The outer room

Post below lifted from Belmont Club. See the original for links

The AP reports that "Italy's most prominent Muslim, an iconoclastic writer who condemned Islamic extremism and defended Israel, converted to Catholicism Saturday in a baptism by the pope at a Vatican Easter service."

Yahya Pallavicini, vice president of Coreis, the Islamic religious community in Italy, said he respected Allam's choice but said he was "perplexed" by the symbolic and high-profile way in which he chose to convert. "If Allam truly was compelled by a strong spiritual inspiration, perhaps it would have been better to do it delicately, maybe with a priest from Viterbo where he lives," the ANSA news agency quoted Pallavicini as saying.

All that I can say is that there are more -- many more who have secretly converted from Islam. Some sites have claimed that nearly 700 Muslims convert to Christianity per hour, though I wonder how accurate those numbers are. In that context Pallavicini's question makes sense: why did Magdi Allam make such a high profile conversion on the occasion of the Easter Vigil too? It's extraordinary for any Catholic to be baptized by the Pope. What's the message?

Maybe it is to remind the Islamic world that despite the frequency of these conversions there are no widespread calls to burn mosques, kill imams or desecrate Korans among the converted. Magdi Allam's public conversion is witness to the quiet of all those which have been made in private. And maybe that message is filtering through to the more thoughtful imams.

Egypt's highest Islamic cleric, the Grand Mufti Ali Gomaa, wrote last year against the killing of apostates, saying there is no worldly retribution for Muslims who abandon their religion and that punishment would come in the afterlife.

A conversion to Christianity is not an announcement of superiority, but an acknowledgement of need. Only sinners need come to the Cross. "But you, when you pray, go into your inner room, close your door and pray to your Father who is in secret, and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you."

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ELSEWHERE

Sinbad Was Right-- Hero Hillary Lied About Bosnia (Video Proof): "There was a saying around the White House that if a place was too small, too poor, or too dangerous, the president couldn't go, so send the First Lady. That's where we went. I remember landing under sniper fire. There was supposed to be some kind of a greeting ceremony at the airport, but instead we just ran with our heads down to get into the vehicles to get to our base..." It was all a lie. Every single word was a lie except for the fact that she was in a plane and it landed. Here is more proof that the Clinton's will do anything- and SAY ANYTHING- to get back into the White House."

Hillary opposes law enforcement: "Hillary Clinton's endlessly recalibrated position on providing driver's licenses for illegal aliens captures her career in miniature. After arguing that a New York proposal to give illegals driver's licenses "makes a lot of sense," she promptly denied having said such a thing, gave an incomprehensible and classically Clintonian non-answer to the question at the Democratic debate in Philadelphia, and now offers this gem of an explanation: "I do not think it is appropriate to give a driver's license to someone who is here undocumented, putting them frankly at risk, because that is clear evidence that they are not here legally." To repeat: Clinton opposes licenses for illegals because such documents might provide evidence for American law-enforcement agencies. As first lady, she garnered valuable experience in hiding evidence of wrongdoing, but we never expected she'd make a policy proposal out of doing so."



The peaceful Dalai Lama is a terrorist?? "Far from heeding international calls for dialogue with the Dalai Lama, China has accused Tibet's exiled god-king of colluding with Muslim terrorists to destabilise the country before the Olympic Games. State-run newspapers have issued prominent leading articles that are part of a campaign to portray the Dalai Lama as the mastermind of the deadly riots that have rippled through Tibet and ethnic Tibetan communities. In Lhasa, the Tibetan capital, yesterday local TV issued the No 7 list of those most wanted in connection with the riots on March 10 in which Chinese officials say 22 people were killed, including a baby boy burnt to death in a garage and one paramilitary police officer."



Islamic nut does his best to destroy the Indonesian tourism industry: "Firebrand Islamic cleric Abu Bakar Bashir has called on his young Indonesian followers to attack tourists - including Australians - in a fiery sermon. In the talk given in October last year Bashir urges his followers to "beat up" western tourists, whom he likened to "worms, snakes and maggots", The Australian newspaper reported on Monday. "God willing there are none (tourists) here," he told the young Indonesian audience on October 22. "If there were infidels here, just beat them up. Do not tolerate them. "Worms, snakes, maggots - those are animals that crawl. Take a look at Bali ... those infidel tourists. They are naked." Bashir was convicted of conspiracy over the 2002 Bali bombings - which killed 88 Australians - serving 26 months in prison."

Socialists can't run an airport: "The opening of Terminal 5 at Heathrow [Britain] last week has been hailed as a new beginning for the airport, but the four older terminals are still a disgrace, according to travellers. A list of the best and worst airports, decided by 7.8 million passengers, suggests that Heathrow's transit system is comparable with the chaos encountered at Bombay airport and that its reputation for baggage delivery is at the same level as the airport at Caracas, the Venezuelan capital. Heathrow was ranked 103rd out of 162 airports, with the main complaints regarding its snaking security queues, surly immigration officials and infuriating baggage system. The airport fell 58 places in the rankings last year, which was due partly to a luggage crisis in August, when British Airways was so overwhelmed that it had to hire a fleet of lorries to transport unclaimed bags from Heathrow to a sorting facility in Milan. Heathrow, which is operated by the British Airports Authority, has the largest number of delayed flights in Europe, with more than one in three departing at least 15 minutes late." [I advise visitors to Britain to come down in Paris and take the Eurostar (train) to London]

Nutty archbishop of doom: "The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, gave a warning yesterday against materialist greed and prophesied the collapse of civilisation. In his Easter Day sermon at Canterbury Cathedral, Dr Williams said that the luxuries we took for granted could not be sustained for ever. In our culture, thoughts of death were too painful to manage, he told worshippers. Criticising modern society's approach to mortality, Dr Williams said: "Individuals live in anxious and acquisitive ways, seizing what they can to provide a security that is bound to dissolve, because they are going to die," he said".

For more postings from me, see OBAMA WATCH, TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL and EYE ON BRITAIN.

List of backup or "mirror" sites here or here -- for readers in China or for everyone when blogspot is "down" or failing to update. Email me here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here or here or here

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"Why should the German be interested in the liberation of the Jew, if the Jew is not interested in the liberation of the German?... We recognize in Judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time... In the final analysis, the emancipation of the Jews is the emancipation of mankind from Judaism.... Indeed, in North America, the practical domination of Judaism over the Christian world has achieved as its unambiguous and normal expression that the preaching of the Gospel itself and the Christian ministry have become articles of trade... Money is the jealous god of Israel, in face of which no other god may exist". Who said that? Hitler? No. It was Karl Marx. See also here and here and here.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialist) and the full name of Hitler's political party (translated) was "The National Socialist German Workers' Party" (In German: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei)

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