Welcome to the Liberty Insider.
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This is a program bringing you
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discussion,
analysis, news, views
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and general information
on religious liberty.
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My name is Lincoln Steed,
Editor of Liberty Magazine
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and my guest on the
program is Melissa Reid.
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We worked
together on several things
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but the title I want to give you
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is associate director of the
North American Public Affairs
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and Religious Liberty Department
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of the
Seventh-day Adventist Church.
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Well, thank you so much
for having me here today.
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I appreciate it.
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Yeah, it's good to have you
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and let's get into
the big discussion.
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We won't talk
about North America
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let's talk about the world.
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Oh, wow.
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The whole world is in affirmant
on religious entitlement
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if you like.
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The Bible
actually speaks about it.
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You know, the weak will
say I'm strong and, you know,
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and everybody wants their thing.
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Since 9/11 the war on terrorist,
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so they focused
their view on Islam
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and its radical expression
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but it's a bit
wider than that, isn't it?
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Have you seen signs around
the world of other religions
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in conflict with either
themselves or another group?
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Right.
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Well, unfortunately there
is not really an exception.
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Is there? No.
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I mean, anyway we
look it's just, you know,
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religiously motivated violence
in one way or the other.
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Whether it's, you
know, within a faith group
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or whether it's one faith group
against another unfortunately
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and it's so
countered to, you know,
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to our God of love
and our God of peace
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that it's just incredible
that the-- that's the,
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you know, the
reality we live in.
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I tried to analyze
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and it's possible
the modernizing forces,
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the modern culture and
technology has brought,
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has put stresses on
all faiths, it's possible.
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I tend to think that
while that's at work,
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what's really happened
is as a general disillusion
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and decaying set in
with all the ideologies.
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Remember communism collapsed
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just before the year 2000
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was 92 or
something around there.
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Even though China continues
it's not really communism.
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You know, its communism
discredited, capitalism.
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I know it dies hard with,
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perhaps the
Republican Party in the US
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but capitalism is not
held in higher statement.
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Even the Pope was
bold enough to criticize it
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before Congress recently.
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Imperialism
certainly out of vogue.
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And so all the isms
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and all of the old
structures are gone.
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Even nationalism not
a big thing nowadays.
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Globalism is the thing. It is.
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So what I see happening
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is all of these old
structures are fading away,
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economies are collapsing
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and what are
people throwing back on.
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They have to have
some group identity.
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Yes.
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Sometimes it's tribal
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but more often it's
a religious identity.
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Absolutely.
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You know, there is
this warning I think,
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I agree with you that there
is this sort of dissatisfaction
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and, you know, looking around
sort of the state of the world
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its kind of understandable
that people are dissatisfied.
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You know, there are such
terrible things happening,
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injustice is
happening but I think, you know,
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rather than they're reacting,
you know, in appropriate way
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and certainly they are just
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sort of adding to the situation.
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And so well, it might be
understandable that, you know,
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that this is that
they are dissatisfied
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or they are
unhappy with circumstances
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this is certainly, you know,
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the wrong way to go
about making changes.
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Well, I don't know
that people always, I mean,
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maybe some of the
thinkers and the leaders
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who could be more comfortable
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but the mass of people
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they don't think,
they just respond.
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Absolutely.
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And, you know, the US history
there was a great conflict
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precipitated by immigration
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when the Irish
in particular came.
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Most of them
were Roman Catholics.
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A religious element kicked
in but what really started
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it was these were
people in competition
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for the jobs of prior Americans
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who were already
economically stressed
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so they didn't think it through.
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It's just that I'm
threatened, my job may go
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and here a guy that, you know,
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that follows the
Pope and all the rest who,
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you know, I've got a
deep prejudice against.
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So that's the
level that kicked in on.
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Even I think with Al-Qaeda.
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It didn't start off
just pure religious malice.
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It started that they were
the interference of the west
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in Saudi Arabia garrison troops
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that garrison American
troop garrisons in Saudi Arabia
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that offended the
religious sensibilities
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and it sort of blossomed,
and it's not a question
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that the western world
is sort of in your face
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for a lot of the Middle East
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and that had been
in rejection anyway.
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Religion makes it,
religious always, well,
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you've heard me talking
about Christopher Hitchens
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who is dead now, not someone
I agree with him on any levels
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but his analysis was correct
because he says in his book
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religion spoils everything.
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He didn't like religion.
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But religion, since
it's such a powerful force
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can spoil everything
because it's so powerful.
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Once it gets involved
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and a person's
view of the hereafter,
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you know, absolute
good and evil kicks in
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you got a
serious conflict in play.
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Right.
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I'm looking, I'm
thinking about Europe
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and the refugee
or immigration crisis
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that we've seen there, you know,
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individuals from Syria fleeing
just these terrible situations
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where they are being persecuted.
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Civil war.
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Civil war happening
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and so your heart goes
out to those individuals
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as they are
trying to escape this.
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You know, they have been
experiencing this for years.
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However, you then can
understand why there is,
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you know, in
Europe where unemployment,
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in various countries,
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their unemployment
rates are very high.
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You know, they are very
anxious about all the sudden
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all these individuals now coming
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and, you know, like you said
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making the economic
situation vulnerable,
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making their own personal
economic situation vulnerable.
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So it's understandable I
think in a lot of different ways
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but I think we never
want to be motivated by fear.
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No. You know, we always--
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But we need to recognize
the historical underpinnings
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as you are explaining
about Europe, think about it.
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Genghis Khan and his
group got on the move
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and that changed
the ancient world.
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The Germanic tribes
moved through Europe
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and down into Italy
and the Roman Empire fell.
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We know that
happened people movements
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that is of the most dramatic
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and confrontational
elements of human history.
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There would be genocide,
there would be dislocation,
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there would be hatred
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and there was in
those incidents before.
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You throw in religious
identity then it's much easier
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for people to respond
to this underlying threat.
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You can't take
million or two people
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from one place to another
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without
creating social distress.
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Absolutely. And
that's happening now.
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But this
religious divider on it.
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Right.
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And it's a very easy
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or a simple
divider like, you know,
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even if we move away
from Africa and we go, I mean,
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excuse me away from
Europe and go to Africa
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we see conflicts
there often between
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Christians and
Muslim groups and,
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you know, a lot
of time, you know,
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it's a very distinct sort of
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easy divider for individual for,
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you know, for groups.
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I'm old enough to
remember something
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before I forget them
Mau-Mau terror was just Muslim.
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It was the animist religions
were against Christianity
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because what it was
they saw imperialism
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and I think it
was the Belgian Congo
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where they had the trouble.
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Imperialism and
other coming in on them
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and so they were
reacting, they would have anyway
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but they enlisted
their elemental animism
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and it was
opposed to Christianity.
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I don't think every
conflict between religion
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is doctrinal if you like.
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No.
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I think it's
cultural and the religion
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is the identity that kicks in.
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But most people in the massive
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any religion don't
adequately understand
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their own religion
little than the other one.
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Yes.
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And one way we can minimize this
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is to educate people a little
better on religious beliefs.
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Absolutely.
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Well, you are absolutely right.
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I mean, and we can never
err in spending more time
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learning about our own faith
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and developing a
relationship with our Savior.
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But I think, you are hitting
the nail on the head as far as,
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you know, there is a
lack of understanding
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and really even
just knowledge wise
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but also like
relationship wise emotionally,
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you know, and recognizing
that this is your brother.
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Whether or not they
believe the ways that you do,
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you know, whether or
not they are motivated.
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You know, their conscience,
it feels the same way you do.
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This is your
brother and your sister.
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So you think more brotherhood
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will diminish
global religious conflict?
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Well, I mean, that might
be a simplistic way to say
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but I think more
understanding and more--
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No, there is no question that
if the true spirit of Christ
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and you can project
that into other religions
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or the true spirit that
usually underlies any religion
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were affective, there
wouldn't be the conflict.
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Right.
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But it's
probably not gonna happen.
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No. No.
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Because like you said
before there's other things
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that are motivating this.
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It's not just religious base,
it's the culture, it's the,
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you know, that they are
in dire economic situations
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that they are
vulnerable as far as, you know,
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their livelihood or
their, you know their family.
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And so absolutely
there are many forces
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that are at work and, you know,
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looking at our
prophetic beliefs also
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I think that we are only
going to see things increased.
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Yes, on that level I
don't have quite hope.
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I know that it's gonna work out
but of my view of prophecy is
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it may be predicted
but not necessarily now.
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Exactly. Yes.
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So there always
can be a saving moment
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where good can come out.
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Right.
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And we certainly, you
know, whether it's, you know,
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next week or, you
know, 20 years from now
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we also are
counseled not to sit quietly by
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and watch people be persecuted
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or peoples'
rights being diminished.
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Now I think a lot
of it can be minimized
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by explanation of the situation
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by education
about other religions.
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It could be minimized on
the part of different countries
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not seeking a
confrontation or, you know,
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there's lot of
demagogues that's just,
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we can let our own
country off the hook so.
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And I'm
originally from Australia
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I can let them off the hook
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but we know that
there are many politicians
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who knowingly will capitalize
an underlying tensions
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to increase the situation.
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Absolutely.
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And citizens themselves
can cry foul when that happens.
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International
bodies can minimize it.
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And then we have
the other, you know,
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we have the other
situations with the Arabs Spring
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where we've seen, you know,
sort of the dictators removed
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and then that almost
open the floodgates, you know,
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freedom actually brought...
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Well, that's one development
that I count myself among
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one of the prophets of gloom.
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I knew from day one
that was gonna end badly.
00:11:40.16\00:11:42.96
Yeah.
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It seems to have
escaped a lot of people
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what some of those
desperates were up to.
00:11:46.30\00:11:48.60
They were actually holding
the religious conflicted bay
00:11:48.64\00:11:52.51
and it wasn't a
liberal generally
00:11:52.54\00:11:54.54
there were some
little exceptions
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but generally the Arab Spring
was not a liberalizing trend.
00:11:56.28\00:11:59.28
No.
00:11:59.31\00:12:00.65
It was actually a follow through
00:12:00.68\00:12:02.02
from the provocation of Iraq
that got people angry and well,
00:12:02.05\00:12:07.19
they were
rejecting the status quo
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but their agenda
was quite radical.
00:12:08.82\00:12:11.03
Yeah.
00:12:11.06\00:12:13.33
But, you know, we
can't solve a lot of this
00:12:13.36\00:12:15.66
but it's worth discussing
as I said at the beginning
00:12:15.70\00:12:18.23
and you well know and
our readers, our listeners,
00:12:18.27\00:12:21.77
readers of Liberty
and listeners of this,
00:12:21.80\00:12:25.34
And viewers of this program know
00:12:25.37\00:12:27.88
the religious
dynamic is very strong
00:12:27.91\00:12:32.08
and there's some
we need to discuss it.
00:12:32.11\00:12:34.35
We can't, we can't dodge it.
00:12:34.38\00:12:36.02
We got a-- I'm hesitating
00:12:41.66\00:12:43.53
because I can be
cynical on all this very easily.
00:12:43.56\00:12:45.69
Sure.
00:12:45.73\00:12:47.06
And maybe we will take a break
00:12:47.10\00:12:48.43
and come back after that
00:12:48.46\00:12:49.80
and I'll pick up this thought,
00:12:49.83\00:12:51.17
where do we go from
this present world situation?
00:12:51.20\00:12:53.74