AIDING THE ENEMY FOLLOW UP

Under pressure from the US, the Vatican, and other Western leaders, Afghanistan's fledgling democracy Sunday sidestepped a politically charged case in which prosecutors had sought the death penalty for a Muslim man who converted to Christianity.
Rather than pass judgment on Abdul Rahman, an Afghan who converted while living abroad 16 years ago, the court declared him mentally unfit for trial Sunday. "He is a sick person," said Mohammed Eshaq Aloko, Afghanistan's deputy attorney general. Afghan officials said Mr. Rahman would be transferred to a hospital for psychiatric evaluation.

Read the rest of the follow up to Aiding The Enemy here.

A brief commentary on the whole ordeal. This tale reminds me of the first well-known public attacker of Christianity and his claims that, well, basically Christians were not well mentally. He couldn't understand why anyone would follow a poor man, a poor JEW, and not the more noble successful gods of the Roman empire.

"I speak bitterly about this," says Celsus, "because I feel bitterly. When we are invited to the Mysteries the masters use another tone. They say, ' Come to us ye who are of clean hands and pure speech, ye who are unstained by crime, who have a good conscience towards God, who have done justly and lived uprightly.' The Jews say, ' Come to us ye who are sinners, ye who are fools or children, ye who are miserable, and ye shall enter into the kingdom of Heaven.' The rogue, the thief, the burglar, the poisoner, the spoiler of temples and tombs, these are their proselytes. Jesus, they say, was sent to save sinners; was he not sent to help those who have kept themselves free from sin? They pretend that God will save the unjust man if he repents and humbles himself...Above all Christians are disloyal, and every church is an illicit collegium, an insinuation deadly at any time, but especially so under Marcus Aurelius. Why cannot Christians attach themselves to the great philosophic and
political authorities of the world? A properly understood worship of gods and demons is quite compatible with a purified monotheism, and they might as well give up the mad idea of winning the authorities over to their faith, or of hoping to attain anything like universal agreement on divine things. "

Celsus thought Christians were unpatriotic crazies. They earned that label. Have I? Should I?