Armando Iannucci on the Pope, Islam, and progress

Armando Ianucci wrote brilliantly, today, on the ridiculousness of the controversy over the Pope's comments on Islam.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/story/0,,1879703,00.html

The situation is ridiculous because the quotation, though unfair to the important moral and cultural legacy that Islam has served in much of the world, was also largely true.

The Pope quoted a 14th-century Byzantine emperor as saying: "Show me just what Muhammad brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached."

Now, I don't know how wise and politically astute it was to call Islam evil. But his reference both to the legacy of forced faith and coversion by the sword is definitely a true legacy of Islam, as it is of Catholicism and Christianity, generally. And it's definitely roughly an "evil and inhuman" legacy, if you care at all about people getting killed because they won't convert to a religious faith. And what's really pissing of Muslims around the world today, I think, is that it is wholly relevant to far too much support by Muslims and non-Muslims, alike, for terrorism and violence to achieve political ends that need more dialogue and engagement and far, far less violence and intimidation to resolve the issues that the violence is meant to resolve, and clearly hasn't, no matter how many decades it has been used.

And at some level, I think what the Pope is saying is that if you don't like the legacy, perhaps Muslims should stop making excuses both for its history and its present in the form of terrorism in the name of Muslim values or Muslim identity or really terrrorism for any reason whatsoever. And if it pisses you off, perhaps murder for a religious or political end should piss you off more.

Do I think it was the wisest thing to say? No. But do I think it was accurate? Accurate enough, I think. And does there need to be a conversation about getting Muslims off of using the Koran or Islam or religious to excuse every murderous, violent, anti-Semetic, anti-Israeli, anti-American, anti-Western, anti-anything-that-would-rationalize-terrorism impulse that Muslims might have? Yes. And that is the real issue here, not whether Islam is inherently evil or inhuman, which is clearly is not.

Islam is clearly a very important and worthy religion and moral tradition in much of the world and worthy of study and respect by all peoples of the world.

And, like Christianity and Judaism, it is a legacy that is also rife with all kinds of dark impulses that it's adherents don't like to acknowledge.

And as Iannucci makes clear in this satire, what really is at stake in this and most divisions in the world, right now, is whether rationality and reason is going to will out, or whether the will to power, religious fervor, the forces of repression, or other illiberal forces are going to will out.

Iannucci sums up the case for rational progress in his quotation of President Warren Harding at the Republican Party convention in 1912. Harding argued:

'Progression is not proclamation nor palaver. It is not pretence nor play on prejudice. It is not of personal pronouns nor perennial pronouncement. It is not the perturbation of a people passion-wrought, nor a promise proposed. Progression is everlastingly lifting the standards that marked the end of the world's march yesterday and planting them on new and advanced heights today.'

Progress is lifting our sights higher, not bullshitting our way into oblivion. Progress follows the light of truth, not the propaganda and spin of the will to power. Progress, as Pope Benedict was arguing with his quotation, does not come at the blade of a sword (generally). Progress comes with the lifting of conscience above our the petty or vengeful historical moment. Progress comes with ideals lifted high, not by leaving our hearts and minds in the muck of a cynical past or present.

It's worth repeating:

"Progression is everlastingly lifting the standards that marked the end of the world's march yesterday and planting them on new and advanced heights today.'"

There's only one way out of our current political malaise. And it by raising our expectations for the future.

Thomas Hobbes did so for the world more than 300 years ago. Enlightenment thinkers like him did the same for a world lost in religious and political strife. It is time, today, that we did the same again.

Love,
Ben