Texas Faith: Should women be required to have a sonogram before undergoing an abortion? Dallas Morning News

Life is about choices; you bear the emotional, physical and spiritual burden for the wrong choices you make or enjoy the life with least conflicts.  

Conscience is a dynamic term constantly expanding its range of acceptability from what the societies set up as a benchmark to the free choices one wants to exercise.

Women have come a long way in regaining their freedom to choose from the patriarchal societies where men had set their boundaries on the issue of abortion.  

There is a revolutionary as well as an evolutionary process of benchmarking the conscience. Some 1400 years ago female infanticide was a common place in the Middle East and Prophet Muhammad turned that around in his life time, calling the female child as God's blessing, the Catholic Church had pioneered that position as well.  

We value life regardless of where we stand on abortion and sonogram is one more effort to ask the carrier of fetus to reconsider her choice to be absolutely certain that she is not aborting a life consciously; the pains of carrying through may outweigh the pain of aborting.

We need to guard ourselves in making decisions based on the needs of today over the burdens of temptations of imposing majority views on those who differ. We need to do a fresh study on abortion remorse and not rush through this, let's evolve and let's not lose our basic human value; choice.

Full version of this article along with 11 others opinions is at Dallas Morning News at: http://religionblog.dallasnews.com/archives/2011/03/texas-faith-do-you-approve-of.html

Mike Ghouse

Brussels wins to host 2014 Parliament of worlds religions

PRESS RELEASE

March 21, 2011, Dallas, Texas

We congratulate the Brussels team headed by Miguel Mesquita da Cunha, Chairman of the 2014 Bid Steering Committee for the tireless work they have put in behalf of Belgians and the Europeans to secure the 2014 bid to host the Parliament of the Worlds Religions.

In behalf of the Foundation for Pluralism and the World Muslim congress, two of the many supporters of the bid for hosting the 2014 event in Dallas, Mike Ghouse, president of the organizations announced,

“We the people of Dallas gracefully acknowledge and honor the decision of the board of trustees of the Parliament of World’s religion for their choice of Brussels to host the 2014 event. Indeed, Brussels will significantly contribute towards the goals of the Parliament; to facilitate an open dialogue among religions, nurture values of co-existence, and encourage cohesion and seek pluralism for people of the world. “

Now, it is our turn to join the Brussels team in making this event successful for the people of world aspiring to create the kingdom of heaven on this beautiful planet, where we can hope and pray that the next seven generations and beyond can live without the apprehension of the other and freely practice their faith and culture.  

You can count on our support any way we can.|
# ##
Mike Ghouse is a speaker, thinker and a writer and is committed to building a cohesive America through the Foundation for Pluralism championing the idea of co-existence through respecting and accepting the otherness of other, and World Muslim Congress committed to nurturing the pluralistic ideals embedded in Islam.

Mike is available to speak on Pluralism, Islam and building cohesive societies at your work, place of worship, school, seminars or conferences.  He is a media commentator offering pluralistic solutions on issues of the day. Mike's work is reflected at three websites & twenty two Blogs listed at http://www.MikeGhouse.net/ (214) 325-1916
# # #
Your Comments:

 REFERENCES:

Articles and pictures by the Foundation for Pluralism, World Muslim Congress and Memnosyne Foundation.  I am pleased to share a few of the many references.  

1.      The Theme of Parliament 2014
http://wisdomofreligion.blogspot.com/2010/07/parliament-of-worlds-religions-summit.html

2.      Defending the need for Parliament in Dallas Morning News – Mike aggressively defends criticism. http://religionblog.dallasnews.com/archives/2010/07/texas-faith-dallas-and-the-201.html

3.      Religious Discourse and the Parliament http://wisdomofreligion.blogspot.com/2010/05/religious-discourse-and-parliament-of.html

4.      2014 Dallas bid to seek the Parliament in Dallas
http://wisdomofreligion.blogspot.com/2010/04/dallas-2014-parliament-of-worlds.html

5.      Mike Ghouse to speak at the Parliament of World’s Religions http://wisdomofreligion.blogspot.com/2009/11/mike-ghouse-to-speak-at-parliament-of.html

6.      Angie Buchanan and Mike Ghouse on NPR http://theghousediary.blogspot.com/2009/12/national-public-radio.html

7.      Dalai Lama and worlds religions 
http://theghousediary.blogspot.com/2010/12/dalai-lama-and-worlds-religions.html

8.      Notes about the Parliament -
http://theghousediary.blogspot.com/2009/12/note-about-parliament-event.html

9.      Summary of the Parliament visit - http://theghousediary.blogspot.com/2009/12/parliament-of-world-religions-15.html

10. Pictures: Parliament’s Chicago visit http://www.flickr.com/photos/mikeghouse/sets/72157624107988176/  Slide show: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mikeghouse/sets/72157624107988176/show/

11. June 5, 2010 Meeting http://www.flickr.com/photos/mikeghouse/sets/72157624217148394/

12. Parliament event in Melbourne http://www.flickr.com/photos/mikeghouse/sets/72157622903144129/show/

13. Dinner event at Fun Asia – sponsored by Fun Asiahttp://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=464318&id=851280248

14. Meeting at Madeleine Restaurant in May 2010http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=429662&id=851280248

15. Official announcement by the Parliamenthttp://www.parliamentofreligions.org/news/index.php/2011/03/brussels-to-host-the-parliament-of-the-worlds-religions-in-2014/

We have had a few more dinner meetings held in Dallas and few more pictures, which I may publish later on due to specific requests from our friends not to publish their pictures for the public.

# # #

http://www.foundationforpluralism.com/
http://www.worldmuslimcongress.com/
http://www.americatogetherfoundation.com/

Mike Ghouse
2665 Villa Creek Dr, suite 206
Dallas, TX 75234 USA
(214) 325-1916

Respone in Dallas Morning News

We all should be concerned about the hearings and hope and pray that Mr. King would be honest, sincere and fair, although his record is marred with bigotry. We hope he will not destroy the fabric of our society and pit one American against the other.

 

Acknowledging that “some of our own” are a security threat to our nation is the right thing to do. We should have done it ourselves, since we did not, we have to accept the bad choice of Mr. King.

I welcome the hearings, Muslims have nothing to fear and nothing to worry, let the man fall flat on his face “if” he resorts to untruths. What if he turns out to be honest and finds guys like Shehzad? Then we owe him gratitude, not just Muslims but the whole nation.

Just as we produced the Quraan conference in Dallas to evaporate the lies the right wingers had propagated, this will perhaps become the first nail in their coffin and hope they will stop pitting one American against the other to have political gains.

If nothing else comes from the hearings, one thing is for sure. Muslims are not a monolithic lot and they are no different than any of the 301 million of us. Each one of has a different thumb print, eye print, DNA, different sizes, shapes and colors, political affiliations, so be it with faiths or no faiths.  That is God’s universe.