The Bloody Hands of Terry Jones

by Pa Rock
Citizen Journalist

Florida “pastor” Terry Jones who heads a little Christian fundamentalist “church” in Gainesville, Florida, called the Dove World Outreach Center (which sounds far more impressive than it actually is), has more blood on his hands than the average insane terrorist.    In his ever-increasing efforts to feed his attention-starved ego, Jones has perpetrated or participated in several stunts that have resulted in the deaths of over four dozen individuals. 

Jones, a native of Cape Girardeau, Missouri, where he was a high school classmate of radio mouth Rush Limbaugh, is devoutly anti-abortion and anti-gay, but more than that he is savagely anti-Muslim.  One of his most publicized stunts was two years ago in September of 2010 when he was planning a big Koran-burning to show his opposition to the Islamic religion and its Muslim followers.   President Obama intervened with a personal telephone call to the miscreant “minister” and convinced him to call off the religious sacrilege.   But just the threat of burning the Korans resulted in rioting in the Middle East and a death toll of nineteen.

Six months later, in March of 2011, Jones followed through on his threat and actually held a mock trial of a Koran at his “church.”  The poor holy book was found guilty and burned for its crimes.  Rioting in the Middle East after that attention-getting stunt resulted in twenty-four deaths.

June of this year found Jones again begging to be noticed.  This time he hung President Obama in effigy from a gallows in front of his “church,” and then buried the effigy, though it was probably not a Christian burial.  The Secret Service investigated that stunt, but sadly Terry Jones continues to roam free and run amok.

The most recent Jones’ outrage occurred this week, again in the Middle East, where rioters, in reaction to an anti-Islamic movie that Jones claimed to have promoted, stormed the U.S. Embassy in Cairo and attacked the embassy in Benghazi, Libya, where eight Middle Eastern nationals and four Americans were killed including U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens.   President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton have both expressed outrage over the incident (and Mitt Romney has voiced outrage at what he sees as an apologetic tone from the Obama administration), but none of these political leaders have directed their anger at the intolerant individuals, including Terry Jones, who foisted this religious insult onto the Internet.

Today Army General Martin Dempsey, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, fed the Jones' ego again by telephoning him and asking that he back off of his promotion of the anti-Islamic movie.   Dempsey asked him to consider the "tensions it could inflame and the violence it could cause."   That, of course, was undoubtedly music to Jones' ears, because his primary goals are to inflame and incite.

The "minister" reportedly intends to follow through with plans to have a showing of the movie in his "church." 

What will be next, Terry?  Hanging a four-star general in effigy?

It is time that Terry Jones (and others like him) are called to account for their insidious provocations, actions that deliberately inflame religious tensions and result in the deaths of dozens.  The courts long ago determined that freedom of speech has limits – such as the infamous yelling of “fire” in a crowded theatre – so that same principle should surely come into play here. 

“Reverend” Jones has overstepped the bounds of human decency, and for that he needs to be held accountable.   Jesus would be mortified at the hate coming from this individual.  Terry Jones is clearly not a Christian in any decent sense of the word.

While I may not be in favor of jailing the provocateur and thus making him a martyr to every religious bigot in America, a good caning would certainly be in order.