Category Archives: missionary mishap

Missionary Mishap: McLatchie Loses the Plot

Once again, we find ourselves appalled at the behaviour of Jonathan McLatchie. After mocking my illness and wishing ill upon me, I continued to dialogue with him despite his negative disposition towards me. Today we had a chat that quite upset him. I questioned his dislike for the scholar Candida Moss, he asked me a question about his behaviour and when I answered his question, he once again chose to block me.

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This is the same person, who on the very day after Nabeel Qureishi made public his illness with stomach cancer, found himself on Facebook concerned with how many times Dr. James White had mentioned his name on the Dividing Line. He was much more concerned with the number of how many times his name was mentioned, while the inter-faith scene was upset with the news of Nabeel’s illness.

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Truly, I am tired of having to receive messages from both Christians and Muslims that have been abused by Jonathan.

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There are a lot more messages like this from Jonathan and his 15 year old friend, who both have been rebuked for their abusive and intolerant behaviour online.

and God knows best.

Missionary Mishap: Scholar Schools McLatchie

Have you ever had a scholar who specializes in your field of interest completely discredit your grasp of the field entirely? I haven’t, most people haven’t, but Jonathan McLatchie has.

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Here’s the scholar’s credentials as of 2014. Five pages worth of academic qualifications spanning multiple disciplines including Judaeo-Christian theology, history and  Biblical languages. After having explained who he was and stating his credentials, none of which Jonathan can match,  I was shocked to see that Jonathan still couldn’t figure out why a scholar with more academic credentials and study would consider Jonathan to be unqualified. Perhaps Jonathan can let us know what his theological qualifications are, how many Biblical languages he knows and how many classes at University he’s taught on Islam and Judaeo-Christianity.

Scholarship, Jonathan, has deemed you totally unqualified…and it isn’t the first time either.

and God knows best.

A Clear Conscience?

Recently my friend and colleague, Br. Aqil Onque debated Jonathan McLatchie on the Trinity Channel – yes, the same channel that his mentor Sam Shamoun accused of stealing money and misappropriating funds:

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Sam indicated that the Trinity channel was using donations to “fatten their pocket,” that is taking donations meant for evangelizing and managing the station, and instead using the money for their personal gain, i.e. theft. Yet, we find Jonathan openly promoting and working with the station. The question needs to be asked, did Sam Shamoun openly lie about his own Christian brothers and sisters at the Trinity channel, or is Jonathan colluding with Christians involved in fraud and theft? For those interested in inter-faith dialogue, the question of misusing religion for monetary gain or popularity seriously brings into doubt the actions of many Christian speakers, preachers and polemicists. As a Muslim, how can I trust what Sam Shamoun has to say if he is willing to fabricate claims about his own brothers and sisters in faith, or how can I trust someone who openly promotes a platform that engages in fraud and theft? Why Jonathan would knowingly promote a platform that engages in financial impropriety is a question he would have to answer himself.

Pursuant to this, I have to say that I am quite disappointed in the immaturity spouting from the Jonathan camp following his debate with Br. Aqil. I was shocked to see that both during and immediately following the debate, memes mocking and comments insulting Br. Aqil were shared to and posted on Jonathan’s Facebook profile. There is a stark difference between critiquing your opponent and openly insulting, mocking and ridiculing your opponent. While Jonathan himself did not post the offending comments or memes (photos), he did “like” them and did not remove them, nor did he caution his camp from such immature behaviour. This is surprising to me, because in the not so distant past, offensive memes ridiculing Jonathan were being shared on social media and I endeavoured quite greatly to not only stop the memes from being spread, but I also directly contacted Jonathan and expressed my disappointment and contempt with such behaviour from my Muslim brothers and sisters. To see that Jonathan would not only condone but engage in behaviour he himself found quite upsetting a month or two ago, is hypocritical to say the least.

In the end, we have to ask, do integrity, decency and maturity count for anything anymore?

and God knows best.

Missionary Mishap: Origin Stories of the Disciples

The origin stories of the disciples is perhaps some of the most contentious passages of the New Testament Gospels. Earlier today I had a conversation with Samuel Green on this very topic, which led to the conversation below:

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One Gospel – Matthew indicates that Jesus initially meets Peter and Andrew beside the Sea of Galilee casting their nets. John 1 disagrees and has Andrew go fetch Peter, bring him to Jesus and there they meet with Jesus near the River Jordan. One version has Jesus going to them (Sea of Galilee), the other has them coming to Jesus (River Jordan). Quite the contradiction!

and God knows best.

Missionary Mishap: Steven Tilley & Vladmir Susic

It’s that time of the day again! Steven and Vladmir are friends of Sam Shamoun and Jonathan McLatchie. Most people would remember Vladmir from the several hour videos that him and Jonathan have made for YouTube. In the below discussion, Steven Tilley, a Christian missionary, posts a photo from a book claiming that this shows the Qur’an has been “tampered with”. Changes in the way vowels have been represented is not tampering, but the development of the written text to make it easier to read, in this case, known as orthography. A common example is of “sonne” and “son” (others include “mi” and “my”, “saule” and “soul”, “gode” and “good)”, the way the written language represents the word has changed, but it carries the same pronunciation and the same meaning. Nothing more, nothing less. So, I point this out to Steven. He immediately replies that I’m wrong. Then his friend and colleague, Vladmir comes along to say that I’ll be ripped to shreds by Steven on this topic.

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I didn’t recognize the book at first, so I asked him what the name of it was. After a minute of posting that question, I remembered the name and found the book that the photo was taken of. Steven never bothered to let us know the name of the book, and it is most likely he’d never do that for a very good reason. That reason? The very photo he posted was taken from the chapter on….you guessed it…..orthography!

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So what does Steven decide to do when he’s been caught lying? Well he apologized, corrected himself and his friend Vladmir did the same. Sorry, I got that wrong, Steven did none of those things and decided to do the following:

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After being caught lying, and having quoted a paragraph from the book by Keith Small, literally mentioning the word, “orthographic”, he decides to delete the entire post and pretend like it never happened. Fortunately for Steven and Vladmir, I enjoy conversations like these and knowing that they are influenced by the characters of Sam Shamoun and Jonathan McLatchie, they’d never correct themselves. This once again shows that these missionaries know very little about the topics they “discuss” and it is more about pride than it is about knowing the truth.

and God knows best!

Sam Shamoun Runs From Br. Ijaz

Yesterday I invited Sam Shamoun to lunch with me. Today Sam has responded by blocking me on Facebook. Despite blocking me, Sam decided to respond to one of my articles on the inanity of the Trinitian Godhead. Here I am, discussing with fellow Christians, arguments about the Trinity:

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Sam then decided to respond to me, by copy-pasting two of his previous articles:

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The question remains, Sam constantly chooses to respond to what I say, post and share, yet at the same time insists he doesn’t have to engage with me. You can’t have it both ways Sam, you need to make up your mind. Addressing me indirectly simply indicates that you do pay attention to what I say, but that you don’t have the courage to engage with me directly. I completely understand that. It’s okay.

and God knows best.

 

 

Christian Polemicists Declare Trinity Channel Heretical

Some would remember that a few months or so ago, Sam Shamoun used to hold shows and debates on the Trinity/ ABN Channel. At some point both him and David Wood stopped appearing on the channel. David in an email indicated it was because he could no longer work with the unprofessional Christian staff of the channel and also could not tolerate the ignorant Christian audience of the channel. In an email dated September 15th, 2105 he says:

Also, why would we take callers in the middle of such short debates? Was this your idea, or did Haifa suggest it? I see multiple problems here. First, we’re not in the studio, and I anticipate all kinds of technical difficulties arising. (We often have technical difficulties with questions in the studio, so I can’t imagine things going smoothly with everything happening somewhere else.) The more complicated the set-up, the more problems are going to slip in to derail the debates. Second, the vast majority of viewers would rather listen to us address a topic than a questioner asking us questions. It would be nice if all callers asked relevant, probing questions, but they won’t. Good questions will be only a fraction of the actual questions we get. People will call in with insults, they will start yelling and we’ll have to cut them, and most of the questions will be completely irrelevant to the topics. That’s just what happens when phone lines are opened for anyone to call in.

In another email on the same date he also said:

As for ABN, I’ve been working with them for years, but I’m at the end of my rope. I simply want to get these debates out of the way so that I don’t have to deal with this network ever again. (Yes, name redacted, years of working with ABN allows us to be frank with each other, and too many frustrating experiences have taken away any inclination I have to soften my words. This is why there’s a need to part ways. We simply don’t work well together and can’t agree on anything. I’m to the point where I get a miserable, sinking feeling whenever I’m contacted by ABN, because I know it’s going to ruin my day.)

Today, Sam has tried to create another excuse as to why the TV station no longer wanted to work with Sam and David, he says on Facebook:

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Here’s the problem, at the time David and Sam stopped appearing on the Trinity/ ABN Channel, David sent out numerous emails claiming that he was upset, angry and frustrated with both the ignorant and unprofessional staff at the station, as well as with the Christian viewers who supported him, calling in and insulting guests. Sam, some ten months later in an attempt to deflect the personal differences that led them to part from the Christian polemics TV station, instead blames his lack of appearances due to the “false Gospel” message that the station is now sharing, some ten months later. In other words, Sam is blaming something that happened yesterday, ten months after he was booted from the station due to personal conflicts with the staff, as the reason for why he no longer appeared on the station ten months ago. That simply does not make sense for anyone who spends more than a few seconds to contemplate the claims made.

All in all, both Sam and David had seriously negative and angry views about the station and their viewership, and found themselves no longer having an amicable relationship with the TV station’s staff. They had no public excuse at that time to mask the personal conflicts that led to their leaving of the station so they remained silent until they could use another excuse to explain their glaring absence. Today, that excuse came in the form of the Trinity Station endorsing a heretical form of Christianity with Joel Osteen at its head. Thus, the issue presents itself that the Trinity Channel is now preaching a brand of Christianity that Sam and company fundamentally view as heretical. An entire TV station converted to a heretical form of Christianity and Sam Shamoun, who views himself as a great Christian teacher and apologist, who has the Spirit of God allegedly inside him, could not convince his own Christians to remain in their faith.

The question thus begs itself, if people like Sam Shamoun, David Wood and their student Jonathan McLatchie who consider themselves educated and guided by the Holy Spirit cannot save their own Christian brothers and sisters from following what they consider to be heretical and false Gospels, then why don’t they focus on the Christian community rather than on Islam? It means to say that they cannot save their own Christians, and so they need to find some other way to keep themselves relevant, which is to deflect from the dire situation they are in within the Christian community and in so doing are using Islam as a distraction from the growing apostasies in their own Christian communities. Sam and David spent years preaching on the Trinity/ ABN Channel, only for the channel and its viewers to begin preaching what they call a false Gospel.

Clearly there is a problem with Christianity, if its “greatest” and most “popular” apologists cannot save their fellow Christians from abandoning their faith en masse.

and God knows best.

God Within Us? A Stumbling Block?

Recently, a quote from Samuel Zwemer’s “Moslem Doctrine of God” has been circulating on the internet and is being celebrated as a succinct explication of how Christianity fundamentally overcomes the “distance of God” in Islamic theology.

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As is typical in missionary writings, Islamic theology is portrayed as having a distant God, that Christianity is superior to either Islam or Judaism because God is within Christians through the Holy Spirit. Here’s the problem though, does God have to be spatially within us for our hearts to be renewed? Christians themselves refute this idea by saying that God is truly a Spirit in nature and not a material being, “God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.” – John 4:24, therefore what is the reasoning for God having to be spatially (materially) within us for us to be guided? Therefore this concept that God must be spatially within us for any of us to be guided is both irrational and self-contradictory. The Qur’an itself responds to this claim, it says:

“And We have already created man and know what his soul whispers to him, and We are closer to him than [his] jugular vein.” – Qur’an 50:16.

God is closer to us, without having to be in the material world. God’s sovereignty is such that space does not affect what He can and cannot do, so the belief that a God from afar is somehow less superior than a God that is “within us” does not make any sense. This fundamentally means that Christians believe God is not all powerful and that God somehow loses power and ability based on distance. Yet, I’m sure if we ask them if God loses power based on distance, they’d disagree, yet they’d gladly offer this as an argument for the truth of Christianity in a book about Islam, as is seen above. This sort of deceptive inconsistency permeates throughout Christian missionary works.

Here’s another problem with that quote above, do Christians really expect us Muslims to believe that God is within them, that God within them is renewing their hearts and bringing them into submission with God’s will? Consider this, if obedience to God’s will means living a good, moral life, no pre-marital sex, no substance abuse, not stealing, not lying, etc, then it means that Christians need God within them to do things Muslims can do without having God within us. On the simple example of substance abuse, a druggie, if it takes a Christian needing the Holy Spirit within them to renew their heart and have them overcome an addiction, and yet a Muslim through their belief in Tawheed can overcome such a problem, then it means to say that Muslims by themselves are greater in will and power than the very Christian God.

In other words it takes God and a human to do what a Muslim can do by themselves through their belief in the truth of Islam. What Christians need to do is present an objective metric to measure the work of the Spirit within them. What do Christians do with the Spirit that a Muslim, Jew, Atheist or Hindu cannot? Can they point to a single living person today that meets this metric standard? Just one person, that’s all. In the end, the quote from the above book is an indictment against the Christian faith, as opposed to a rational critique of the Islamic faith. I’m not sure why Christians find it useful to pat themselves on the back with such drivel, when in the end it paints Christianity in a bad light, if only a moment is spent considering the theology presented in their propaganda.

and God knows best.

 

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