surgery anyway.

Jazz Jennings, 19, was born a biological male but socially transitioned to female years ago. The teen’s transgender journey has been a hit TLC show.

Doctors recently performed a third surgery on Jennings to further the transition from young man to young woman. Jennings suffered from severe complications after receiving a “new vagina.”

Walt Heyer is well known for his crusade against such medical transitions. Heyer, a fellow contributor to The Daily Signal, lived as a woman for several years. After taking female hormones, he had breast implants but was still suicidal after a short reprieve.

Eventually Heyer came to the belief not only that sex reassignment surgeries didn’t make him female, but that his issues were rooted in trauma and abuse—as they are for most people.

Heyer wrote in The Daily Signal in 2017:

Too many post-surgical patients contact me to report they deeply regret the gender change surgery and that the false hope of surgical outcomes was a factor. For children, the focus on encouraging, assisting, and affirming them toward changing genders at earlier and earlier ages, with no research showing the outcomes, may lead to more suicides.

Although it’s true that many conservatives would reject government involvement in the family via heavy-handed legislation, there are times when it’s necessary, specifically when safety—even common sense—is rejected in favor of the cause du jour.

This is such a time, when parents and activists are blindly answering the rallying cry of progressives who favor feelings over facts, even when it means leading our own children down a path of pain and regret.

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All men in Alabama will be forced to have a VASECTOMY at 50 or when they have their third child under 'outrageous' state law proposed by Democrat

All men would be forced to have vasectomies when they reach the age of 50 or have a three children, under a new law proposed by an Alabama lawmaker.

Rep. Rolanda Hollis, a Democrat, on Thursday put the bill forward requiring men in the state to pay for the procedure within a month of turning 50 or the birth of their third biological child.

The HB 238 bill to sterilize all men in the state has been branded an 'outrageous overstep' by critics.

Hollis said that her bill is a reaction to Alabama's near-total abortion ban, which was temporarily blocked by a federal judge in October 2019 after it was passed by the state

Hollis said she was trying to counter Alabama's abortion ban, which was temporarily blocked by a federal judge in October 2019.

The law, which was passed by the state where Republican's hold the majority last year, would block nearly all terminations for women.

Hollis defended her proposal on Twitter on Friday, saying that it was intended to 'neutralize' the abortion ban bill.

'The responsibility is not always on the women. It takes 2 to tangle. This will help prevent pregnancy as well as abortion of unwanted children,' she said.

Committee Chairman Rep. Jim Hill, a Republican, said that the bill was the first of its kind that he had come across. 'I've never seen a bill that attempted to sterilize a person, male or female,' he told CNN.

Hollis acknowledged in an interview with WSFA that her bill is seen as 'an outrageous overstep' by opponents.

She said: 'Year after year the majority party continues to introduce new legislation that tries to dictate a woman's body and her reproductive rights.'

She said she wanted to send a message that 'men should not be legislating what women do with their bodies'.

Randall Marshall, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Alabama, praised Hollis for making the statement but said that the bill would not progress.

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Australian public broadcaster loses legal challenge on free speech grounds

Australia's national broadcaster has lost its legal challenge to controversial police raids on its Sydney newsroom last year.

In June, police searched the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) and the home of a newspaper journalist over articles which relied on leaks from government whistleblowers.

The raids sparked a public outcry and protests across the nation's media.

However, the Federal Court of Australia has ruled the searches were legal.

ABC's managing director David Anderson said the decision was "disappointing". He said the raids had been a high-profile "attempt to intimidate journalists for doing their job".

Why did police raid newsrooms?

Australian Federal Police alleged the stories and reporters at the centre of its searches had breached national security laws.

In the raid last year, they seized thousands of documents over a 2017 ABC investigation which alleged Australian armed forces had committed war crimes in Afghanistan.

Police also raided the home of News Corp reporter Annika Smethurst. In 2018, she had reported an alleged attempt by a government agency to spy on Australian citizens.

Australia's conservative government tightened its security laws in 2018 to make it a criminal offence for journalists to receive classified information from military or intelligence sources.

Canberra has previously said it backs press freedom but that "no one was above the law".

What was the ABC's challenge?

The ABC tried to challenge the legality of the police search warrant, arguing that it breached an implied constitutional right for free speech on political matters.

However, the court rejected that argument. It said "the purpose of the warrant in this case was entirely legitimate" as police had been investigating "valid" national security offences.

The court also said the few legal protections for journalists' sources were not applicable in this case.

The industry's union, the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance said the case's dismissal showed "ongoing and serious threats to the public's right to know".

Mr Anderson, from the ABC, said the ruling was "a blow for public interest journalism".

Police have not ruled out prosecuting Ms Smethurst, and ABC reporters Sam Clarke and Dan Oakes over their stories.

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Political correctness is most pervasive in universities and colleges but I rarely report the  incidents concerned here as I have a separate blog for educational matters.

American "liberals" often deny being Leftists and say that they are very different from the Communist rulers of  other countries.  The only real difference, however, is how much power they have.  In America, their power is limited by democracy.  To see what they WOULD be like with more power, look at where they ARE already  very powerful: in America's educational system -- particularly in the universities and colleges.  They show there the same respect for free-speech and political diversity that Stalin did:  None.  So look to the colleges to see  what the whole country would be like if "liberals" had their way.  It would be a dictatorship.

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, GREENIE WATCH,   EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS and  DISSECTING LEFTISM.   My Home Pages are here or   here or   here.  Email me (John Ray) here.  Email me (John Ray) here. 

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