You're not HELPing....

[Note: I had not heard about the definitive canceling of the book-burning before writing this. I am glad it was canceled, but I think the sentiment in here is important anyhow (because someone else out there is surely contemplating something similar), so I'm leaving this up.]

Dear Pastor Book-burner,

I know that's not your name, and that you, strictly speaking, haven't burned books yet. (Or at least not the books you're getting known for wanting to burn. Who knows what you've done in your spare time before?) But that's what you're currently getting famous for. Whether or not you go through with it, right now what you're mainly known for is: "The guy who thinks burning a religion's holy book will accomplish anything meaningful."

I'm not going to try to dissuade you from your belief Islam is from the devil. If meeting with actual Muslims and hearing from many leaders of your own religion expressing the contrary wasn't sufficient to make you rethink this, someone like me isn't going to make a dent. Nor am I going to spend much time reminding you that you're supposed to love your neighbor; you're hardly alone amongst American Christians who seem to have forgotten that you're supposed to be doing that, as witness many of my other posts.

But I am going to ask you this: What in God's name is wrong with you? Do you really think this would accomplish anything? Even if you were right (and you're not), burning some copies of a freely available book would accomplish nothing useful. All it would do is piss off a lot of Muslims, many of whom would use it as concrete evidence that Americans are fascists who are out to destroy their religion. It would not in any way stop the religion from being practiced or spread in this country; copies of the book in this country are extremely easy to get ahold of, and they can print more. It would certainly not stop the religion from being practiced or spread in the countries where the extremists live... but it would endanger Christians in reach of those people, who are (you may have noticed) prone to retaliation when they feel attacked.

Oh, and it makes our country and religion look really barbaric in the eyes of civilized people who recall that, typically, the book-burners and the fascists have been the same people.

You're entitled to your opinion about the religion. You're entitled to think or even say anything you like about it... if you can find someone who wants to listen to you spread your hate (which, as a Christian, is pretty much the opposite of what you should be doing). You're even entitled to have a book barbecue; strictly speaking, it's your right as a free American to be a total moron.

But an empty, dramatic gesture like this that harms peace sounds a lot more like the work of the devil than it does of God to me.