Religious Tolerance After September 11th.

After September 11, 2001 it became obvious that our country would experience many changes in foreign policy and security measures. One change that perhaps was not foreseen is the shift in religious tolerance, particularly the conflict between Muslims and Christians, or more specifically, extremist Muslims and uninformed Christians. Unfortunately, terrorist actions taken by extremist Muslims have imparted upon many Christian Americans negative views toward all those practicing Islam.

Our country is made up of many different people with many different religious beliefs, but Christians are the majority in the public, and the overwhelming majority in our national government. As much as our political leaders state that they in no way discriminate against anyone, there have clearly been several changes in policy affecting only certain citizens and non-citizens living in our country. One specific change is the policy from the newly established Department of Homeland Security requiring non-citizen men from twenty-five countries with large Muslim populations to register with U.S.

Muslims..

United States

Official Photo of

Immigration authorities before April of this year. The purpose of this policy is to isolate and identify any Muslim men who may have connections to any known terrorist groups, but to critics it is nothing more than a hastily thrown together plan to make visible to citizens and the rest of the world that the American government is doing some type of action to prevent another terrorist attack against our country. Regardless of the intentions of the policy, eighty-two thousand men came forward to register, and as of June 7 thirteen thousand of those men face deportation because they are residing in this country illegally. However, only eleven of those eighty-two thousand men and the thousands more Muslim men who have been stopped and checked at airports and border crossings have been linked to any kind of terrorism (Swarns). Only those...