RUTHFULLY YOURS

Fox News host Bill O’Reilly was right when he insisted that Abders Behring Breivik, who committed mass murders in Norway in July, is not a Christian. Even though Breivik referred to himself often as a Christian, Mr. O’Reilly noted, no one who slaughters innocents can be a follower of Jesus Christ, the Prince of Peace.

The Bible says “Thou shall Not Kill.” The Bible says we should love our neighbor as ourselves. Those are the values of a true Christian.

Related Video

Editorial page editor Paul Gigot and deputy editorial page editor Dan Henninger reflect on 9/11.

Now I hope that people of all faiths will accept my assertion that those who kill innocents in the name of Allah are not true Muslims. That’s a much harder thing for Christians and Westerners to accept. In the immediate aftermath of the horror in Norway, Western news media leapt to the assumption it was the work of Muslim terrorists.

When I launched my effort last year to build an Islamic Community Center in Lower Manhattan as part of reconciliation after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the vitriol hurled against me and Islam was overwhelming. Islam is evil, our critics said. The only good Muslim is a dead Muslim.

It is little wonder, then, that the screeds of the sharpest critics of our community center showed up in the 1,500-page manifesto Breivik wrote to explain his actions. Hate breeds hate.

But the fact is that true adherence to Islam at its essence is as peaceful as true adherence to Christianity. The Holy Quran says that whoever kills an innocent, it is as if he has killed all mankind. True adherence to Islam would end terrorist attacks not just against civilians in the West but also among Muslim groups that still are blowing each other up in Iraq and Afghanistan.

At some point, we must recognize that the real battlefield in this world is not between Muslims and non-Muslims but between extremists of any stripe and the anti-extremists of all faiths.

We hear very little about the underlying fundamentals of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. These are three faiths based on the Abrahamic principle that the purpose of humankind is to praise God and to help each other. The tenets of each religion provide common ground to work out the underlying issues of power and control that actually are at the root of conflict.

Moderate people in the West and the Muslim world understand this. But too often, especially in this time of indiscriminate communication, the moderates have let themselves be hijacked by extremists.

It’s time to build a Global Coalition of the Moderates. This may sound like a wimpy thing, but I can tell you from hard experience, moderation is a dangerous place to be. It takes courage and stamina to stand up to the people who love their megaphones and nurture their hatred.

We must start with this premise: Extremists can never live together in peace. Conflict for them must be eternal. That’s why the Coalition of the Moderates must work together—different religions not just in toleration of each other but in acceptance of each other.

We must use the basic peaceful principles of our religions to overwhelm the extremists. In this way, religion can be part of the solution, not the cause of the problem.

I ask my brothers and sisters of all faiths, especially members of the media, to join hands with me in building that future.

Imam Rauf is the founder of Cordoba Initiative, an independent, multifaith and multinational project that works to improve Muslim-West relations.