Statement on the Burning of the Koran in a Florida Church
Posted by peacedevelopmentnetwork on March 26, 2011
It is with great regret that we heard the news that the Christian Minister, Terry Jones burned a Koran in a public ‘trial’ in Gainsville, Florida. We as people of different faiths urge respect for faith to be the benchmark of inter-religious and inter-community relations. Religion can be a powerful force to divide humanity. Centred on respect for faith in its many and varied forms religion can be a force for healing and unification that encapsulates and articulates the great love of our Creator.
- Rt Rev Riah Abu El-Assal, Emeritus Anglican Bishop of Jerusalem
- Rev Canon Peter Challen
- Jack Lynes
- Aftikhar Ahmed
- Robin Marsh, Secretary General Universal Peace Federation-UK
- Ruth Barnett
- Major (Retired) Suryaparsad Upadhya
- Sir Bryan Frasi
- Sudesh Sharma
Please leave a comment if you wish your name to be added to this statement.
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Major(Retired) Suryaparsad Upadhya said
Regretably this kind of action will also divide society and does not help bring peace to the world.
zahid mir said
yes it is a great regret that terry jones burnt the Quran.
i would urge all muslims, other faiths and non faith people to just ignore this behaviour.
If one has a strong faith than no amount of burning of any kinds of books will shake your belief.
peacedevelopmentnetwork said
‘I am shocked and dismayed how Christians keep damaging the beautiful
image of Christ . What gain did he get . … it is shameful.’
Rt. Rev. Riah Abu El-Assal, Emeritus Anglican Bishop of Jerusalem
bryan frasi said
As a non-Christian,I wonder just what part of the Christ’s Teaching Terry Jones would be able to claim he was following.
It is always easy to sow hatred and mistrust as much of history has shown us.
Ruth Barnet said
Terry Jones has the Right to believe what he chooses but this Right carries the Responsibility to respect everyone else’s Right to choose what they believe. Without showing respect for others’, he cannot expect his own religion to be respected. Burning a Koran is doing a great disservice to his own religion.
Best wishes
Ruth
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Terence Malley said
The burning of the Koran is symbolic of a deep hollowness and malaise within the Christian faith. Christians in the West may be understandably apprehensive about the growth of the Muslim faith, especially in capturing the minds and hearts of our young and disaffected youth, but that does not justify such a deliberate provocative act. It rather points the finger at the spiritual poverty within the West, as a result of which we will progressively see an erosion of our material wealth. God’s blessing of the Christian ideal, its core principles and values, and which helped create our material wealth, intended to share with the whole world, started to erode from the 1960s when we decided to go our own way. This is now a time for all the major world faiths to seek more constructive dialogue and engage in more that unites us rather than divides us. When enough good people unite in such a spirit then God’s blessing will have a foundation for it to come again – make no mistake, Satan has the upper hand in running the affairs of man – if we ignore this fundamental principle then Satan will lead us all into a merry dance down along this road to perdition. Thank you.