MT: You’ve written that we must overcome the stultifying effects of political correctness, and that “free speech is the best friend Muslims have.” What do you mean by that?

DG: First, thank you for asking me this. This matter is very urgent and close to my heart. I grew up, and currently live, in Passaic County, New Jersey, which is said to have the second largest Muslim population in the U.S. I grew up with Arabs and with Muslims. I have had Muslim friends, boyfriends, bosses, coworkers, and students. I love many Muslims. I feel for them the kind of love you feel for any close friend. When I was a girl, one day a Muslim friend turned to me and said, “When the time for jihad comes, if you don’t accept Islam, I will have to kill you.”

The simple truth is that Islam is different from the other world belief systems: Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Confucianism. None of these includes anything like the call to jihad. Islam does. No, most Muslims are not active jihadis, but a critical mass are, and we cannot predict which Muslim will become an active jihadi. We need free speech about jihad in order to solve the dilemma we all face: peaceful integration of existing Muslim populations into American life, a rational foreign policy, and our own security. We need this free speech from professionals for whom speech is their sharpest tool: journalists, political, military and religious leaders, academics, and creative artists.

Right now we are not hearing free speech. Rather, we hear dogma fashioned to forfend free speech. This dogma is so predictable we could all chant its creed in unison: “Islam means peace. Not all Muslims are terrorists. The Bible contains shocking verses. Christians do bad things.” We recently heard Ben Affleck and Nick Kristof mouthing these Orwellian bromides on the October 3 episode of Real Time with Bill Maher. In the absence of the free flow of ideas, the average Joe, who is not as stupid or as docile as the Ben Afflecks and Nick Kristofs of the world think he is, is becoming fearful and concluding that our culture is not addressing jihad. Many average Joes are deciding that they are free agents, and must go it alone. You can see it in internet discussions. People – nice people, average people – are talking about what kind of ammunition they are stockpiling.

What is better for Muslims in the U.S.? A frank conversation about our best response to jihad, or our cultural leaders mouthing bromides that demonize free inquiry, while millions of average people plan to be vigilantes? Can we please have the conversation we need to have about, say radical mosques and how petro-dependency steers public policy before we start shooting innocent people? If Americans felt that they could openly express their fears about jihad and receive honest and informed replies, if they felt that their leaders had their best interests at heart and were addressing radical mosques, petro-dependency and the threat of free agent jihadis, I don’t think as many people would be talking about stockpiling ammo.

I think of one Muslim man I know. He is a mechanic. He interacts with Americans all day long. He is liked and respected by his customers. He’s an older guy who has lived in this country most of his life. He sacrificed much to leave his Muslim-majority homeland and come here to enjoy the fruits of democracy. I think the chances of his ever hurting anyone are near zero. He has expressed to me his hatred and rejection of terrorism. I think this man would be totally open to America having a frank conversation about addressing extremism in our country. But we are afraid to have that conversation. I think my Muslim friend believes more in American ideals like free speech than someone like Ben Affleck. I think the Ben Afflecks of the world fail my Muslim friends.

MT: Tell us about your novel Save, Send, Delete, a debate between a Catholic and an atheist. What’s the philosophical thrust of that debate, and why was it important enough to you to write a book about it?

DG: Save Send Delete is a true story. Several years back I was wrestling with the big, hard questions: Is there a God? Why is there suffering? I saw an atheist on TV and I sent him an email. To my great surprise, he wrote back. We corresponded for a year, debating the existence of God, and we fell in love.

Save Send Delete isn’t a left-wing book or a right-wing book. It’s about confronting God and love and trying to dig down as deeply as possible for worthy, livable truth. But even if I were not a believing Christian, I would shudder at the message of “capital A” Atheists. Recently Salon made waves by publishing Jeffrey Tayler’s criticism of Islam. Here’s the thing – Jeffrey Tayler is a proselytizer who exploits discomfort with Islam to peddle capital A Atheist tracts. “If you don’t like suicide bombings you should agree with me that all religion is evil,” is his main idea. Religion, he says, is like pestilence-spreading rats in the sewer. We must eradicate it. This has long been the thinking of mass murderers from the French Terror to the Khmer Rouge.

Capital A Atheists use their “Flying Spaghetti Monster” concept to sell total relativism. All religions are the same; Mother Teresa is just as bad as Osama bin Laden. We may as well believe in a Flying Spaghetti Monster as in anything else. This extreme relativism is deadly. Our inability to differentiate between cultures is comparable to being unable to differentiate between nourishment and poison.

Save Send Delete makes the case not only for faith, but for civilization, in the face of the absolute relativism, the scorched earth, of the capital A Atheist Flying Spaghetti Monster mentality. In it I write about being a teacher who communicates to her students that Western Civilization, for all its flaws, is worth it.