Mosques & Miracles revealing Islam and God's Grace

Stuart Robinson, Mosques & Miracles: Revealing Islam and God's Grace (Mount Gravatt: City Harvest Publications, 2003) While travelling in Papua New Guinea in last year, I observed the Christian community was growing increasingly concerned about the rise of mosques in major cities and the spread of goats trucked in from across the border in West Papua to replace the monopoly of pigs. Mosques and Miracles provides more background to this situation. Apparently in the 1980s permission to build mosques was withheld, but financial incentives (and a Muslim Education Minister) opened the way. The spread of Islam in Australia's closes neighbour is paralleled around the globe according to Stuart Robinson. The tide of missionary endeavour has reversed. For example England, the birthplace of William Carey and the modern Protestant missionary movement, receives more missionaries from Islam than are sent out to Islam. Islam has become England's second religion, with more Muslims than either Methodists or Baptists. (p.293-295) In Australia in the 1970s, Islamic leaders set a goal that by the year 2000 we would be an Islamic state. Although the goal is not (yet) reached, a new date has been set and Islam has grown dramatically. The 2001 census showed Muslims represent 1.5% of the population, a 40% increase since 1996! (p.80) Mosques and Miracles gives an overview of the dramatic expansion of Islam beyond its traditional boundaries - notably in the UK, Europe, USA, Africa, Asia and Russia, and most tragically in countries like Sudan. Robinson draws on personal encounters with Muslims and study of Islam to give a good overview of the origins of Islam, Muhammad, Islam's relationship with Judaism and Christianity, anti-Christian theology, the Quran, and gender relations. His most distinctive and topical contribution, however, is its treatment of jihad and human rights abuses. It is realistic in its portrayal of how Islam is actually practiced in various places, rather than being politically correct and upholding the ideal view of moderate Islam. While accepting that many Muslims are peace-loving, it challenges the popular view that Islam is a religion of peace. When reports of violence fill our television news screens, many Muslims and sympathetic onlookers comment, `That's not Islam but terrorism.' However, the terrorists themselves may not own that simplistic description of themselves. I wonder if the `terrorists' would reply, `This is not terrorism but Islam.' Another comment sometimes made is, `That's just fundamental Islam.' However, many orthodox Muslims would argue military jihad is core Islamic teaching. Dr Hassan Turabi, who gave the theological framework for Islamising Sudan, argues, `All Muslims are fundamentalists. We have to be fundamentalists because it is obligatory that we believe in the fundamentals of Islam. Those who do not believe in these fundamentals ... are not Muslims. Thus it is irrelevant to call a Muslim a fundamentalist' (p.10-11)