Malik Nadal Hasan

Malik Nadal Hasan was a military psychiatrist and a U.S. army major who allegedly opened fire on a group of soldiers in Fort Hood, Texas, on November 5, 2009. Hasan was shot, wounded and survived the incident.

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When Religion and Nationalism Collide

Written by mitchmaitree on

From: asymptoticlife.com

(Svadilfari photo.)

As I read the background on the Fort Hood shooter, Nidal Malik Hasan, a familiar pattern emerged. He was the son of immigrants-- Palestinian in this case. He moved a lot, attending three colleges in different parts of the country (including, ironically, Virginia Tech) before joining the military. And, according to his family, he had few friends. This pattern fits many recent shooting-spree perpetrators, from Virginia Tech to Salt Lake City.

But there was another wrinkle in Hasan's story that caught my attention: he reportedly told classmates that he was "a Muslim first and an American second." The article suggested this is a bad thing.

Too often, nationalism co-opts religion, turning it from a moral guide to a tool for hatred and destruction. But what happens when religion and nationalism collide? When your country contradicts your religion, which do you choose?

No matter your religion or your country, if confronted with a choice like that, I hope you choose your religion. What we believe must come before our loyalty to any nation, ethnic group, relationship, or profit. Otherwise, we don't believe it very strongly.

To put this another way: If a Christian is confronted with a choice between serving the United States and staying true to the teachings of Jesus, and he or she chooses nation over God, they're not much of a Christian.

Hasan happened to be a Muslim. Several sources indicate that he saw the war on terror as a war against Islam. It's hard to argue that when at least one Pentagon general has said exactly that.

I have no idea what went on in the mind of this "dedicated soldier" (as some who knew him described him) before he pulled the trigger and killed 13 people. I won't try to justify his actions-- in my mind there is no justification. But in the interest of understanding why such violence occurs, which would be essential to preventing future outbreaks, we might look to the stress caused by the irreconcilable loyalties between a man's religion and his oath to perform actions his religion cannot tolerate.

And we might look to our own religious inclination. Do we really believe strongly enough to defy those who tell us what is good for the country, when our religion says something else?

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