Where David Goldman (Spengler) is wrong (I think)

I am a big fan of David Goldman (Spengler) who writes for Asia Times and First Things, among other publications. His recent book How Civilizations Die (and why Islam is Dying too) was a great read. On the whole I enjoyed it and learned a lot. I do not share his optimism about Israel and the USA, but on the whole he is making some great points. (I am, in the end, a neo-medievalist, after all.)

But there is a real problem here...I don't think his case that Islam is 'dying too' is really correct. Yes, there are some really low birth rates in Iran and a few other places, but let's take a look at the TFR (total fertility rate) of the world's eleven most populous Muslim-majority countries:

                Name             Population               TFR[1]         Net migration/1000 population

11.       Indonesia            204,847,000                        2.23                        -1.08

22.       Pakistan               178,097,000                        3.07                        -2

33.       Bangladesh         148,607,000                        2.55                        -1.04

44.       Egypt                     80,024,000                           2.94                        -0.2

55.       Iran                        74,819,000                           1.87                        -0.11

66.       Turkey                  74,660,000                           2.13                        0.5

77.       Algeria                  34,780,000                           2.78                        -0.27

88.       Morocco              32,381,000                           2.19                        -3.67

99.       Iraq                        31,108,000                           3.58                        0

110.   Sudan                   30,894,000                           4.17                        -4.52

111.   Afghanistan        29,047,000                           5.64                        -2.51

---

[1] From CIA World Factbook, estimates for 2010 or 2012.

And now note that of the eleven only one of them has a TFR below replacement, Iran. Meanwhile, countries like Afghanistan and Sudan are very high. Also note the net migration. With the exception of Turkey and Iraq, these countries are exporting large numbers of their uneducated Muslim population. And again, we are not taking into account Somalia or Yemen, both with high TFR and high net out-migration.

Where does this all point? It does not seem to me like Islam is dying too. Yes, the birth rates are declining, but in the populous countries they are all still well above replacement and these countries are exporting their Muslims to the world, and especially the West.

But maybe I'm missing something here. Dear David Goldman (Spengler), please let me know what it is that I am missing in these numbers. 

Abu Daoud on Insider Movements

For a long time now this has been one of the main debates going on in misiology (I dislike the word--who combines Latin and Greek? Oh yeah, Americans). The debate goes by various names, all of which are annoying. The most recent label is Insider Movement. Nobody knows exactly what these are, or where they are happening, or how to define them. It appears to have something to do with Muslims staying within their birth communities while following Jesus. For most Muslims this means remaining within the Umma, one would think. Most Muslims and Christians throughout history agree that the Umma and the Holy, Apostolic Church do not overlap. Remaining within the Umma would appear to mean that one continues to call one's self a Muslim, if not actually go to mosque (lots of Muslims don't go to mosque, lots of Muslim women can't go to mosque at all). The whole thing is very confusing.

John Piper has recently spoken out against IM. Cody Lorance (don't know who this person is at all) responded. Our brother Warrick Farah over at the fine blog Circumpolar has summarized the two issues and offers his own two cents.

I personally find the whole incredibly annoying. Not because the discussion is not worth having, but because the people engaged in this discussion simply do not have, imho, the civilization resources to make a positive contribution to the discussion. Here is what I said in a comment at Circumpolar:

In the end I suspect that American evangelicals are just not really capable of having this conversation. As Americans we are a history-less and rootless people. As evangelicals we have, for the most part, tried to get by on the bible alone (a ridiculous project) while getting rid of tradition and ritual. A tradition that lacks an appreciation for its own rituals, history, and traditions simply is not capable of making a useful contribution to matters of religious identity for Muslims [or Christians] who are deeply invested in history, ritual, and tradition.

One attempt to define IM is here. It is the best one I've found so far.

Insider movements can be defined as movements to obedient faith in Christ that remain integrated with or inside their natural community. In any insider movement there are two distinct elements:

1. The gospel takes root within pre-existing communities or social networks, which become the main expression of “church” in that context. Believers are not gathered from diverse social networks to create a “church.” New parallel social structures are not invented or introduced.

2. Believers retain their identity as members of their  socio-religious community while living under the Lordship of Jesus Christ and the authority of the Bible

--Rebecca Lewis, 'Insider Movements: Honoring God-given Identity and Community, p 16, IJFM 26:1, Spring 2009. (Google it...)

Asia Times Online :: Palestinians ditched; Egypt next?

Egypt collapsing? What do you think? Check out what Spengler says here in this great article:

Asia Times Online :: Palestinians ditched; Egypt next?

Orient & Occident: Great News from Anglican Diocese of Egypt

Just read this on the Anglican Communion website. I am happy to hear this news that this wonderful publication, Orient & Occident, is being revived in an online, bi-lingual format. Check out this interview with the Episcopal bishop of Egypt. He seems to really understand the important of Temple Gairdner, one of my heroes. I have mentioned Temple Gairdner in a number of previous posts (here, here, here, and here).

Here is a snippet from the article.

Why did you choose to relaunch Orient & Occident instead of a new publication?

Orient and Occident was launched by Temple Gairdner and Douglas Thornton, and they are very precious figures to us. They were behind the real start of the Anglican Church in Egypt. They are not the ones who started the church, but they are the ones who started to engage with the Egyptian society and not just care for British citizens who lived in Egypt.

Temple Gairdner was a great thinker and a pioneer. He was 100 years ahead of the community when he started interfaith dialogue with the magazine. He allowed Muslims to write in it and responded to them. He was ahead of the whole world in engaging with the Islamic world. We cannot find better that what Temple Gairdner and Douglas Thornton did, and we would like to have the same spirit they did, which we need much more than any time before.

Well, check out the revived Orient & Occident already! (Or in Arabic here...)

Friday Demonstrations: Pray for Jordan

Hi All,

Here is a prayer update from some colleagues in the country of Jordan where things are less stable than you might think. All names have been removed. Please keep this little country in your prayers:

...a huge demonstration/march that is being planned for this coming Friday, October 5th here in Amman. It will take place at around 1 p.m. (6 a.m. EST) after Friday prayers.
 
As you know, the Middle East has been in the news quite a bit lately. While countries to the north, east and west of us are grabbing the headlines, the weakening Jordanian economy is taking a toll on the poor and middle class. Over the past year, there have been demonstrations throughout the country. Most of those have been peaceful. Our prayer is that they continue to remain that way.
 
The organizers of the event this Friday have been voicing more and more that the government has had a year to come through on promises and it has fulfilled very little. There are two parties that both desire change, however, one wants political reform in cooperation with the government and the other party is calling for the participants to not back down and be heard no matter what the cost. The latter is being led by the Muslim Brotherhood.
 
In light of these events, we are asking you to pray for the following:

1. Pray that those who intend to bring harm will have their plans exposed and that there would be disunity among their leadership.
2. Pray that the demonstrations would remain peaceful and that there would be no casualties or injuries.
3. Pray for peacemakers and wisdom for King Abdullah and the government. Also, pray for peace and stability in the country.
4. Pray that God would use the current events to bring all those living in Jordan closer to the Prince of Peace.
5. Thanks for praying with us and for your concern for our safety. Please be assured that we will be in a safe location during these demonstrations. 

 
Your love and support is invaluable. [...]

Victor Davis Hanson on the Neurotic Middle East

Asymmetry is, of course, assumed. One expects to be detained for having a Bible in one’s baggage at Riyadh, whereas a Koran in a tote bag is of no importance at the Toronto airport. The Egyptian immigrant in San Francisco, or the Pakistani who moves to London, expects to be allowed to demonstrate against the freewheeling protocols of his hosts, while a Westerner protesting against life under sharia in the streets of Karachi or Gaza would earn a death sentence. What is nauseating about this is not the hypocrisy per se, but the Middle Eastern insistence that there is no such hypocrisy. We expect the immigrant from Egypt to deface public posters and call it freedom of expression; we expect Mr. Morsi, who enjoyed American freedom while he studied for his Ph.D. and then taught for three years in California, to deny it to others and trash his former host.

Read it all HERE. The Middle East will have no progress until the folks here get that there really is a double standard and that, to put it bluntly, the Middle East (excepting Israel) contributes practically nothing to the world. Ouch. I know. But true...

St Augustine's Jerusalem

It does not matter where you live in the Muslim world, sooner or later the topic of Zionism will come up, if not from Muslims from Christians. Regarding this topic, I love how Augustine writes about his Jerusalem:

As for myself I will enter into my closet and there sing to thee the songs of love, groaning with groanings that are unutterable now in my pilgrimage, and remembering Jerusalem with my heart uplifted to Jerusalem my country, Jerusalem my mother; and to thee thyself, the Ruler of the source of Light, its Father, Guardian, Husband; its chaste and strong delight, its solid joy and all its goods ineffable--and all of this at the same time, since thou art the one supreme and true Good!

--Confessions 12:16.

Circumpolar: Identity Issues for Ex-Muslim Christians, Tim Gree...

Circumpolar: Identity Issues for Ex-Muslim Christians, Tim Gree...: Identity issues for ex-Muslim Christians, with particular reference to marriage, by Tim Green   at St. Francis Magazine . Here is a very t...

Prayer Request

Abu Daoud and family are applying for visa renewals. Please pray that all would go smoothly.

Abu Daoud: on training potential MBB leaders

On Training Potential MBB Leaders

by Abu Daoud

A few days I hopped on a morning bus for a neighboring city. I had a meeting there and I figured that afterward I would drop in and see a friend of mine as well. This friend is a local guy (not a foreigner) and in his city/area there is a lot more going on in terms of ministry to Muslims than in my city. Anyway, I asked him how the Muslim-background congregation was doing and he said that he was shifting his focus, and would be meeting with some baptized men to focus on leadership training, rather than helping to run the church meetings. Right away he asked me what I would teach them about.

I get this quite a bit actually. After a few years some of the locals came to the conclusion that I was good guy to consult with in making decisions about local ministry, I guess. I thought about the example of the early church and how and I took a piece of paper and drew a triangle, on each side of the triangle I wrote a word (all in Arabic, but I'll give you the English): ethics, sacraments (in Arabic the word is 'secrets' actually), doctrine. Then under ethics I wrote "Commandments" and "Beatitudes", under sacraments I wrote baptism and Communion, and under doctrine I wrote the two creeds. 

I said, "My own opinion on this matter is not very important, but here is a picture of how the early Church handled these things. The idea is that once a person knows about each of these three aspects of the Christian faith, they will have the basics down. Also, back then, people would have to memorize all this stuff (10 Commandments, Beatitudes, etc). All your guys are ex-Muslims so memorizing should be easy for them. Since people didn't normally have books back then, it means that each believer knew from memory all the basics of the Christian faith, including how to baptize new believers. They will also easily learn this triangle here so they will know how to disciple new believers or seekers."

He really liked the overall idea. I challenged him to keep a diary and let me know how it was going. 

Please pray for him and his six disciples, that they would mature in strong, faithful, wise leaders for the MBB congregation. And pray for me, that I would be able to give good council to local believers when they ask for advice on ministry. Some day we will leave this land and go back to the West, but most of these local believers will stay here through thick and thin. Until then, thank you for making our ministry possible and investing in the local church through us.

Missionary Secrets 3: Communicating with supporters sucks...sometimes

Missionary Secrets 3: Communicating with supporters sucks...sometimes

By Abu Daoud

So here’s the deal: I spend time writing an e-mail update about some recent encounter with a Muslim here in town, or some other observation about Islam, or something encouraging that happened with one of our Christian friends, or what have you. I send them out to about 400 people on my e-mail account. And a few people…maybe…respond. Who reads these things? I have no idea. Am I wasting half a day in doing this? I often feel like it.

Two or three times a year I Um Daoud and I put a few days into producing a high-quality newsletter, we e-mail it to out agency back in the West, and they distribute it to 500+ post addresses on THAT mailing list. Another business prints them, our mission envelopes them, and posts them. The whole project comes out of our funds to the tune of $400 or so. How many people read these things? We normally see an uptick in contributions after we send it out, so it must mean that someone reads them. But given the expenditure, are we wasting much-needed funds?

And I also keep two blogs—islaomdom.blogspot.com and abudaoud.blogspot.com.

And then, we get an e-mail from one of our churches or supporters saying that they are concerned because we do not keep them up-to-date on our work here. Sometimes this is our fault, but not usually. Also, normally these e-mails come with an apologetic e-mail saying they do not feel called to support our mission anymore. We genuinely respect people’s and churches’ responsibility to discern how they will invest their funds in the Kingdom. We also know that sometimes the Spirit really is telling people not to support our mission anymore.

But these e-mails are difficult to receive. Especially when we have done everything we could to keep in touch. Mr. X didn’t update his post address with us after moving, and then he feels he can no longer support us because we don’t stay in touch? Ouch. But it’s better than a supporter just dropping off your list with no notice. Anyway, support is a sensitive topic. 

Some workers send out too many notices and people just delete them. Some workers do need to stay in touch more. In the end, missionaries are trying to balance the needs of a LOT of people. From the personal friend of many years who is fine with getting one update per year, to the church that wants a monthly story for their newsletter. Recently, we were informed by a faithful donor that he would not be supporting us anymore. He was very kind about it, but he said he wanted to support works that were more entrepreneurial (his word). I respect that because I know he is a great Christian, but I thought, in the Middle East that is precisely what we don’t need. The problem here is a lack of seasoned, Arabic-speaking folks who already have a network of relationships. (A good number of missionaries here don’t speak Arabic well at all, believe it or not.)

So with your missionaries, give them input. That’s the takeaway here. Let them know what you want to hear about if their letters are too long, short, frequent, infrequent, and so on. Also, if you don’t get what you want, remember we are generally communicating with hundreds of folks and churches, all with different desires.

Missionary Secrets 2: Life is not that exciting most of the time

Missionary Secrets 1: Retirement worries us

Contemporary Muslim apologetic of mysogeny

Ran across this on Facebook. Nice example of how some Muslims defend what non-Muslims perceive as some of the unjust ways that some Muslim men treat some Muslim women. (How's that for a lot of qualifications?) Anyway, there's a good insight here. (BTW, Alim means teacher or scholar).

A non Muslim came to an alim and asked : Why is it not permissible to shake hand

s with a man?

The alim said : Can you shake hands with queen Elizabeth?

He said: Of course not there are only certain people who can shake hands with Queen Elizabeth. 

The alim said: our women are queens and queens do not shake hands with strange men. 

Then the non Muslim asked: Why do your girls cover up their body and hair?

The alim smiled and got two sweets, he opened the first one and kept the other one closed. He threw them both on the dusty floor and asked, " If I asked you to take one of the sweets which one would you choose?"

The non muslim said, " the covered one."

The alim said: Thats how we treat and see our women. Women should not be like the moon which everyone can see and admire, they should be like the sun which makes the viewer lower their gaze. 

Christianity growing among Muslims in Indonesia

I recently ran across a video for a (Muslim-run) ministry called Save Maryam. Their goal is to stop Muslims in Indonesia from converting to Christianity. Here is the Save Maryam video:

The figure mentioned in there of two million Muslims converting each year appears pretty incredible to me, as in one should not believe it. After a bit of digging I think the number is way too high.

That having been said, Muslims are turning to Christ in Indonesia in significant numbers, we are talking about tens or perhaps hundreds of thousands per year. Time Magazine has a good article from 2010 about this, authored by Temang Gung and Hannah Beech (my favorite writer for Time who looks like she's twelve :-)

The article is titled Christianity's Surge in Indonesia and you can read it all HERE. For now, here is one section about this surprising growth and also the persecution that comes along with a vibrant, bold, growing faith.

What is it about Evangelical Christianity that has so resonated in Indonesia? As in many other crowded, developing-world countries where a person can feel lost in a teeming slum, the concept of individual salvation is a powerful one. At the same time, the attempted hijacking of Muslim theology by a small band of homegrown terrorists who have killed hundreds of Indonesians in recent years has led some to question their nation's majority faith. So, too, has the general trend toward a more conservative Islam that has given rise to hundreds of religiously inspired bylaws, from caning for beer-drinking to enforced dress codes for women.

Read more: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1982223,00.html#ixzz25P5YtmOL