it is sad that a 50-member church (Dove World Center Outreach in Gainsville, Fla) and a revengeful pastor (terry jones) can hijack the media and thousands of minutes of airtime. and organise a burn the quran day "in the name of Jesus." whatever happened to turn the other cheek?

just as the Filipino hostage situation involving a bus load of HK tourist should have had a media black out, similarly this burning of the quran event should have. the former resulted in 8 deaths. the latter would bring much more.

if the media has not fanned the flames of this runaway spark, it will not have turned into such a huge worldwide religious fire that is so hard to put out. we cannot continue to sacrifice peace and social harmony, international relations and inter-personal decency on the altar of sensationalism. it is time to call the media to attention and to hold them to good journalism and worthy news coverage. it is time we should re-think how our media function such that a delinquent minority will not waste the time and resources of the majority and that their lame causes not be inflated above and beyond that they are.

ever since the media caught wind of this, it has blazed the world over and this time round the fire is being flamed by the church in Germany that Pastor Jones has founded. that church has disowned and renounced Jones in 2008 but now felt need to voice their disapproval of Jones' antics to the world. the Church (note capital letter 'C') need to live not in reaction, not in retaliation but in reconciliation and for restoration. we are ambassadors for Christ (1 Cor 5:20), we are called to be witnesses (Acts 1:8). Jones in his call to burn quran to send a message to the muslims is doing so in retaliation. the church in germany, and all the world around are reacting, and thus give rise to probable more escalated reaction on the recipients' part and over-correction of a minority's error by government or society.