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Politics & The Nation
BY MICHELLE BOORSTEIN Geoff Tunnicliffe heads of one
of the world's largest faith organi- zations — theWorld Evangelical Alliance — but on Wednesday morning, when he reached the Florida pastor planning to burn the Koran on Sept. 11, “I felt like a deer in the headlights,” he said. For weeks, Tunnicliffe had re-
mained silent about the intention of the tiny Gainesville church to
EZ RE
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THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 9, 2010 Evangelical leaders try to reach out to pastor who plans to burn Koran
publicly torch Islam’s holy book this Saturday, not wanting to lend legitimacy to the Dove World Outreach Center or its controver- sial pastor, Terry Jones. But after hearing from Pentecostal leaders around the globe who fear that the scripture-burning could spark sectarian violence, he de- cided he needed to appeal to Jones as a fellow Christian. Tunnicliffe is among the reli-
gious leaders who have tried to reach out to Jones in recent days
and persuade him to abandon his plan, which has been condemned by everyone from Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton to Gen. David H. Petraeus to conser- vative commentator Glenn Beck to actress Angelina Jolie. Even Franklin Graham, son of famed evangelist Billy Graham and an outspoken critic of Islam, tried twice without success to reach Jones on Wednesday to express his disapproval of defacing or destroying the sacred texts or
writings of other religions, a spokesman said. Jones did not return telephone
calls Wednesday seeking com- ment. Tunnicliffe described himself
as “pleading” during a 10-minute cellphone conversation with the man whose plan has sparked an- gry protests in Jakarta and Kabul, a plan that some fear could put the lives of U.S. troops inMuslim countries at risk. “I tried to talk about the
impact this would have on his own stated goals of taking the Gospel to the world,” said Tunnic- liffe, whose group represents hundreds of millions of evangeli- cals, including those in Muslim countries. He told Jones that Christian
leaders and missionaries around the world were opposed to the burning, and asked, “What are you hearing from God that these people aren’t hearing?” He asked how Jones would feel if the event
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led to the death of a pastor or the destruction of a church in anoth- er part of the world. Jones listened but remained noncommittal, Tunnicliffe said. “He said they might not change their minds, but that they were praying about it.” At the end of the phone call,
THEWAY FORWARD
Tunnicliffe said, he prayed for Jones. “Here’s the reality: That video
will never go away,” he said. “It will be so detrimental to our work with religious liberty around the world. Everywhere I go around the world, I will have to address this for years to come.” He and others described their lobbying efforts this week as deli- cate and strange. Jones doesn’t belong to a religious denomina- tion and doesn’t appear to know fellow pastors in his town. Some religious leaders said
they fear that Jones won’t listen to strangers, or they are reluctant to fuel something that they hope will go away. Others said the fact that evangelical leaders aren’t taking more action reflects a dis- tant and sometimes tense rela- tionship with Muslims and the fact that many evangelicals are skeptical of Islam. “People don't speak out the
way they should because they don't have personal relation- ships,” said Richard Cizik, a for- mer longtime lobbyist for the National Association of Evangeli- cals (NAE), the U.S. branch of the World Evangelical Alliance. He noted that an NAE poll of evan- gelical leaders in 2008 found none who said they had a good friend who wasMuslim. Nevertheless, NAE President
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Leith Anderson issued a state- mentWednesday askingMuslims not to judge “all Christians by the behavior of one extremist. One person with 30 silent followers does not speak for 300 million Americans who will never burn a Koran.” Christian leaders from other denominations echoed those sen- timents Wednesday, saying there was no support in their commu- nities for Jones. The question was how to reach the former hotel manager who sells furniture on eBay to make extra money. Richard Land, president of the
Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Com- mission, said he decided not to approach Jones because he be- lieves that the pastor would dis- approve of Land’s advocacy for the rights of religious minorities and his general engagement with pluralism. “If I know my boy, he thinks
we’re apostate liberals anyway,” Land said. “My guess is my call would be counterproductive. My calling him would just encourage him to do it.” City commissioners and the
mayor of Gainesville have called Jones, as have local clergy, includ- ing the Rev. Dan Johnson of the 4,000-member Trinity United Methodist Church, the closest house of worship to the Dove Center. Johnson tried several times tomake appointments with Jones before the Dove pastor called Johnson “yellow-bellied” in a local paper, said Troy Hollo- way, Trinity's director of steward- ship development.
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