highly recommended

I listen to NPR regularly in the car. Rarely ever does a program grab me so tightly and pull me into my speaker box. Last night there was once such story. While running errands and traversing in and out of the car I caught parts of This American Life.

The program, titled Shouting Across the Divide, consisted of three stories on Muslim/Christian relations in the United States. You can listen to the program here. It's a free download for about a week, so I'd recommend snatching it now before they charge you $1.

The first story covers this year’s drama over the Danish Mohammed cartoons. Did you know that there’s a statue of Mohammed in the US Supreme Court building? The second part tells the story of a Muslim-American family who was ostracized from their small town community after the events of September 11. This one is by far the most poignant. The third part is my favorite - it details the soul crushing world of advertising and one advertiser’s attempt to market brand AmericaTM to the Muslim world. You can take a guess whether or not his attempt was successful...