America’s biggest enemy has been boldly announced on the marquee outside the Faith Baptist Church in Avon, Indiana. “Islam,” the sign reads, “America’s Number One Enemy.”

Marc Monte, the church’s pastor of 5 1/2 years, says he only wanted to “stir interest, not alarm” when he chose the words heralding that week’s sermon, and that he’d selected his subject after he “opened the Quran and smelled a stinking, bloated, dead rat on every page.”

Dr. Sayyid M. Syeed, secretary general at a nearby chapter of The Islamic Society of North America, finds the pastor’s message against Islam to be no better than Osama bin Laden’s message against America.

“It’s the same treatment of religion,” Syeed said. “Extremists think alike.”

Monte says he only received one call complaining about the sign, and proudly reports that the call ended in a “very productive conversation.”

» Scott Saxon