A Little Nuance, Please

Reasonable people are upset by the actions of violent mobs, especially when they seem motivated by religious extremism. Yesterday and today we were surprised and saddened to hear what took place in Niamey, Niger with churches burned and people killed all because a thoughtless cartoonist insulted their prophet.

Today in church we heard a different perspective on these events from someone who has lived as a Christian and church leader in Niger. He stood up to ask for prayer for his country. Some of the things he said can add layers of understanding to our perspective of the situation and therefore deserve our attention.

1. One Muslim friend that he called told him, "Hearing your voice on the phone has made tears come to my eyes. I am so ashamed at what my co-religionists are doing."
2. He claims that the violence has a political aspect. The president of the country has resisted islamization and supported religious tolerance. His opponents have taken advantage of the offensive cartoon to inflame the hearts of uninformed people and lead them to mob action.
3. One group after burning a church knew that the people across the street from the church were believers in Jesus so they came after them. The head of the family met them in the yard. He said, "I know you want to burn my house, but before you do may I ask you a question?" They agreed so he continued, "You all believe in God, right? Do you also believe that God wants you to do wrong because this is wrong!"
   While they mulled that over, the neighbors from next door came up and stood between the attackers and the Christian family. They said to the crowd, "We are Muslims like you and these people are Christians. However we have lived next to them since the 1980's. We have only had good relations with them and see no reason for you to hurt them." They then took the children to shelter them in their home while the crowd (who sadly were not dissuaded) ransacked and destroyed the house.

What do we learn from his account? One, that even when extremists succeed in rabble-rousing there is often a majority of people who completely reject that dark-hearted mentality. Pockets of decency and kindness are found in the midst of deplorable circumstances. We have to avoid painting groups of people with too wide of a brush, even as we deplore the misdeeds of some of them. Yes there are Muslims who have a hateful agenda of violent domination but there are even more who do not. The more hawkish among us need to be balanced by others who can resist a subgroup without rejecting the people as a whole.