In India they get along *relatively well*. Most of the problems there are actually
instigated by Hindu nationalists, not Muslims. Muslims are a minority in India, but
given India's
size it actually works out that it's the world's largest Muslim country, which is kind
of weird.
Let's see -- Indonesia was relatively peaceful except in one area (the Celebes --
can't remember the new, Indonesian name for the province) where there was strife
between new Muslim
immigrants from overcrowded Java and Christians who had been living there already. But
Hindus and Muslims seem to get along on Bali, which is majority Hindu.
Some of the Gulf states are surprisingly tolerant. The Church is actually allowed to
own land in Oman, for instance. But Christianity isn't (yet) on the Omanis' radar
scope. I'd say
the same about Qatar. Don't know about Bahrein, Kuwait or the UAE.
Iraq is, in a way, an ironic example. It's an ethnically complex place, where Shiite
Moslems are in the majority, in the old Turkish province of Basra (the lower
Tigris-Euphrates
delta), although Baghdad and area is mostly Sunni Moslem, and they have more influence
than the Shiites. We know about the atrocious treatment of the Kurds by Saddam, but
the weird
thing is that Iraq (like Syria) considers itself a secular state and both are
one-party states. But the party is the Baath party (I think that's Arabic for unity or
something like
that, I can't remember) and it was founded by a Syrian Christian ("Syrian" in this
sense meaning not the country but the religion -- I have "The God of Small Things" by
Arundathi Roy
on my "to read" stack by my bed, and it's a story about India's Syrian Christians.
They've been in the area between Lebanon and India for centuries and claim to have
been founded by
the apostle Thomas). Saddam personally is an atheist and I don't know much about the
new ruler of Syria, the son of Hafez al-Assad who took over when his father died, but
the Assads
are Alawites, the "Jehovah's Witnesses of Islam," by which I mean a despised sect
which attracts lower middle class and poor people primarily and which most Moslems
don't consider to
be true Islam (sound familiar? I'd say Ismailis, another group, are the "LDS of Islam,
" but I'm digressing).
So Christians have done okay in Iraq; less well in Syria.
Turkey is majority Moslem, but of a moderate kind, and it, too, is officially a
secular state. People will immediately remind me of the Armenian massacre and the
current difficulties
with Kurds, but from the Turkish pov those were anti-secession issues, not
maltreatment of minorities as such. Christians and even Jews are tolerated in Turkey
(there are even LDS
branches there now, which are mostly for ex-pats and military types, but I know one
Turk personally who's joined in AIstanbul and lives there -- I sent him a copy of
"Guess Who Wants
You for Lunch?" an apologetics book written for inexperienced missionaries (I gave one
to my son, and FAIR has, to give the book a plug, just reprinted it -- it's an
excellent
introduction and a book I'd recommend that every ward missionary have just in case
they face "contaminated" investigators [nothing works against insincere
investigators]).
Malaysia's perhaps the best example I can think of. It's mostly Moslem but tolerates
its religious minorities. The problems there are language-based: Malays versus Chinese.
I don't know a lot about the Central Asia "Stans" (Uzbek and his gang, Turkmen,
Kirgyz, etc.) but I know the Church is legal in several of them and there's an
official branch (not
just for ex-pats) in Almaty, Kazakhstan's largest city, and I believe one of the other
Stans recently recognized the Church, too.
Egypt has traditionally been tolerant of its minorities (10% of the population is
Coptic Christian and there used to be a large Jewish colony in Alexandria) but
fundamentalists have
ruined that, I'm afraid. Sudan? Fuhgedaboutit. Most of the other African countries
where Moslems are in a majority are relatively tolerant of others, but in a
"federative sense" --
Nigeria, for instance, allows its states a lot of power, and several of them in the
north have declared Sharia to be their law, which is a sure sign of intolerance, in my
opinion. But
most of Nigeria's senior military officers seem to come from the Moslem north for some
reason, and they've been relatively successful at holding a very complex federation
together.
That's just a rough survey off the top of my head.
Grampa Bill wrote:
> > From: "Marc A. Schindler" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Culturally speaking, the further north you go the more Moslems there are. Bouaké,
>the main city in
> > northern Cote d'Ivoire is in an area with a lot of Muslims, and fundamentalists
>there are trying to foment a secessionist revolt.
> ========================
> Grampa Bill asks:
> Is there an area anywhere in the world where Muslims constitute a majority or a
>sizable minority in which they get along with their neighbors? If not, is there a
>message here?
> Love y'all,
> Grampa Bill in Sabvannah
>
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--
Marc A. Schindler
Spruce Grove, Alberta, Canada -- Gateway to the Boreal Parkland
"The greater danger for most of us lies not in setting our aim too high and falling
short; but in setting our aim too low, and achieving our mark."
--Michelangelo Buonarroti
Note: This communication represents the informal personal views of the author solely;
its contents do not necessarily reflect those of the author’s employer, nor those of
any
organization with which the author may be associated.
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