Jesus and the Dogs in Dearborn (Matthew 15:21-28)

    We’ve spent the past few weeks moving through the life and teachings of Jesus as recorded in the Gospel of Matthew – lingering on his parables and thinking about his miracles. Today I’d like to continue that by taking the next episode in Jesus’ life, the next little pericope – as Bible students will call it – and treat it as a sort of parable. I want to tell his earthly story with a heavenly meaning with the goal of shaping how we live our earthly lives for the purposes of the kingdom of heaven.

    We’ve seen Jesus, in these past weeks, preaching and teaching the people. We’ve seen how they followed him for instruction and pursued him for healing. And now Jesus wants to find someplace to be alone, some place where he can get away from the seeking, searching, pleading, desperate crowds. He wants a place to recharge.

    So imagine Jesus going up and down through the towns and villages of Michigan. He’s been to Ann Arbor and Flint. He’s been up to Port Huron. But now, when he’s tired and wanting some place to be alone, some place where they haven’t heard of him, some place where he won’t be recognized, he and his entourage of disciples head to Dearborn.

    But while he is there a Muslim woman, wearing her hijab and carrying her small daughter, approaches him on the street and shouts out, “Isa! Isa al-Masih! Please, take pity and heal my troubled daughter.”

    She shouts so loudly that she is starting to attract unwanted attention, so the disciples say to Jesus, “Master, please. Give her what she wants so she’ll shut up and just go away.”

    But Jesus says, “No. I’ve not come for people like them. I’ve been sent only to care for real Americans. America first.”

    And this Muslim woman in her hijab pleads again. “Please.”

    Jesus says, “No. It is not right to take food from the children to give it to dogs. I don’t know you.”

    But the woman won’t quit. She says, “As the prophet, peace be upon him, has taught us, Allah has said, ‘O humanity! Indeed we created you from a male and a female, and made you into peoples and tribes so that you may get to know one another. Surely the most noble of you in the sight of God is the most righteous among you.’”¹

    And Jesus, looking at this Muslim woman, wearing her hijab and carrying her small daughter, said, “Woman, you have great faith. Let your wish be granted and your daughter healed.” And from that moment her daughter was well.

    Or consider again, German Jesus in Berlin, approached by a Jewish woman, “Bitte. Bitte. Heal my daughter.” And German Jesus says, “No. I can’t. I’ve come only for the pure-blooded Aryans.”

    Or Jesus in Georgia in the 1960s still under the Jim Crow laws approached by a Black woman with her daughter…

    Or Jesus in San Francisco in the 1980s at the height of the AIDS crisis, approached by a gay man, “Please heal my partner…”

    And Jesus replies to them – “It’s not right to take food for the children and give it to dogs.” Dismissive and denigrating, he speaks to them as if they aren’t even human. As if they are animals. Beasts. And this is ugly and grotesque.

    Now I am not saying that Jesus was an American Christian Nationalist, or a Nazi, or segregationist, or a homophobe, but in calling the Canaanite woman a “dog” Jesus was repeating the first century Jewish equivalent of these groups’ rhetoric, the same kind of ethnic and religious boundary language that has been used throughout history to exclude people for one reason or another.

    And it is ugly. But here it is. As I said before, Jesus’ parables are not simple. They are strange and weird, and sometimes told to deliberately confuse. It’s up to us to wrestle with them. And the same is true with this episode in Jesus’ life. It is difficult, and strange, and horrifying. And we must wrestle with it.

    Now the common explanation, the easy explanation of this event in Jesus’ life is that Jesus is testing her – saying the ugly thing to see if her faith is strong enough to overcome the objection. But Matthew never says this, never gives any indication of this. He simply records Jesus calling her – and her small daughter – dogs.

    But her humble response changes him. Her simple rebuke corrects him. He learns from her and grows in compassion. Maybe we’re uncomfortable with the idea of Jesus having to learn compassion. But the letter to the Hebrews describes Jesus learning obedience through suffering (Hebrews 5:8) and the Gospel of Luke describes Jesus growing in wisdom (Luke 2:52). Here we see that growth, that learning in action. Jesus learns compassion from the Canaanite woman.

    And in that moment of learning and growth Jesus says, “Woman! Your faith is great!” He is changed and in that change the world is changed. The child is healed. The gospel is not only proclaimed but put into action. And the Kingdom of Heaven is expanded.

    The good news, the gospel good news, is that Jesus listens and learns to love. The good news is that compassion builds the kingdom. The good news is that faith can break down the barriers between us.

    So we wrestle with this story this morning. And we ask the question: Who are the dogs? Who are the outsiders? Who are the unwelcomed? Who are the excluded? Who are the unwanted and unloved?

    The Jew? The black single-mother? The lesbian? The illegal immigrant? The red-hat MAGA enthusiast? The liberal? The conservative? The socialist? The atheist? Who is the dog?

    And what will you share with them?

1Surah 49:13 – Translated by Dr. Mustafa Khattab, 2016

Allah Azeem – Another Troll Conversation

    It was my day off, but I woke up early anyway. I wanted to sleep late but my body said, ‘no.’ I had a number of errands to run and chores to do around the house anyway, so an early start wasn’t really a problem. I just wanted that one day to sleep… But God has made the night as a cover, and made sleep for resting, and the day for rising.¹ So I was up and working when I saw him again – my semi-regular troll, Gunner.

    I heard him first, actually. I was in the kitchen making coffee when I heard the screech and skid of a vehicle outside, followed immediately by the slamming of a door, and aggressive horn honking. Then, him shouting, “Carter! Carter! What is this? Carter!”

    I closed the water reservoir on the coffee pot and pushed the button to start the brew and then went out the front door to see him.

    “Good morning, Gunner. It’s a bit early, isn’t it?”

    Gunner pointed at the window of my house. “What is this?” he demanded.

    “Not even a ‘hello’ today, Gunner? No greeting? No salutation? Just demands?”

    “I saw it as I was driving by your place last night and it pissed me off. I had to come back today to talk to you about it. I want to know why you’ve got that Mohammedan filth in your window and what I have to do to get you to take it down.”

    He was referring to the sign I made and put up in my window yesterday. It says:

الله عظيم

    “Tell me, Gunner, what do you think it says.”

    “I don’t read heathen,” he snorted.

    “I don’t really know Arabic, either,” I told him. “But I asked my friend, Rizwan, to help with it. It says Allah azeem.”

    “So, you’re a Muslim, now?”

    “Well, now, Gunner, you’ve made two faulty assumptions, and I haven’t even had my coffee yet. Why don’t you come inside?”

    It was cool inside, out of the sun. Another thing I appreciate about my days off. And I could smell the coffee. The pot was gurgling and just about finished. Gunner followed me into the kitchen, and we sat down at the table together.

    “You’ve made two faulty assumptions, Gunner. The first being that anything written in Arabic is Muslim. Arabic is a language, not a religion. And Arabic Christians have been affirming Allah azeem – ‘God is magnificent,’ since the day of Pentecost.”

    “What are you talking about, Carter?”

    “Parthians, Medes, Elamites, et cetera et cetera, Jews and proselytes – Cretans and Arabs… they were there when Peter gave the gospel in the upper room.”

    “But…” He started to object but I stood up from the table and opened the cupboard. Pulled out a pair of coffee mugs. “You take sugar with yours, right?”

    Coffee poured and sugar stirred, I continued. “Your second mistake, your second assumption is that everything Muslim should be hated or feared.”

    “Carter, you know as well as I do that Muslims hate Christians. It’s in their Quran that they have to hate and kill Christians.”

    “Is it?”

    He set down his coffee and glared at me.

    “I’m going to share something, Gunner, but first, when the Quran is recited, listen to it attentively and be silent, so you may be shown mercy.²”

    “But…”

    “Silent,” I reminded him. “The Quran says that the Believers – Jews, Christians… whoever truly believes in God and the Last Day and does good will have their reward with their Lord. And there will be no fear for them, nor will they grieve.³"

    I paused, waiting for his reaction. “Silent, right?” he sneered. I nodded for him to speak. “So, like I said, you’ve gone Muslim.”

    “No. Not at all” I said. “I’m still a Christian. Still a Methodist and not a monster. But I have read the Quran a couple of times, and I try to appreciate it.”

    “But the terrorists…”

    “Yes. The violent will use whatever text proves useful to their violence. The hateful make every book a weapon. It’s the same with the Jew, the Muslim, the Christian, the Buddhist, the Sikh.”

    “But the jihadists…”

    “The Quran says that whoever takes a life – it will be as if they killed all of humanity. And whoever saves a life, it will be as if they saved all of humanity.⁴ - which is very similar to something from the Jewish tradition - Whoever saves a single life is considered to have saved an entire world.⁵”

    He started to say something, but I said, “Your coffee’s getting cold.” We sipped from our mugs in silence for a few minutes.

    “All you liberals want is Sharia law and the death of America. Sharia and Islamism are incompatible with America.”

    “By the wind scattering dust, and the clouds loaded with rain, and the ships gliding with ease, and the angels administering by God’s commands⁶ – what is Sharia law, Gunner? Give me some examples.”

    “The hand-cutting hudud punishments. Punishments for adultery. Punishments for blasphemy. Punishments for apostasy. Your pal, Rizwan, will tell you all about it.”

    “Rizwan’s a Christian. Episcopalian.”

    “So, another liberal, like you.”

    “Doesn’t the Bible demand death by stoning for adultery, for idolatry, for blasphemy?”

    Gunner set his coffee cup down and said, “Just like you, Carter, to twist the scripture to defend the Muslim.”

    I didn’t say anything. I’d already said enough.

    “You’re still just one of those so-called Christians who cause trouble and pervert the gospel of Christ. But anyone who preaches another gospel, a different gospel is accursed. I’m just here as a reminder of the danger you’re working upon yourself, Carter. You’ve departed from the faith and given heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of devils. False teacher. Damnable heresy. Spoiled by vain philosophies and the traditions of men.”

    He stopped and looked me in the eye. “What do you have to say to that, Carter? You’ve got an answer for everything, don’t you? Are you going to quote from the Quran again?”

    I sighed, breathing through the annoyance and the exclamation. I rubbed my forehead. “You’re making this more difficult than it needs to be, Gunner.”

    He stood up from the table and stared down at me. “Why should it be easy, Carter?” Then he walked off, banged the front door open and went outside. I heard his truck peel out from the driveway seconds after.

    I stood up from the table, went to the front door and closed it. Then I went back to the kitchen to wash his coffee cup and refill my own. “Be gracious,” I said to myself. “Enjoin what is right and turn away from those who act ignorantly.⁷”

An Imaginary Conversation with a Real Troll (the first of the series) 
I Will Not Fight the Argument (the second)
Supermarket Wrestling (third conversation)
Do You Even Pray (the troll returns)
All Means All (A fifth conversation)
The Doctrine that Cannot Be Challenged (sixth conversation)
Toward Sodom - (a halfhearted seventh conversation)
Millions of Years of Death (the eighth conversation)
Truth with Untruth (the ninth conversation)
Bulls, Dogs, and Villains (the tenth conversation)
The Righteous Forsaken (the eleventh conversation)
A Sabbath Garden (conversation number twelve)
Doesn't Doctrine Mean Anything to You? (conversation thirteen)
Real Christian Men, Real Christian Marriage (conversation fourteen)
 

1Surah Al-Furqân 25:47

2Surah Al-A’râf 7:204

3Surah Al-Baqarah 2:62

4Surah Al-Mâ’idah 5:32

5J. Sanhedrin 4:9:1

6Surah Az-Zâriyât 51:1

7Surah Al-A’râf 7:199 

Using the Nativity to Cause Offense

I saw the following image shared on the Facebook yesterday and I wanted to offer something of a corrective to it.

A nativity set depicting the birth of Jesus is not likely to offend Muslims. Joseph, Mary, and Jesus are all highly revered in Islam. And the Quran repeatedly describes the virginal nature of Jesus' conception. In many ways Muslims are closer to a Christian understanding of Jesus than Jews (who those Christians who seem most upset by Muslims are likely to embrace).

Using the nativity stories of the Gospel to purposefully attempt to cause offense strikes me as counterproductive and anti-gospel.


Relate in the Book (the story of) Mary, when she withdrew from her family to a place in the East.

She placed a screen (to screen herself) from them; then We sent her our angel, and he appeared before her as a man in all respects.
She said: "I seek refuge from thee to (Allah) Most Gracious: (come not near) if thou dost fear Allah."
He said: "Nay, I am only a messenger from thy Lord, (to announce) to thee the gift of a holy son.
She said: "How shall I have a son, seeing that no man has touched me, and I am not unchaste?"
He said: "So (it will be): Thy Lord saith, 'that is easy for Me: and (We wish) to appoint him as a Sign unto men and a Mercy from Us':It is a matter (so) decreed."
So she conceived him, and she retired with him to a remote place.

Maryam 19:16 – 22 (Abdullah Yusufali translation)

Hero or Villain?

The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS or ISIL) is terrible and evil because of the way they have been destroying sacred monuments and holy sites.

King Josiah is a hero of the faith because of the way he pulled down and destroyed the high places and altars in Israel.  – “Even the altar at Bethel, the high place made by Jeroboam son of Nebat, who had caused Israel to sin--even that altar and high place he demolished. He burned the high place and ground it to powder, and burned the Asherah pole also.” 2 Kings 23: 15

ISIS or ISIL is disgusting and vile because they behead Christians.

The prophet Elijah is a hero of the faith because he hunted down and killed the priests of Ba’al.  “Then Elijah said, “Capture the prophets of Baal! Don’t let any of them run away!” The people captured all the prophets. Then Elijah led them down to the Kishon Valley, where he killed them.” 1 Kings 18: 40.

What is the standard of our outrage? 

Remove those Books from the Library! Remove those Books from the Bible!

Several parents in Duval County, Florida have submitted a petition to the Public School System to have children’s books set in Iraq and Afghanistan removed from school libraries. The two books, The Librarian of Basra and Nasreen’s Secret School, written by Jeanette Wilder are both based on true stories.

But why should we stop with the purging of elementary school libraries?  If it’s dangerous to allow our precious, innocent, impressionable children to be exposed to stories set in these dangerous (and Muslim!) locations, how much more treacherous is it have these kind of horror is our bibles, in our treasured scriptures?! I say we follow the example of these fearful parents and excise the following stories from our bibles as they contain “subject matter too heavy for children” and may expose them to the horrors of the world, and because they’re set in non-Christian countries like Iraq and Iran.  

Genesis chapter 1 – 11, 29 – 31,
Exodus
Ruth
Ezekiel
Daniel
Esther
Revelation

These books are far too dangerous for our children.

How Did We Go from This, to Being Afraid of Offending Christians?

I saw this meme being shared by some of my friends on the Facebook.  

And it bugged me.  So I created a couple of pics to share along with it. 

On July 27, 1996, Eric Rudolf set off a bomb at Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta during the Summer Games, killing two people and injuring more than 100.  

Anders Behring Breivik – Norway’s Christian Terrorist killed 8 people by setting off a bomb in a van, and then killed 69 people at a summer camp.

On July 27, 2008, Jim David Adkisson walked into the Knoxville Unitarian Universalist Church in Knoxville, Tennessee and began shooting people; two were killed, six others were injured

A Dangerous Expression of Christianity in America

You may have already seen some of the brouhaha on the internets over a homework assignment given by a Wisconsin teacher to her 10th grade US and World History class.  The students were challenged to write a typical five paragraph essay (a “hamburger essay”) imagining themselves to be a Muslim living in the US. The three body paragraphs of the essay were to describe the challenges that they might face and the struggles of their daily life. 

The outrage being expressed by some is as expected as it is lamentable. 

“I would go in, dressed all tattered and torn and turn in a charred piece of paper and say "I'm sorry but my assignment blew up before I could finish it."

“first off, my kids or grandkids wouldn't be learning about mulims, my assignment would of been IM AN AMERICAN, IM CHRISTIAN, THROW THEM OUT OF MY COUNTRY, gang rapers, murders, child molsters and this what you want to teach our children, shame on you, and this sh** they are teaching our kids now a days has got to stop, your the teacher, teach them our american ways, learning about culuture is one thing not about muslims, teach them the truth then”

“Most innappropriate! This has no place in a public school. [The teacher] needs to be suspended pending counseling on appropriate behavior and teaching methods.”

These comments were found at the Fox News Blog

Pair this story with the recent outrage and fury unleashed by those in response to President Obama’s remarks at the National Prayer Breakfast:

So how do we, as people of faith, reconcile these realities -- the profound good, the strength, the tenacity, the compassion and love that can flow from all of our faiths, operating alongside those who seek to hijack religious for their own murderous ends?

Humanity has been grappling with these questions throughout human history.  And lest we get on our high horse and think this is unique to some other place, remember that during the Crusades and the Inquisition, people committed terrible deeds in the name of Christ.  In our home country, slavery and Jim Crow all too often was justified in the name of Christ.

People responded with the same kind of vitriolic comments that we’ve come to expect: they denounced him as a Muslim, as anti-American, and on and on and on…

It seems to me that this combination of 1)an unwillingness to consider the point of view of “the other” as well as 2)an inability (or more accurately – a refusal) to think critically about our own history, our own failures – makes for a very ugly and a potentially very dangerous expression of Christianity in America.  

After

I wrote this poem a few years ago.  I don't remember now why I didn't post it here.  I post it now even though Ramadan, and the iftar meal will be celebrated in June - July.

***

After fasting, after days of self-reflection
            after prayer comes feasting,
            comes celebration.

Music plays and children laugh
as the dates are passed;
the iftar meal begins.
And father is home now.
He hugs those children
he so dearly missed.

After detention, after prison-camp interrogation
            after captivity comes release,
            comes freedom.

Unnoticed comes the bomber
with explosives strapped
to her breasts.
She exploded – ignoring the prophet’s words:
and take not life which Allah has made sacred
except by way of justice and law.

After detonation, after smoke and burning rubble
            after the blast comes blood,
            comes death.

Iftar is the meal that is celebrated at the end of the days of fasting during the month of Ramadan celebrated by Muslims.  On September16, 2008 a female suicide bomber blew herself up among police officers who were celebrating the release of a friend from a U.S. detention camp.  At least 20 were killed (including the man who’d been released, his parents and his two children) and 30 were wounded.

The quotation from the Quran is found at Al-Anam 6:151

The Soldiers of Christ / Allah / Israel

But the Soldiers of [Christ / Allah / Israel] may safely fight their battles …, fearing neither sin if they smite the enemy, nor danger at their own death; since to inflict death or to die for [Chris / Allah / Israel] it is no sin, but rather, an abundant claim to glory. In the first case one gains for [Christ / Allah / Israel], and in the second one gains [Christ / Allah / Israel] himself. …

The soldier of [Christ / Allah /Israel], I say, may strike with confidence and die yet more confidently, for he serves [Christ / Allah / Israel] when he strikes, and serves himself when he falls. Neither does he bear the sword in vain, for he is God's minister, for the punishment of evildoers and for the praise of the good. If he kills an evildoer it is not homicide, but, if I may so put it, malicide. He is evidently the avenger of [Christ / Allah / Israel] towards evildoers and he is rightly considered a defender of [Christians / Muslims / Israel]. Should he be killed himself, we know that he has not perished, but has come safely into port. When he inflicts death it is to [Christ's / Allah’s / Israel’s] profit, and when he suffers death, it is for his own gain. The [Christian / Muslim / Israeli] glories in the death of the pagan, because [Christ / Allah / Israel] is glorified; while the death of the [Christian / Muslim / Israeli] gives occasion for the King to show his liberality in the rewarding of his soldier. In the one case the just shall rejoice when he sees justice done, and in the other man shall say, truly there is a reward for the just; truly it is God who judges the earth.

If you find any one of these more acceptable – or more loathsome than the other two variations, you are a hypocrite.



The words come from Bernard of Clairveaux’s work Liber ad Milites Templi: De Laude Novae Militae (Book to the Knights of the Temple: In Praise of the New Knighthood) written sometime between 1120 and 1136 CE in defense of the newly formed Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and of the Temple of Solomon (the Knights Templar). I added the variations for comparison You can read most of the original (in English translation) here.

What I’m Reading: The Quran – With or Against the Bible?

In a very broad sense I could be called a Muslim and a follower of Allah – that is I could be described as one who submits to the will of God, one who follows and obeys God.  I can say the Takbir without any twinge or hesitation: Allahu Akbar, that is “God is great” or “the greatest.”  And I can also say the first part of the Shahada “la ‘ilaha ‘il allah…” or “there is no god but God…”

And after having read Ejaz Naqvi’s book The Quran: With or Against the Bible?[i] one could almost be excused for thinking that there is very little difference between the three major monotheistic faiths – Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.

Naqvi is writing to a non-Muslim audience – particularly in the west, that may not be familiar with the Quran - with the intent to clarify some of the misunderstandings that have been developing in recent years about what it is that the Quran actually says.  The emphasis of the book is on the many similarities that the Quran has with the Hebrew Bible and with the Christian New Testament. 

And there are many. 

God is one – Yes. Absolutely.  “Your God is one God; there is no one worth of worship except Him, the Compassionate, the Merciful.”2: 163

God is light – Yes, indeed.  “God is the light of the heavens and the earth…” 24:35

God is kind and forgiving - agreed.  “And He is the Oft-Forgiving, Full of Loving Kindness.” 85:14

The book is a terrific corrective for those who think that all Muslims are bad and that the Quran is an evil book.  Naqvi’s book is a great place to begin.  It is not a commentary on or an exegesis of the Quran.  Instead it focuses very narrowly on the many similarities between the monotheist scriptures – so that there might be civil discussion between us – and that the widening gulf between us might be bridged.

Some issues however:

1. A glossary and an index would have been helpful.

2.  I tried to read it for what Naqvi had to say about the Quran, rather than nitpicking his description of the Hebrew Bible/ and New Testament – but sometimes what he said was just … well … wrong.
For example at one point early on he wrote, “It is interesting to note that the word ‘Quran’ itself has been noted in the Quran at least seventy times.  The word ‘Gospel’ is not found in current versions of the Bible... (Navqi, 17)”  

3. At times Navqi sounded very much like some of the Young Earth Creationist Christians.  His arguments for the ‘divine nature’ of the Quran are exactly those of the YEC for the divine inspiration of the Old and New Testaments.  He refers to portions of the Quran which can be interpreted in such a way as to refer to the expansion of the universe, human embryology, and other scientific concepts unknown or not understood in the 7^th century CE in the same way that Ken Ham and others like him find dinosaurs and the water cycle and so on in the pages of the Bible. 

4. Navqi gives very little time to the varying opinions and interpretations of the Quran by Islamic scholars.  He presents Islam and the Quran as a largely monolithic entity.    But just as there are any number of opinions among faithful Jews and Christians, there are differing understandings within Islam.  Yet Navqi doesn’t delve into that much.   

5. Navqi’s goal is to highlight the similarities but also to downplay the more problematic areas.  He smoothes over some issues – like the equality of women – which he says that the Quran affirms and briefly mentions that not all Islamic scholars agree  - and the role of Jihad – which he says the Quran defines as either A) personal and spiritual or B) as an armed conflict for self defense.  He says nothing about why some followers of Islam interpret it otherwise.

This is not necessarily a fault.  He makes it clear in the introduction – and again in the conclusion that he intends to highlight those areas of common agreement and not the divisive issues.  He leaves it to the interested reader to pursue those on his/her own. (367)

6. While it may be true – in a broad sense – that I could call myself a Muslim (a submitter) and a follower of Allah (God) – I could not really wear that designation.  I cannot finish the Shahada - "There is no god but God, Muhammad is the messenger of God."     While I am very pleased to learn more about the Quran, and to find more and more common ground between us, I am not convinced of its claims.  

Still – there is much that can and should unite us between its pages, if we would only see it.

---

[i] Naqvi, Ejaz The Quran: With or Against the Bible?  iUniverse, Inc, Bloomington, IN, 2012. 

Call to Prayer in the Rain

During our time here in Israel so far the skies have been dark and hazy with dust blown up into the air; there hasn't been rain to keep it down.  But it rained in Jerusalem today, something of a blessing to farmers worrying about having to harvest crops much earlier than usual because of the lack of rainfall.

Near our hotel is this mosque.  I recorded part of this evening's call to prayer along with the sounds of the rain and traffic in the streets below.

Can You Imagine the Outcry If …

Christians in America certainly seem to be an overly defensive lot, sometimes.  We get all out of sorts when we feel like we're being slighted.  We get indignant at offenses – at real offenses and, more often than not, at perceived offenses.   

And then to cover our indignation we have taken to saying things like “Can you imagine the outcry from Muslims if Allah had been mocked this way?”  (A backhanded way of saying that Muslims are overly sensitive and reactionary and prone to violence)

But this is whining.  This is petty. It does no good to say “well at least I'm not as bad as so-and-so,” which is, essentially, what this whine boils down to.

So what? If Jesus is slighted in the media?  So what?  He’s a big boy.  He knows how to deal with it.  And so what? If some followers of Islam react violently to perceived insults to their faith?  That doesn't give us license to behave badly ourselves.  And comparing our faults to the faults of others doesn't make ours disappear.