In Angry Waves, the Devout See an Angry God _WP

[Rose Siding]

BANDA ACEH, Indonesia, Jan. 4 -- Aceh's highly influential Islamic clergy have explained the giant wave that devastated this overwhelmingly Muslim region as a warning to the faithful that they must more strictly observe their religion, including a ban on Muslims killing Muslims.
...
"Wherever you go in Aceh, you will see the village leader and the imam working together," Banta Ali said. "One is the religious leader, the other is the government leader at the lowest level of the administration."

In this atmosphere, the swift care provided around mosques and the interpretation handed down in sermons and individual counseling by local imams seemed likely to be decisive for years to come in how the people of Aceh understand the tragedy that has befallen them.

"God is angry with Aceh people, because most of them do not do what is written in the Koran and the Hadith," the collected sayings and actions of the prophet Muhammad, explained Cut Bukhaini, 35, an imam. "I hope this will lead all Muslims in Aceh to do what is in the Koran and its teachings. If we do so, God will be merciful and compassionate."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A48407-2005Jan4.html

[BrutalEntropy]

1. wow, how neat!

your god gets mad, so he kills over a hundred thousand people... sounds like a god I'd want to worship! *retch*

[Rose Siding]

2. Same logic used by some right wing religious in the US

[RaleighNCDUer]

3. Yeah. 911 happened because god was angry about the gays.

So saith Rev Falwell.

[FizzFuzz]

20. and uppity women

don't forget he included feminists in his blame

[Hekate]

29. A fundy is a fundy is a fundy -- & oddly, all are monotheists

Right after 9-11 the horrid duo of Robertson and Falwell got to yapping on their preachin' show, and they explicitly blamed the terrorist attacks on the behavior of gays and feminists. They said it was God's Will because the US countenanced such naughty behavior.

I said at the time that they were demonstrating that they are brothers under the skin with fanatical Islamists. Such hatred, such venom, toward not only their fellow man but even toward God, in that they attribute such vile motives and behavior to their own divine being.

In the wake of the tsunami disaster, sure enough, there have been some Islamic Robertsons and Falwells who have gotten air time on Middle Eastern television, and they are spewing the same message. One fellow said it coincided with Christmas because Christians use the occasion to commit all kinds of "forbidden acts" and abominations, and God finally gave the world a good smiting. Really does sound like Falwell's God.

Extreme fundamentalism has been rising for over a generation in all three branches of the Abrahamic religions, and this hate-filled religiosity is a threat to world peace. This world is nothing; the next world is everything; and things like torture are just petty details when God is on your side.

And what a God he is, fashioned in these men's own image of themselves.

Hekate

[FizzFuzz]

50. the similarity between the two groups views of women tells the story

both groups pose as sole owners of truth, but their shared hatred of women is so transparent, it tells me volumes.

I never was comfortable with any of the Abrahamic "desert religions", they seem to be harsh, authoritarian, rule-based and dualistic. (good/bad, us/them)

[Catchawave]

36. ....and Pat Robertson ! (1998 article)

Norfolk Virginian-Pilot, June 10, 1998
P.O. Box 449, Norfolk, VA 23501-0449
(Fax [phone])(E-Mail: [e-mail])
(http://www.pilotonline.com/)

Evangelist Robertson says gays bring about earthquakes, tornadoes, bombs By Tony Wharton, The Virginian-Pilot

VIRGINIA BEACH -- Pat Robertson said Orlando, Fla., should beware of hurricanes, since it and Disney World allowed Gay Days to be held there this past weekend.

"I would warn Orlando that you're right in the way of some serious hurricanes, and I don't think I'd be waving those flags in God's face if I were you,'' Robertson said Monday on his TV show, "The 700 Club.''

Robertson also said the widespread practice of homosexuality "will bring about terrorist bombs, it'll bring earthquakes, tornadoes and possibly a meteor.''

more....ugh....at:
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/patrob3.htm

[Oversea Visitor]

12. n/t

:puke:

[renegade000]

22. be careful, he shall smite you for your sardonic mockery

:crazy:

[saltpoint]

4. Does anybody know if the DSM-IV --

-- has determined that this kind of religious-based behavioral disorder is international?

Because that would explain why Islamic nutcases in this instance are as limited, narrow, and unimaginative as Christian nutcases in the West.

[ixion]

17. all religious zealots

are a bit nutty, IMO.

You can be very devout and committed without being a zealot.

[saltpoint]

19. People can be a bit nutty in any endeavor.

My quarrel is with those who invoke Providence to justify suffering and exclusion.

One very good place to find such folks are in religious fundamentalists.

I consider that kind of religious fundamentalism to be a behavioral disorder.

[ixion]

32. yes, agreed

I should have said all zealots. :-)

[saltpoint]

48. Help me out with your avatar --

-- is it a profile of Jesus in mosaic?

I'm curious as to its source. My skills in art are limited (at best) and I admire people who can do this.

[Just Me]

30. Likely falls under anti-social and delusional.

Can occur without regard to race, sex, religion, political orientation etc.

[saltpoint]

49. Three friends of mine are psychiatrists.

In their practices, they have come to a consensus that there isn't much difference between an adult who believes in a magical figure like Jesus and a 4-year old who believes in the Easter Bunny.

[jdj]

5. And other famous last words.

[GoddessOfGuinness]

6. Why do stories like these permeate the media

without criticism, while a question on a DU discussion board is raked over the coals by the NYT?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x1116859

[saltpoint]

14. Extremely good question.

[FizzFuzz]

21. and every week, Time or US News&World Report or Newsweek

have a cover story on Jesus?

Your question is so perfect.

I am sick of this Judeo-Christian boosting everywhere I look. As if it were news.

[Ernesto]

39. Me To

Whenever I pick up one of the "big 3" weekly news wrags I am reminded of Parade "the throw away" Magazine. Looks like the "race to the bottom" is alive & well in publishing.

[Just Me]

34. Psy-ops?

Perpetrating the fears within the human psyche? Fears of the unknown,...of death/destruction/armageddon. :shrug:

Or,...could be the projection of those fears. :shrug:

Is it intentional? If so, why: for profit or control or "news"?

[GoddessOfGuinness]

46. Is there more money to be made from human stupidity

than from human intelligence?

[RandomKoolzip]

7. Damn, I thought this was gonna be a "Imam sees image of Allah

in Tidal Wave Photograph" kinda thing, like those American/Euro nutballs who see the Virgin Mary in aluminum siding erosion or rock formations or whatever.

[KDLarsen]

31. You forgot the grilled cheese sandwich!

:evilgrin:

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

44. Unlikely. Muslims frown at images. Jews too.

That's why you don't see those "face of <insert-holy-person-here> seen on <insert-inanimate-object-here>" stories coming from those religions.

I'll go out on a limb and speculate that, since Buddhists (like Catholics) don't have these restrictions, there have been sightings of images of the Buddha. Am I correct?

[Solly Mack]

8. religious leaders who compound hardship and pain with this bag of hooey

should be flogged.

I don't give a damn what religion it is either.

Stop blaming the victim!

[elshiva]

9. No! No! No!

God is a God of love he never would do such things to his/her children!
(I got my B.A. in Religious Studies so I want to put my two cents in here.) God is not angry, God is suffering with the tsunami victims. According to Process Theology, which emphasizes evolution and free will, nature has a will of it's own. God is omnipotent because that would interfere with creation's free will. Nature is sick and is rebelling against the human race since our race abuses nature so much. God dwells within the soul of every being and is suffering with the humans in this disaster.
God weeps to hear him/herself used as a force for political control by some power crazed cleric AGAIN. I crying to think some people truly believe this bullshit about some angry god, so they will be oppressed again. I sympathsize with all atheists, but this is not the God of the Muslims. This is not the loving Allah who is closer to humans than their jugular veins.

[Oversea Visitor]

10. Please

The actual facts are more in line like this
Is God angry with us ?
Acheh a province of civil unrest people kill each other
Should message of positive nature trying to promote peace be allow to be so twisted
Should the message of a more peaceful way to resolve conflict be attack and turn into a religious issue
And the use of guns to kill each other instead be allow the norm
and seen as the right approach

All this cause so much problems in Indonesia all this wrong branding of Muslim and the end result is terror win
10,000 troops was deploy to protect churches in Indonesia this christmas so the 22 million christian there can go and pray in peace

Why why does you need troops to protect churches
Are the religious leader fighting a religious war
I dont see this all the religious leader are asking for peace and harmony
So who the hell is making all this happen

This is so sick

[slay]

11. When will people learn that saying God is on their side doesn't make

their point of view right. Neither us nor them. All it does is stop intelligent discussion. Christians are just as guilty. :(

[Gman]

13. Meanwhile in America

the fundies here see it as God's wrath directed at the nation of Islam for being the nation of Islam.

Others believe Neptune was really pissed.

[complain jane]

15. I'm telling my boss tomorrow it happened because he angered the God of

healthy raises, says I should have a fricken raise or else.

[Ellen Forradalom]

16. Opportunism at its most naked

In other news, God is angry because Americans are not buying enough cars, said spokesmen for the Big Three automakers.

[Porcupine]

18. Now batting...Gaia!! She bats anytime she wants.

Trimming us puny humans like an unruly rose bush.

[NYC]

23. U.S. military in Indonesia.

...US soldiers will for the first time touch down on Indonesian soil...

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/4A0A0C42-C6C4-42A8-8B5D-5BAC00C99BA2.htm

A friend is reading Blowback. I forget the author's name. A lot of information about U.S. - Aceh.

[NorthernSpy]

24. humans often cope with natural catastrophe...

... by reassuring themselves that they can prevent such things from occurring in the future. All they have to do is to follow a certain ritual or moral code, and all will be well. One of the things that religion does is to create and preserve man's necessary illusion of (indirect) control over things that are bigger and more powerful than he is. The blank facts of nature, life, and death might be too awful to face otherwise.

This coping mechanism can easily be exploited by those who claim to have special knowledge of which rituals to perform, and which deities to appeal to. The search for power over nature always winds up with a real goal of more power over other people.

[daleo]

25. It's the same the world over with religious fanatics

Does this mean that God is happy with any area that is NOT undergoing a cataclysm?

[SidDithers]

26. Waves are not angry, they're just waves....nt

Sid

[Merlin]

27. Yes, folks, there IS a God ! (And he HATES us!)

God is so brilliant and powerful and good.

It's a godam shame he can't think of better ways to communicate with us.

Even 3,500 years ago when he used to talk to people regularly, if you read the dictation from him that his scribes wrote down, it is completely confounding!

Now the only people this god talks to are Bush and Falwell.

(I, too, believe in a creator. But one that does not communicate with us, does not hear our prayers, and does not intervene in the rythyms of the extraordinary systems it has implemented throughout the universe.)

[Merlin]

28. .

.

[devinsgram]

33. What a fool.

Kill inocent people just to teach a lesson. Yeah, that will do it.

[hollowdweller]

35. Good Article on Same Thing On Beliefnet

http://www.beliefnet.org/story/158/story_15872_1.html

[sidpleasant]

37. No no, the tsunami was to punish Sweden

The world's zealots need to get their stories straight. According to the sick "God Hates Fags" family that occasionally turn up on Howard Stern's show to be ridiculed, the tsunami was God's revenge on Sweden for prosecuting some obscure homophobic minister. These morons are actually celebrating the deaths of thousands of Swedes. Left unexplained was why the Divinity felt it necessary to slaughter 100 thousand Indonesians, Sri Lankans, and others to get at the Swedes, or why Sweden itself wasn't targeted.

[GOPBasher]

38. "A ban on Muslims killing Muslims."

How about a ban on "people killing people," you fucking assholes. Man fundamentalist Muslims and fundamentalist Christians have so much in common; I wonder why they hate each other?

[Igel]

41. Read it in context. A few issues.

1) There's an insurgency by Muslims who want to establish Shari'a and the Caliphate in Aceh Banda. (You may disagree that they're Muslims, if you want, but that's what they call themselves.) They're fighting the government. At the very least, they want complete autonomy. The government doesn't want to pull out--what government likes ceding territory?

The government is primarily composed of Muslims. This means that Muslims are fighting Muslims. This is either a call for the insurgency to stop killing government troops, or for government troops to stop killing insurgents (can only see Basher's post, not the main post or the article).

The insurgency and government attempts to suppress it have gone on regardless of the tsunami.

And, as with every disaster that strikes and every problem facing the Ummah, the hardliners say it's punishment from God for disobedience. I hope that narrative doesn't stick. If the insurgents win, it's not good news for the non-hardline Muslims (or non-Muslims) in Aceh.

2) Hardline Muslims object to infidels on Muslim soil: once Muslim, always Muslim. They esp. object to troops. Esp. troops fighting Muslims elsewhere. Fighting the Ummah is fighting the Ummah, and it'll only create problems for the hardline imams if they call for jihad against the US troops and other "Crusaders" in any way. But approving of them is just as much a problem, because they've been haranguing the Crusader forces for so long as inherently evil that to admit they may, just may, have some bit of humanity in them will undermine their cause. I saw a picture of two US soldiers carrying an injured Indonesian; I wouldn't be surprised to see that same picture crop up in a week or two with a rather different caption.

This should be entertaining, at the very least.

[GOPBasher]

42. Okay, I understand that context now. But,

I still have big problems with fundamentalist Muslims (and fundamentalist Christians, for that matter).

[atommom]

40. Fundies of every stripe do this .... if there's a disaster, it has to be

punishment for someone ELSE!

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

43. AAARRRGH. Pat Ben Robertson and Jerry Ali Falwell? (nt)

[peacetalksforall]

45. People in on this thread...there is a distinction to be made....

While fundamentalist Robertson and Falwell and their followers shout God's retribution by demonstrating their bigotry....

...this Islamic leader targeted his own fellow Moslems.

Without bigotry. Without words of hate in the heart.

[sendero]

47. The devout see the virgin Mary....

... in a grilled cheese sandwich. So freaking what?