I am grateful to that one Muslim who, in my nearly 10 years of writing a regular weekly column, if you will, that I called Payaam-e-Maghrib (meaning: a Message from the West) in the Indian Muslim Viewsweekly Radiance, evidently glanced at my article, even though he may not have read it with any due diligence.

I am grateful to him for allowing the article to catch his attention, even though I have no means of knowing the exact circumstances in which this might have happened, or the extent to which the gentleman might have actually paid any serious attention to its content.

I am grateful to him that he cared enough about his children to want to shield and protect them from being exposed to such "nefarious" ideas -- I think that is the word he used, "nefarious," I don't remember; the word "nihilistic" to me sounds equally usable -- as doing "Dhikr" of Allah 10-15 minutes a day in some structured format.

Come to think of it, what could be more "nefarious" -- or "nihilistic" -- than that?

And I am grateful to him for firing off a strong protest letter to the editor of Radiance Viewsweekly. Here, evidently, is a Muslim who does not believe in letting grass grow under your feet.

So, my gratefulness to him has no bounds. 

It is only matched by my wonder: These are the Muslims the Civilized World is so terrified about?

I am tempted to ask: Who is kidding whom? 

But then I don't want anyone to think that my faith in the "Truth" of the Modern-Day Miracle of 9-11 is shaken or weakened in any way. 

I want to assure everyone that while my intellect may take a second seat in front of George Bush (Junior of course), my patriotism yields not a whit to the likes of the Great Warrior Mayor and Truth Teller of New York, Rudy Giuliani -- the Prophet Par Excellence of the Modern-Day Miracle of 9-11. 

Oh, you don't know the Modern-Day Miracle of 9-11? Here, let me summarize it for you:

"16 Idiots from the Muslim Middle East Blew up the Whole World to Bits 

Right in Front of Everyone's Eyes!."

You know what I mean?

Don't worry, that is just a typical New York Type expression. Quite benign and meaningless in fact.

So, my gratefulness gushes forth unbounded.

Thank you Mr. Muslim who, evidently, cares.

END