Which is more violent--the Bible or the Qur'an?

I was glad to hear the story today on NPR regarding Philip Jenkins' take on the violence in the Bible. He argues that the scriptures Christians count as sacred contain plenty of texts that justify violence and have been used from the Crusades to modern White Supremacists to justify violent acts. Where his position will upset people the most concerns his belief that the Bible is more violent than the Qur'an.

Both sacred texts justify violence and both religions have extremist elements who will gladly use these passages to justify their horrible acts. The difference in our current time is that it seems to be occurring more often among certain elements in Islam due to the impact of modern technology and secularism upon traditional cultures in the Islamic world.

I've noted any number of times that the bible has its own violence that it justifies and those verses have been used by Christians for millennia to justify atrocities, but usually I've heard responses from people who wish to declare Islam is inherently evil and inferior to Christianity. They fail to see the danger inherent in all sacred texts that the religious authority they are given can be mixed with violent extremism with horrible consequences.

We Christians should be careful lest we ignore the plank in our own eye when it comes to our use of scriptures.

Grace and Peace,

Chase

FCC St. Joe on Facebook!

It took me a while, but First Christian Church of St. Joseph, MO now has a group on Facebook. I've chosen to make it a group requiring invitation so that we aren't swarmed by people who have a bunch of money to give us if we just hand over our bank account numbers so they can transfer it out of Nigeria, if you know what I mean?

If you're interested in the group, just do a search for First Christian Church of St. Joseph, MO.

I knew DOG is GOD spelled backwards, but . . .

Thanks to Facebook I came across this video--thought it would be cheesy--but found it to be deeply moving.