It is important to note that many of the opinions written regarding the preachers in Friday's edition of "The Daily Collegian" were valid. Some, however, were not.

Patrick Abdalla made the point that whether or not we want to agree with them (the preachers) is our "own personal choice."

This is true, they did not force anybody to listen to them, and people came and went as they pleased.

I appreciate the comment made by Bill Simon regarding Vice-Provost for Educational Equity Terrell Jones' statement: "There is very little difference between Christianity and Islam."

It is true that there are similarities between the two religions, but the differences must be looked at.

The difference that the preachers were trying to bring to light for the crowd was that Christianity states that Jesus Christ is God and Islam states that Jesus Christ is not God. This is not a minor difference.

Kate Miller is "furious that they continue to be allowed to preach religious intolerance and Christian blasphemy on our campus." She regards this as "hate speech." As a self-proclaimed Christian, Kate Miller needs to realize that the speech of the traveling preachers is not hateful, irrespective of the type of language they used.

Rather, they were trying to show people that the only way to know God is through God who is Jesus Christ. I believe that putting forth the effort to show people who God really is can be nothing but an act of love.

It is true that not all of their ideas regarding Christianity are proper understandings of the faith, but I would like to focus on the understanding, which was the foundation of their debate.

The argument must begin with the identity of God. In Christianity, it is necessary to be intolerant of the view that Jesus is not God, just as in Islam, it is intolerable to understand that Jesus is God.