As one of the most controversial and media-magnetic law enforcement officers in Los Angeles in recent years — a characterization that is a cheek-full in this hotbed — County Sheriff Lee Baca could have been arrested Sunday afternoon for stealing.
A scene, that is, from the main event orators —the religious ones — at the solemn and sprawling Coptic Orthodox Christian memorial at the Los Angeles Convention Center for for their 21st century martyrs who have been slaughtered in the Egyptian homeland by radical Muslims.
For his supposedly minor part, Mr. Baca was expected to slip in and out of the program with an easily forgettable secular treatment on Islamic terror.
He pleasantly fooled all 1300 Orthodox Christians in the room by fairly exploding with perspiration-level fervor. For 18 rigorous minutes, he plunged into a turbulent sea of widely varied religious beliefs, announcing that, as a Roman Catholic, he was swimming with the newly committed Coptics toward finding a solution to Islamic terror.
His biting remarks were the more impressive because he appeared to be speaking extemporaneously.
On a day devoted to religious diplomacy, Mr. Baca torpedoed the paradigm, laying into Muslim radicals as if they were fodder for target practice.
“Quite frankly, if they would do one simple thing and read the books of their own faith, they would realize clearly,” he said, rhetorically stomping his foot, “that they are on the path to insanity.”
Can We All Get Along?
He spoke throughout as a brother Christian, as a member of a common army. When a prominent presumably secular personality transcends his assigned narrowly drawn agenda, the impact on an audience could be outsized. He proudly flag-waved his Catholic faith, without embarrassment or boast, and forcefully urged his Coptic audience to join his mission against Muslim terror. Word-mincing was not on his menu.
The sheriff scarcely resembled a candidate for being the hot orator of the day. Fashionable enough in his favorite tailored gray pinstriped single-breasted suit, Mr. Baca is tall, balding, skinny as a No. 2 pencil, and, oddly, almost ascetic in appearance, strictly emotionless, even if there isn’t one employee in the County who would attest to that.
His determinedly unsmiling expression never wavered an inch east or west. Deftly crisscrossing his religious beliefs with his crime-fighting professional convictions, Mr. Baca would have rattled the rafters had there been any.
No single-dimension observer from a remote distance, Mr. Baca spoke at length of his recent pre-revolution trip to the Egyptian homeland of the Coptic Orthodox, declaring what he saw and what his audience must do by obeying their impulses to fight, literally, for what they believe in, for what they want, for what they deserve. “Coptics must take a stand,” the sheriff said. “(Egypt) is their land, and they must be protected.”
At the outset, he established a we-are-one tone of commonality. “The Christian community has contributed immeasurably to the growth and prosperity of the world because of our faith exclusively within God,” Mr. Baca said. “Nothing we can do as human beings can be attributed solely to ourselves. We have to recognize the divine reality of each and every one of us. Therefore, our faith is the cornerstone of our existence.
What Happened to Peace?
“When we have leaders from all aspects of Christianity, we are at a point where we must continue to define the points of a narrative that says violence is totally against God. With all of the technology available, the 21st century should be the beginning of a non-violent co-existence of all religions.
“I understand the great historic significance of Egypt, the land of the Phaorohs who made many important contributions.”
Partisan in his faith and in his observations, Mr. Baca said that when members from the great religions of the world meet in heaven, “I don’t believe God will say Jews go here, Coptics here, Muslims here.” Rather, he said, they will intermingle. “That is my own belief,” he added. “I am not asking you to believe it.”
On his December trip to Egypt, Mr. Baca said that the police chief of Cairo recounted recent incidents of terror and told him that the dreaded Muslim Brotherhood “is out of control. When all of that is considered, I think we have reason to worry.
“There is a need for a readjustment of a faith that has members who think they are God, who believe they can kill other people, who believe that somehow they have a connection to God you and I do not have.”
Such persons, Mr. Baca said, should not labeled religious. “I believe extremists of any faith are criminals first. A crime is a crime.”
Alluding to Muslims who have mass-murdered Coptic Orthodox followers in very, very recent times, Mr. Baca attempted to contemptuously reject such Muslims.
“They are not above you, no matter how hard they want to believe it,” the sheriff said.
