Images of the aftermath in Mumbai

Battlefields are messy places. I have a good friend who was a financial reporter for the Chicago Tribune. They sent him to New York literally on the afternoon of 9/11 to cover the story as he was familiar with the financial district, forgetting that the geography of that area was now somewhat different. He never recovered from it. He was home in a week, took two weeks to sober up and left journalism for good some time after.

While I am not a Muslim and do believe that Islam has some seriously flawed doctrines, I think it is an over simplification to say that the problem is somehow just Islam...though Islamic terror is certainly the bog problem right now.

The real problem is a dogmatism that can infect any religion or philosophy. Atheists who tend to pillory religion as the source of all such mindless conflict and brutality conveniently ignore the scores of millions murdered, tortured, and oppressed by "enlightend" ahteistic regines in teh Soviet Bloc, China, North Korea, Cambodia, etc.

An absolutist mindset that finds it easy to believe that "I am right and you are evil" can justify atrocities in the name of God or dialectical materialism, or racism.

The Bible says that we are to "act justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with our God" which pretty much rules out gleefully slaghtering those with whom we disagree.

It is fanatical fundamentalism which is the root problem. It's latest manifestation is in the form of these murderous monsters who committed the Mumbai atrocities. But, the same mindset can attach itself to almost any other belief system and turn it into something demonic.

Indeed, we must be careful, as we combat this evil, not to resort to its methods, and thus become simply the next generation of terrorists.