Not Just the Imams...

In fairness to the Muslim clerics who gleefully used the horrendous loss of human life from December's Indian Ocean tsunami as evidence that God hates infidels (i.e., anyone whose religious beliefs differn from their own), they were hardly alone in making theological merry over the disaster.

Writing in the Free Presbyterian Magazine, the Rev John MacLeod compared the disaster to the biblical flood "on the world of the ungodly" in the time of Noah.

In the article, Mr MacLeod wrote: "Possibly ... no event since Noah’s flood has caused such loss of life by drowning as the recent Asian tsunami.

"That so many of our fellow creatures should have perished in so short a time, and in so awful a fashion, was a divine visitation that ought to make men tremble the world over."

More than 160,000 people - mostly ordinary Indonesians, Sri Lankans, Indians and Thais - have been confirmed as victims of the disaster on Sunday 26 December.

Mr MacLeod said: "To rule out the hand of God in this ... is to forget that He is in sovereign control of all events. If the sparrow falling to the ground is an event noted, and ordered, by Him, how much is this the case when the souls of so many thousands are parted from their bodies?"

He went on to say that some of the places most affected by the tsunami "attracted pleasure seekers from all over the world".

"It has to be noted that the wave arrived on the Lord’s Day, the day that God has set apart to be observed the world over by a holy resting from all employments and recreations that are lawful on other days," he said.

"We cannot but fear that it found multitudes unprepared for the eternity into which they were ushered so suddenly."

Mr MacLeod told The Scotsman he stood by the article but said he had concluded by saying such acts of God did not necessarily claim the worst sinners. "None of us has reason to be complacent, including myself," he said.

He said people should "of course" give to the tsunami appeals but refused to say if he had made a donation.

Naturally.