Heretic Revisited.

Recently, at a social event, I ran into one of my favorite people. He is delightful. An heir to a liquor fortune, I have known him for years and while I am thinking of the more "base" things of life, friends, women, my transgressions, whatever, he is the epitome of the esoteric existence. My friend is a "Birkenstocks, Southern gentleman from the get go--just returned from a three month sabbatical where his guru of 15 years worked with him in meditation. What the f..K. 

In the course of us talking some southern stuff, he told me that he was the volunteer head of some multi-faith group: Christian, Buddhist, Muslim. I finally got a word in and related that I had just read Hersi Ali's book, "Heretic" and how did his involvement in this multi-faith group, square with her as she asserts that "Islam is not a peaceful religion." I briefly let him read her statement which by the way was in my iPhone, here is what she says in her intro, "In September 2001, a group of 19 Islamic terrorists flew hijacked planes into buildings in New York and Washington, D.C., killing 2,996 people. For more than thirteen years now, I have been making a simple argument in response to such acts of terrorism. My argument is that it is foolish to insist, as our leaders habitually do, that the violent acts of radical Islamists can be divorced from the religious ideals that inspire them. Instead, we must acknowledge that they are driven by a political ideology, an ideology embedded in Islam itself, in the holy book of the Qur’an as well as the life and teachings of the Prophet Muhammad contained in the hadith. Let me make my point in the simplest possible terms: Islam is not a religion of peace."