Iconophili's Great Big Thread of Conspiracies!

[joasia]

Tessa,

Also another thing that has come to mind is the Tower of Babel in the Old Testament. It's kind of creepy how the buildings themselves have almost underwent some sort of Deification, their images are everywhere-from tattoos to t-shirts, gold pendants to adhesive cutouts you can paste on your windshield. People are worshiping the "tower(s)"

That IS an intriguing point. It certainly has created some kind of psychological sensitivity. Times will be referred to as pre- and post Twin Towers.

In Christ,

Joanna

[Kollyvas]

http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/01/09/D8F19DCO0.html

Pope Says Terrorism Is 'Moral Perversion'
Jan 09 12:00 PM US/Eastern
Email this story

By NICOLE WINFIELD
Associated Press Writer

VATICAN CITY

Pope Benedict XVI condemned terrorism as a "moral perversion" and demanded religious freedom around the globe Monday in an annual foreign-policy speech to Vatican-based diplomats.

Benedict stressed the need for forgiveness and reconciliation to bring peace in armed conflicts around the world. And he told the ambassadors that wealthy countries must do more for the world's poor. Even half of what they spend on weapons "would be more than sufficient to liberate the immense masses of the poor from destitution," he said.

Benedict described a global "clash of civilizations" taking root and said the danger was made even greater by terrorism, whose causes he attributed to politics as well as "aberrant religious ideas."

"No situation can justify such criminal activity, which covers the perpetrators with infamy, and it is all the more deplorable when it hides behind religion, thereby bringing the pure truth of God down to the level of the terrorists' own blindness and moral perversion," he said.

Benedict stressed the need for all human rights to be respected, but said religious freedom was most important because it involves "the most important of human relationships: our relationship with God," he said.

"Unfortunately, in some states, even among those who can boast centuries-old cultural traditions, freedom of religion, far from being guaranteed, is seriously violated, especially where minorities are concerned," he said.

He did not name any countries, but the Vatican has in the past expressed concern about the plight of Roman Catholic minorities in China, in Saudi Arabia and elsewhere in the Middle East, as well as in the former Soviet bloc where Orthodox Christianity is dominant.

"To all those responsible for the life of nations, I wish to state: if you do not fear truth, you need not fear freedom!" Benedict said.

Benedict has indicated that he wanted to restore the diplomatic ties with China that were severed a half-century ago.

He did not repeat that message Monday, but a former Vatican foreign minister said China remained the top political priority for the pope's diplomatic initiatives.

"He is ready to open up, to enter into a concrete dialogue with China," Cardinal Achille Silvestrini told the church-affiliated Telepace TV.

The top religious priority for Benedict was unifying with the Russian Orthodox Church, Silvestrini said during a panel discussion to analyze the pope's speech.

"The Orthodox are certainly among the most immediate objectives of this pontificate," he said.

The pope mentioned a few specific conflicts in his speech, reaffirming that Israel has a right to live in peace "in conformity with the norms of international law," while the Palestinians must be allowed to develop democratic institutions for their future.

He said forgiveness was particularly necessary in Iraq, "which in the past years has suffered daily from violent acts of terrorism."

Lebanese people must rediscover "their historic vocation to promote sincere and fruitful cooperation between different faith communities," he said.

He also mentioned Africa's Great Lakes region and Darfur, Sudan, where "defenseless people (have been) subject to deplorable violence."

But Benedict spent the bulk of his speech, delivered in French, arguing that world peace can only come from a search for truth, and that truth brings about reconciliation and hope for the future.

Benedict has often spoken about the need for the world to rediscover that there are some absolute truths in life. He has decried a "dictatorship of relativism" _ the ideology that there are no absolute truths _ that he says is taking hold in the modern world.

[ICONOPHILI]

Ever notice how "Al-Qaida" doesn't realy attack Isreal, Get ready to loose your "Constitutional Rights" Once and For All! : http://judicial-inc.biz/Nuclear_attacks_on_america.htm

[ioannis]

I have no doubt the end of the world is coming, but these conspiracy theories are just stupid sometimes.

It starts out...

The Zionists, who control the Federal Reserve, have used fiat credit to create an enormous inflation for the past 40 years. They used this wealth transfer to buy hard assets, especially monetary metals such as gold, as well as oil, knowing the coming financial crisis will demand a new currency, and that currency will be commodity-based. The only reason we are in Iraq is so Israel can control the world's oil, of which Iraq has massive reserves. Their final targets are Iran, and Venezuela, due to those nations also having massive oil reserves.

May I ask at this point:
-Prove they have world dominating amounts of commodities.
-Demonstrate we are in Iraq for the oil, we nobody has been able to get really and now we just want out.
-how is Venezuela such a rich oil target for Isreal and not Russia??

I'm sorry, the writing cannot expect a reasonable person to just swallow these mini theories and move on as if they were true. They don't even make good logic.

[ICONOPHILI]

Now The Elite wants the Bush Adiministration to keep us scared, so latter on in the future we will give up our "Constitutional Rights" to "BE SAFE" http://www.propagandamatrix.com/article ... orcard.htm

[Kollyvas]

(PICS)

http://directionstoorthodoxy.org/mod/ne ... le_id=7031

Indonesia's capital, Jakarta, demonstrators make their feelings felt in front of the Danish embassy. Islam-West divide 'grows deeper'
BBC

Malaysia's prime minister says a huge chasm has opened between the West and Islam, fuelled by Muslim frustrations over Western foreign policy.

Abdullah Badawi, seen as promoting a moderate form of Islam in largely Muslim Malaysia, said many Westerners saw Muslims as congenital terrorists.

As he spoke at a conference in Kuala Lumpur, thousands protested outside at cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad.

Their publication in Europe has led to demonstrations across the Muslim world.

Paper shut

Friday's demonstration was the biggest in Malaysia's capital for years.

"Long live Islam. Destroy Denmark. Destroy Israel. Destroy George Bush. Destroy America," protesters shouted as they marched to the Danish embassy in the rain from a nearby mosque.

"The West should treat Islam the way it wants Islam to treat the West and vice versa - they should accept one another as equals " Abdullah Badawi

The satirical cartoons include an image portraying Muhammad with a bomb in his turban. Islamic tradition explicitly prohibits any depiction of Allah and the Prophet.

The cartoons were first published by a Danish newspaper in September, but have since been reprinted in several other European publications.

On Thursday, Mr Abdullah shut indefinitely a Borneo-based paper, the Sarawak Tribune, for reprinting the cartoons.

He described their publication as "insensitive and irresponsible". The paper had apologised for what it called an editorial oversight.

The prime minister had also declared possession of the cartoons illegal.

In other developments:

There have been more angry Muslim protests around the world, as here in Nairobi, Kenya, to condemn the publication of cartoons satirizing the Prophet Muhammad.
In the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, security forces fire tear gas to disperse hundreds of protesters trying to march on the Danish embassy

The culture editor of Jyllands-Posten, the newspaper which first published the cartoons, is sent on leave for an indefinite period, as the editor of a Norwegian magazine that reprinted them apologises

A Swedish internet service provider shuts down the website of a right-wing anti-immigrant party which invited readers to send in cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad

Around 10,000 Muslims stage a silent protest rally in Bhopal, India, carrying banners reading: "Stop all anti-Islamic activities... Do not invite disaster."

Hundreds of international peacekeepers and Afghan soldiers prevent demonstrators entering the Afghan capital, Kabul

Around 3,000 Muslims march in the Bangladeshi capital, Dhaka, and more than 4,000 in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, in demonstrations organised by hardline Islamists

Thousands march in an Islamic Jihad demonstration in Gaza City, joined by members of other militant groups

Nato defence ministers seek to soothe the dispute in scheduled talks with counterparts from six Arab nations in Sicily.

'Demonisation widespread'

Addressing an international conference intended to promote dialogue between Western and Islamic thinkers, Mr Abdullah said Islam and the West should stop demonising each other, and try to curb extremism and promote moderation.

CARTOON ROW
30 Sept 2005: Danish paper publishes cartoons
20 Oct: Muslim ambassadors complain to Danish PM
10 Jan 2006: Norwegian publication reprints cartoons
26 Jan: Saudi Arabia recalls its ambassador
31 Jan: Danish paper apologises
1 Feb: Papers in France, Germany, Italy and Spain reprint cartoons
4-5 Feb: Danish embassies in Damascus and Beirut attacked
6-7 Feb: At least eight killed in Afghanistan as security forces try to suppress protests
9 Feb: Hundreds of thousands protest in Beirut

He said mere talk and being nice to one another were not enough, and mutual respect should replace hegemony.

"They think Osama bin Laden speaks for the religion and its followers," he said, quoted by the Associated Press news agency.

"The demonisation of Islam and the vilification of Muslims, there is no denying, is widespread within mainstream Western society."

But Muslims for their part had to avoid "sweeping denunciation of Christians, Jews and the West", he added.

"The West should treat Islam the way it wants Islam to treat the West and vice versa. They should accept one another as equals," he said.

The BBC's Jonathan Kent in Kuala Lumpur says that if this speech had been made by a firebrand or a radical it might more easily be dismissed as rhetoric, but Mr Abdullah has been avidly calling for Muslims worldwide to embrace education, science, technology and development, while rejecting extremism.

While Western diplomats at the meeting were unwilling to accept a link between Western military intervention and Islamic radicalism, he says, it remains one widely believed across the Muslim world.

Malaysia is currently the head of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference.

[Kollyvas]

(PICS)

http://directionstoorthodoxy.org/mod/ne ... le_id=7026

What's worth fighting for?

by Phil Lawler
special to CWNews.com

Shiite Muslim supporters of the Hezbollah group raise their fists as they shout pro-Imam Hussein slogans while wearing bandanas reading 'Here I Am At Your Service Muhammad' during a march to mark Ashoura day in the suburbs of Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, Feb. 9, 2006. Ashoura day is the remembrance of the 680 A.D. battle in which their saint and grandson of Islam's prophet Muhammad, Hussein, was killed by rivals cementing the split in Islam between Shiites and Sunnis. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Tawil)
Feb. 09 (CWNews.com) - "Ultimately, there is no compromise," writes Daniel Pipes of the Middle East Forum. "Westerners will either retain their civilization, including the right to insult and blaspheme, or not."

Is "the right to insult and blaspheme" an intrinsic aspect of our civilization? Maybe so. Freedom of speech necessarily entails the freedom to say things that others may find offensive. Still, is it necessary to applaud insult and blasphemy? Or to put it another way, is it wrong for government officials to say that some expressions are tasteless?

Pipes, in a CNSNews column, answers that question with an emphatic Yes. He finds it offensive that some government leaders have apologized for the cartoons that Muslims find offensive.

Fair enough. As long as he's not using violence (like Islamic fundamentalists), or trying to shut down the presses (like tyrannical governments), he can express his views freely. And we can disagree.

My disagreement with Pipes began with the first paragraph of his column:

The key issue at stake in the battle over the twelve Danish cartoons of the Muslim prophet Muhammad is this: will the West stand up for its customs and mores, including freedom of speech, or will Muslims impose their way of life on the West?
Here Pipes falls into the same mistake that has weakened Europe in the face of militant Islam. The West is locked in a global struggle against militant Islam. And what is at stake is far more important than "customs and mores." If you classify freedom of speech in the category "Customs and Mores," you're already in trouble.

Daniel Pipes in a perceptive, intellectual observer of world affairs. I feel sure that he did not intend to suggest that freedom of speech is merely a matter of social custom. But the fact that he would slip into that error, on a topic of such fundamental importance, reflects a confusion that is all too common among political analysts. This confusion arises from a failure to distinguish between matters of taste, which are determined by individual choice, and first principles, which are based on logic and faith.

Militant Muslims have no uncertainties about their own beliefs. But in the West, and particularly in the intellectual salons of old, jaded Europe, belief itself is unpopular. No longer prepared to speak about truth and natural law, a weary generation instead clings to its preferred "values" and "customs." But values and customs are things that you choose to uphold, recognizing that others may choose differently. In this respect they are very different from truths, which remain true whether or not you choose to accept them.

As we call for the defense of Western society, let's be clear what we're defending. The cartoons that originally appeared in a Danish publication are not the fundamental issue here; the issue is freedom of expression. The cartoons themselves were vulgar and offensive; they offered no particular insight and expressed no sentiment more profound than simple contempt for Muslims. There is no reason to applaud their publication. But even as we regret their appearance, we can defend the publisher's right to print them, because something much more important is at stake.

In Western society, our system of government is constructed upon the truths of natural law. If you recognize the truths which the American Founders declared to be "self-evident," then the right to freedom of speech follows-- not as a custom, which might be altered with the passage of time and circumstances, but as a fundamental human right, which should be always and everywhere defended.

Islam is on the rise all around the world-- and again, particularly in Europe-- because Muslims are clear in their beliefs and unapologetic in advancing them. If we in the West are not equally clear about our beliefs, we are at a severe disadvantage. What are the fundamental beliefs that Europeans will defend at any cost? If there are none, then the eventual Islamicization of Europe is a foregone conclusion.

Ultimately this conflict is a clash of beliefs, a clash of faiths. Those who have abandoned their faith are entering the battle unarmed.