Islam, Secularism and the Gospel

http://www.christianpost.com/article/20080923/islam-secularism-and-the-gospel.htm

[The Christian Post] 23 Sep 2008--While Britons may think of America as its juvenile and impetuous offspring, Great Britain has surely become our senile grandmother. Through repeated acts of self-condemnation and political correctness, the British are systematically capitulating to all things Islamic. In essence, our British forbearers are committing cultural suicide.

In what may appear to be deferential considerations to their growing Muslim population, British authorities are slowly conforming to the demands of an increasingly outspoken and violent minority. Already in Britain, Muslim men with multiple wives have been given the go-ahead to claim extra welfare benefits following a year-long government review. Even though bigamy is a crime in Britain, the decision by British authorities means that polygamous marriages can now be recognized formally (not to mentioned subsidized) by the state, so long as the weddings took place in countries where the arrangement is legal. And yes, polygamy remains a norm in the Muslim world.

In other another act of mindless irony, the Research, Information and Communication Unit, a division of the British Home Office, established for the purpose of countering al-Qaeda’s influence in the UK, is actually instructing civil servants not to use terms such as “Islamist extremism” or “jihadi fundamentalist.” Instead, they are to use phrases such as “violent extremism” or “criminal murderers” or “thugs” to avoid any implication that there is connection between Islam and terrorism.

Closer to home, the US government also issued guidelines earlier this year for the Department of Homeland Security suggesting such terms as “jihad” and “Islamic terrorism” not be used. (Where is the Ronald Reagan of our generation who is willing to call evil evil?)

So ridiculous have British concessions to Muslim demands become that Fortis Bank “stopped giving piggy banks to children for fear of offending Muslims,” according to The Times of London. (Pigs are an offensive, unclean animal to Muslims.) There are also accounts of Muslim nurses refusing to comply with hygiene procedures on the grounds that scrubbing requires them to bare their arms.