While it is incomprehensible that an angry mob in Afghanistan would murder about 20 United Nations workers – beheading at least two – over what some goofy guy does to draw attention in Florida, it is even more frightful an Atlanta woman recently served on the “jury” to burn the Muslim holy book.

Mazar-i-Sharif is the fourth-largest city in Afghanistan – roughly the same size as Chattanooga – and that’s where a group of people who we do not understand just savagely attacked and killed peace workers for a reason they do not understand. This is what happens when “crazy-meets-crazy.”

Pastor Terry Jones, a Florida preacher who uses hatred as his main tool, apparently burned a copy of the Muslim Koran on March 20. He said he was going to do it earlier, collected a lot of famous signatures begging him not to, and when the glow died down he finally struck the match.

The American media played it down, now recognizing him as “a homophobic used-furniture salesman” instead of a follower of Christ-like principles, but the foreign media got all astir with tapes of the actual burning being shown all the way to Mecca. Bingo. Seven foreigners were among those killed.

Now we learn that Jobeth Gerrard, a follower of Jones’ Dove World Outreach Center which is located in Gainesville, Fla., has been making the commute to the Florida center. On Friday, April 2 she told Katie Leslie, a reporter for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, that she asked to serve on a “mock trial” jury that found the Koran guilty of inciting all types of things.

Jobeth has apparently been led to believe the Koran teaches prejudice, incites violence and killing, and inspires the degradation of women. She had not heard of the riotous rampage when contacted but scoffed at the notion the burning of the book was responsible.

“That’s the excuse du jour. … They aren’t linked,” she told the reporter. “Don’t even try tying them together. It’s just pointless. They’re killing people every week over there.”

Rather indignant, she said the international outcry over the proposed burning is what got her all fired up. “What is wrong with this picture – that the whole international community and everybody is getting involved?

"Why are they so terrified of this little guy in Florida with a Quran (Koran) in a little no-nothing church?” she said. “We are told that Muslims are peaceful and we don’t have a Muslim problem. Why are they all freaking out about this? Don’t we have free speech?”

Well, it seems the trial was presented largely in Arabic – which was then translated to the jurors – and lasted over five hours. She said it was a bit anticlimactic with Pastor Jones serving as the judge. Are you kidding me? What on earth did the woman suspect the outcome might be?

Let me tell you what it was. The burning was inflammatory, if you’ll pardon the pun, and the senseless outcome was enraged by a video where Pastor Jones is heard to say, the book “burns very good.” That’s right, the book’s “punishment” after the mock trial was to be burned up.

No, what burns is within the soul of every man who yearns for peace and when the Pastor, according to today’s Washington Post, deplores the “tragic and criminal action,” and says “the time has come to hold Islam accountable,” the view from here is that this guy can’t see the splinter because there is a log in his eye.

In essence, Pastor Jones and jurist Jobeth Gerrard become tools for the Taliban, which issued the following statement:

“The American media outlets like their rulers stayed completely silent as regards this inhumane and wicked action,” the statement said. “Hundreds of times, we have seen abhorrent instances of blasphemy at the hands of the American soldiers in Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib and Bagram prisons, desecrating the Holy Quran and other Islamic tenets.”

The whole thing is absolutely senseless and the only balm I can find is in the belief when the Lord comes and there is Judgment Day, Pastor Terry Jones better hope the evidence isn’t presented in Arabic.

Contact: [email protected]