{"id":1369,"date":"2017-05-21T19:23:40","date_gmt":"2017-05-22T00:23:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/?p=1369"},"modified":"2017-05-21T20:09:47","modified_gmt":"2017-05-22T01:09:47","slug":"trump-speech","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/trump-speech\/","title":{"rendered":"Pleasant Surprise at President Trump&#8217;s Speech on Islam"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><i>In the Name of God: The Extremely and Eternally Loving and Caring&nbsp;<\/i><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/257\/2017\/05\/f7aa0de9-1db8-4cfe-ac7c-fb28a1f7dc94-16288-00001b42169022e9.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1160\" height=\"629\" alt=\"\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/257\/2017\/05\/f7aa0de9-1db8-4cfe-ac7c-fb28a1f7dc94-16288-00001b42169022e9.jpg\" title=\"\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-1374\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>All the <a href=\"http:\/\/religionnews.com\/transmission\/satire-donald-trumps-speech-on-islam-leaked\/\">jokes<\/a> about President Trump&#8217;s speech on Islam given in Saudi Arabia aside, I was pleasantly surprised at the text of the speech. It was moderate, humble, respectful, and optimistic. I must be honest that I didn&#8217;t think it would be like that, and for that, I thank and commend President Trump for a job well done.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>My favorite part of the speech is below:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Every time a terrorist murders an innocent person, and falsely invokes the name of God, it should be an insult to every person of faith.<\/p>\n<p>Terrorists do not worship God, they worship death.<\/p>\n<p>If we do not act against this organized terror, then we know what will happen. Terrorism\u2019s devastation of life will continue to spread. Peaceful societies will become engulfed by violence. And the futures of many generations will be sadly squandered.<\/p>\n<p>If we do not stand in uniform condemnation of this killing\u2014then not only will we be judged by our people, not only will we be judged by history, but we will be judged by God.<\/p>\n<p>This is not a battle between different faiths, different sects, or different civilizations.<\/p>\n<p>This is a battle between barbaric criminals who seek to obliterate human life, and decent people of all religions who seek to protect it.<\/p>\n<p>This is a battle between Good and Evil.<\/p>\n<p>When we see the scenes of destruction in the wake of terror, we see no signs that those murdered were Jewish or Christian, Shia or Sunni. When we look upon the streams of innocent blood soaked into the ancient ground, we cannot see the faith or sect or tribe of the victims \u2013 we see only that they were Children of God whose deaths are an insult to all that is holy.<\/p>\n<p>[&#8230;]<\/p>\n<p>That means honestly confronting the crisis of Islamist extremism and the Islamist terror groups it inspires. And it means standing together against the murder of innocent Muslims, the oppression of women, the persecution of Jews, and the slaughter of Christians.<\/p>\n<p>Religious leaders must make this absolutely clear: Barbarism will deliver you no glory \u2013 piety to evil will bring you no dignity. If you choose the path of terror, your life will be empty, your life will be brief, and YOUR SOUL WILL BE CONDEMNED.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Wow. I didn&#8217;t think I would like the speech, but here I am praising the President for an excellent speech. This is how it should be.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s no secret that I am not a political supporter of the President. But, politics end at the shores of our country. While in Saudi Arabia, or Israel, or Beligium, or the Vatican, he represents me and the rest of our people. Abroad, he is my President, and I wish for him to succeed and put forth the best possible face for our nation. If this speech is any indication, perhaps this foreign trip will be a tremendous success. And that can only be a good thing.&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Wow. I was pleasantly surprised at the speech given by President Trump.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":175,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[840,11,88,768,786],"class_list":["post-1369","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-a-common-word","tag-foreign-trip","tag-islam","tag-saudi-arabia","tag-speech","tag-trump"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Pleasant Surprise at President Trump&#039;s Speech on Islam - Common Word, Common Lord<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, nofollow\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Pleasant Surprise at President Trump&#039;s Speech on Islam - Common Word, Common Lord\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Wow. I was pleasantly surprised at the speech given by President Trump.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/trump-speech\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Common Word, Common Lord\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2017-05-22T00:23:40+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2017-05-22T01:09:47+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/files\/2017\/05\/f7aa0de9-1db8-4cfe-ac7c-fb28a1f7dc94-16288-00001b42169022e9.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Hesham A. Hassaballa\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@GodFaithPen\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Pleasant Surprise at President Trump's Speech on Islam - Common Word, Common Lord","robots":{"index":"noindex","follow":"nofollow"},"og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Pleasant Surprise at President Trump's Speech on Islam - Common Word, Common Lord","og_description":"Wow. I was pleasantly surprised at the speech given by President Trump.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/trump-speech\/","og_site_name":"Common Word, Common Lord","article_published_time":"2017-05-22T00:23:40+00:00","article_modified_time":"2017-05-22T01:09:47+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/files\/2017\/05\/f7aa0de9-1db8-4cfe-ac7c-fb28a1f7dc94-16288-00001b42169022e9.jpg"}],"author":"Hesham A. Hassaballa","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@GodFaithPen","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/trump-speech\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/trump-speech\/","name":"Pleasant Surprise at President Trump's Speech on Islam - Common Word, Common Lord","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/trump-speech\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/trump-speech\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/files\/2017\/05\/f7aa0de9-1db8-4cfe-ac7c-fb28a1f7dc94-16288-00001b42169022e9.jpg","datePublished":"2017-05-22T00:23:40+00:00","dateModified":"2017-05-22T01:09:47+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/#\/schema\/person\/c2d50a46198edad19abb055001c4cd21"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/trump-speech\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/trump-speech\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/trump-speech\/#primaryimage","url":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/files\/2017\/05\/f7aa0de9-1db8-4cfe-ac7c-fb28a1f7dc94-16288-00001b42169022e9.jpg","contentUrl":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/files\/2017\/05\/f7aa0de9-1db8-4cfe-ac7c-fb28a1f7dc94-16288-00001b42169022e9.jpg"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/trump-speech\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Pleasant Surprise at President Trump&#8217;s Speech on Islam"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/","name":"Common Word, Common Lord","description":"Beliefnet Voices - Hesham Hassaballa","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/#\/schema\/person\/c2d50a46198edad19abb055001c4cd21","name":"Hesham A. Hassaballa","description":"Hesham A. Hassaballa is a Chicago doctor and writer. He has written extensively on a freelance basis, being published in newspapers across the country and around the world. He has been a Beliefnet columnist since 2001, and has written for the Religion News Service. He is also a columnist for Patheos. His articles have been distributed worldwide by Agence Global, and he was also a guest blogger for The Chicago Tribune and has blogged on ChicagoNow\" . In addition, Dr. Hassaballa has appeared as a guest on WTTW (Channel 11) in Chicago, CNN, Fox News, BBC, and National Public Radio. Dr. Hassaballa is co-author of The Beliefnet Guide to Islam (Doubleday), and his essay, \u201cWhy I Love the Ten Commandments,\u201d was published in the award-winning book Taking Back Islam (Rodale). His latest book, Noble Brother, is the story of the Prophet Muhammad told entirely in poetry, and it is now published in its second edition. In 2007, his blog \"God, Faith, and a Pen\" was nominated for a Brass Crescent Award for a blog that is \u201cthe most stimulating, insightful, and philosophical, providing the best rebuttals to extremist ideology and making an impact whenever they post.\u201d \"God, Faith, and a Pen\" has also received an award for being one of the \"Top Muslim Blogs for 2010\" by Awarding The Web. In addition to writing, Dr. Hassaballa helped found the Chicago Chapter of the Council on American Islamic Relations and currently serves on their board of directors. He also co-founded the Bayan H. Hassaballa Charitable Foundation and now serves as its Treasurer.","sameAs":["https:\/\/x.com\/GodFaithPen"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/author\/hhassaballa\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1369","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/175"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1369"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1369\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1377,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1369\/revisions\/1377"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1369"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1369"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/commonwordcommonlord\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1369"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}