Islam vs. the pope

I was reading an article on CNN.com about some clerics and scholars in Pakistan who are calling for the pope to be removed. I'm just sort of sitting here shaking my head in disbelief of it all. Evidently the pope quoted an old text which said that some of the teachings of Islam are "evil and inhumane" and referred to spreading Islam "by the sword."

Evidently this has caused a backlash of words and threats from at least these 1,000 clerics and scholars including a warning to the West that "severe consequences" would come if its stance on Islam did not change. I think that this group is sort of cutting their nose to spite their face on this issue. In other words, if someone says that I'm a hothead that yells a lot I'm can't rightly defend myself by going off the deep end and railing on the guy.

Man, this just shows us what we are fighting against as universalism and tolerance become more widely taught, lived, and expected. We're not talking about someone getting angry that the pope referenced history. We're talking about a very significant group of people who likely have a ton of influence in a country making threats against the West (guess that really means the U.S. and the vatican in this case?). Now that's anger!

I don't know where I'm going with all of this at this point. I just wanted to throw out a little editorial before heading to bed tonight. Maybe my next post will integrate thoughts from this along with the question from earlier today about simply being the church. Global dynamics make that question that much more interesting.