The Crusade Against Erdogan

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Last weekend was the Turkish festival in my city.  It was downtown and not too far from where I lived so I decided to go.  I remember how on Canada day I engaged the Muslims at the dawah booth at the festival downtown.  I expected to find a Muslim booth but I didn’t know what to expect in terms of dawah. 

I found the Muslim booth and there was a kind older man there.  I struck up a conversation with him and we talked for a while.  It wasn’t long until he started talking about Erdogan and how much of a danger he was to the Turkish people.  I looked on the table at the books that he was selling.  They were all really liberal, watered down Sufi spirituality.  The books were mostly by Turkish authors but there were a few books by non-Turkish authors as well.  There was a lot by Fethullah Gulen.  He seemed to be the theologian of choice at the information desk.  There was one book dedicated to refuting the theory of evolution.  The man said that very few Turks believe in evolution.

There was also a lot of books on interfaith dialogue with Christians.  Seeing this showed me that this wasn’t really a dawah booth.  It was more about promoting peace and harmony.  Surah 109:6 came to mind.  For you is your religion, and for me is my religion.  I obviously didn’t engage this man in debate since his religion was essentially gnosticism and probably didn’t believe in objective religious truth.  I’ve known about two dozen Turks in my life and not one has been religious.  It’s a bit disappointing that the first religious one that I met was squishy on religion.  He was a very kind man though.

Erdogan kept coming up.  Eventually the man pointed me to a booth that was specifically dedicated to giving out anti-Erdogan literature.  The two Turkish men manning the booth were both University professors that had lost their jobs because of Erdogan.  I asked if most Turkish people at this festival oppose Erdogan.  He told me that every single Turk at this festival was against Erdogan.

I looked around for a bit more then I left.  It wasn’t that big of a festival as there are only a few hundred Turks in my city.  I wanted a good debate but I obviously wasn’t going to get one from this man.  He was theologically squishy.  I suppose that the Turks are to Islam what the Germans are to Catholicism. Orthodoxy doesn’t matter to them.

There is an Arab festival coming up in my city next weekend but I’ll be out of town.  The next weekend after that I’ll be in Eastern Europe for vacation where the last thing I expect to find is a dawah booth.  I suppose cultural festivals aren’t the best places to debate Muslims anyway.  I still also need to learn more Hadith as well.  Something tells me that I won’t be debating any Turks anytime soon.  At least regarding Islam, if I said something positive about Erdogan I think these Canadian Turks would be more than willing to engage me.

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8 thoughts on “The Crusade Against Erdogan”

  1. You should have gone strait for issues like the Deity of Christ, the Crucifixion, death of Christ, atonement, sinful nature of mankind (original sin in the heart) and the doctrine of the Trinity. You probably could have challenged them on those issues.

    Reply

      • I agree that Sufis who are in the west are difficult – in a way, in my own experience, many Iranians are that way also, until you start about sins in the heart and ask them questions about their own sins and heart and about repentance (Mark 1:15) and also preach the truth that Jesus is the ONLY way to be saved. (John 14:6; Acts 4:12; Romans 10:13-15)

        You still should preach the gospel to them and appeal to those things. When you start talking about their sins in the heart (Mark 7:20-23; Jer. 17:9; Genesis 6:5; Matthew 5:21-30) (and ours also, include myself and yourself in that to make sure they understand we are not saying we are better than them) and that repentance and faith in Christ alone is the ONLY way to get to heaven, you will get some debate.

        Reply

        • Hi Ken,

          I honestly think that most Muslims in the West are hopeless. The younger generation of Muslims in Canada are extremely compromised. They believe in liberal culture, homosexuality, and other abominations. They always march in pride parades and stuff. In many ways they’re no different than young Catholics on this issue. I suppose Western secularism doesn’t discriminate when it seeks out religion to destroy. The days of the leftist-Islamic alliance are long gone.

          In hindsight I probably should have been more aggressive. The Quran has a very weak doctrine of sin and redemption so sin and punishment are always a good place to start. I’ve recently re-read the Quran so all of that material is fresh in my mind.

          God Bless,

          Allan

          Reply

    • Hi Ken,

      You’re correct, this isn’t a Turkish dance. Other cultural groups who are close with the Turkish community in my city had booths as well. There were groups from Kyrgyzstan, Azerbaijan, and other countries in central and southeast Asia. The Turkish community was sponsoring the festival though so they were the majority of the people there.

      God Bless,

      Allan

      Reply