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As professional religion reporters looked back on 2010, they ranked the debate over an Islamic center and mosque near Ground Zero—along with a pastor's threat to burn the Qur'an—as the year's top story. The threat of Qur'an burning has dropped out of the headlines. But loud opposition to construction of Islamic centers continues across the country. Outside of Manhattan, metro Nashville became the most prominent of the local controversies (which were legion). Brentwood residents successfully quashed plans for a mosque in their town as plans to convert a historic theater in Antioch into an Islamic center continued despite local opposition. But it was Murfreesboro that got the most attention from national media, the Justice Department, and local politicians. A court has ruled that construction of an Islamic center there can continue, but a legal challenge is ongoing.

Meanwhile, some churches have modeled a much more welcoming approach. At Heartsong Church in Cordova, Tennessee, Steve Stone and his congregants put out a sign welcoming incoming neighbors at the Memphis Islamic Center. The church then allowed these Muslim neighbors to use their sanctuary as a makeshift mosque throughout Ramadan while the Islamic Center was under construction. Stone and Heartsong received extensive national media coverage for their efforts.

For Stone, allowing Muslims to worship on his church's property was a matter of "What would Jesus do?"—a matter of his United Methodist congregation modeling the love of Jesus to strangers, just as Jesus had welcomed them.

Another United Methodist pastor 900 miles away came to a similar conclusion when a neighboring Islamic congregation asked to use his church's space for five months of Friday prayers. Jason Micheli, pastor of Aldersgate Methodist Church in Alexandria, Virginia, shares part of his theological reasoning in a sermon published at Scot McKnight's Jesus Creed blog.

While Micheli uses more explicitly evangelical and exclusivist language than Heartsong and Steve Stone, he similarly defends his decision by appealing to Jesus and Christian love: "[W]hen we say that Jesus is the only way to the Father, we don't just mean our belief in Jesus is the only way to the Father. We also mean Jesus' way of life is the only way we manifest the Father's love. That we would welcome Muslim strangers into our sacred space with no strings attached is not a reduction of what we believe about Jesus (or a betrayal); it is, I think, the fullest possible expression of what we believe about Jesus."

Both of the pastors allowing Muslim worship on their property appeal to the love required of Christians as an authoritative guide for their decision-making.

But it is not self-evident that this duty requires us to provide property for false worship. The theological issues at play come down to whether Jesus' love command also requires leaders to avoid causing undue stumbling; or, as Wesley put it, the command to do good works includes avoiding causing or leading others to harm, whether they are believers or unbelievers. Does facilitation of false worship violate the love command?

Absurd extremes of Qur'an burning and protests over mosque construction illustrate the fact that the love command requires theological interpretation in order to be correctly applied. A Terry Jones apologist might argue that the love command dictates a demonstration. At the other end of the spectrum, Herman Melville's Moby Dick gives a classic illustration of the overuse of the love commandment, as the Presbyterian Ishmael argues himself into idol worship with Queequeg using "biblical" reasoning:

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January (Web-Only) 2011, Vol. 55

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