Hey, It's His First Amendment Right...Right?

[we vs us]

I love it when I read moronic comparisons of the current Islamic Fundamentalist atrocities to the Crusades (what, 700-800 years ago) and the Spanish Inquisition (unsure how many centuries ago that was). Hell, let's throw in the Salem witch trials (400 years ago) while we are at it. I guess what those folks are saying is the modern Islam is what, 500 years behind the rest of humankind?  I wonder why that position isn't considered a bigoted/intolerant towards Islam?

Not that I think you're particularly interested in the historical context of the great religions -- or how that might play into the politics and culture of Islam vs the West -- but you're right.  Islam never went through a Reformation process.  Its authority was never challenged, and there's never been a movement -- the way the Reformation was -- that emphasized an individual response to God.  It's very group oriented, very authoritarian, very top down.  This dovetails, btw, with the traditional tribal structure of the places it first came about (the arabic peninsula), where the family is strong and big, and headed by a strong male chief. 

Islam also didn't fragment as much as Christianity did.  If you look around at the variety of options that could legitimately be considered Christian churches in America alone, it's easy to tell how much freedom to interpret the holy book has come to be valued.  It wasn't always that way, but definitely is now.  Islam is equally text-centered, but doesn't have nearly the freedom of interpretation.  There's freedom along physical and political lines (groups in Indonesia will worship differently than groups in Somalia) but there's not the sort of institutional diversity that we have between and amongst Protestants.

So yeah, Christians went through centuries of stunning atrocities -- millions killed, on multiple continents -- but as a religion and a culture, it's settled into equilibrium, more or less.  Islam hasn't settled yet, and I'd bet that's as much to do with the nations that make up the Umma (very few of whom are 1) industrialized, 2) globalized, 3) or democratized) than the religion itself. 

Islam is, for whatever reason, one of the religions of the developing world.  Christianity, at this point, is most definitely a first world religion.

[Ed W]

I know there are nutjobs in protestant/Catholic religions. My problem is that I cannot recall those folks flying jetliners into buildings and incinerating people or cutting the heads off of news reporters.

The difference between Islamic fanatics flying jetliners into buildings and Christian fanatics bombing federal buildings, bombing abortion clinics, and shooting doctors is a difference of degree rather than kind.  Across the board, they've all believed that God is on their side and that justifies their actions.  Eric Rudolph isn't fundamentally different from the jihadists of September 11th.  And they, in turn, are no different from the fanatics of the IRA.

[nathanm]

The difference between Islamic fanatics flying jetliners into buildings and Christian fanatics bombing federal buildings, bombing abortion clinics, and shooting doctors is a difference of degree rather than kind.  Across the board, they've all believed that God is on their side and that justifies their actions.  Eric Rudolph isn't fundamentally different from the jihadists of September 11th.  And they, in turn, are no different from the fanatics of the IRA.

That's pretty much what I was trying to get at. The point being that, yes, OBL and his merry band got incredibly lucky on 9/11, much to our dismay, but there are plenty of other nutsos around the world doing equally nutso things.

In case anybody is under the impression that crazy Christians are a relic of the past, I give you the Lord's Resistance Army. They're doing their God's honest best to implement theocracy in Uganda.

[custosnox]

and I did find this nice little article on Wikipedia.  While I know not a source to hang everything up on, it is something to give pause and thought to.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_terrorism

[Red Arrow]

In case anybody is under the impression that crazy Christians are a relic of the past, I give you the Lord's Resistance Army. They're doing their God's honest best to implement theocracy in Uganda.

Yeah,  I saw on TV that all the Protestant Christian leaders and the Pope were actively supporting the LRA.  They threatened any one opposed with a death sentence. It was on FOX. 
/sarcasm

[heironymouspasparagus]

I don't know for sure, but it just kind of seems that if one is a terrorist, that pretty much by definition excludes one from being Christian, no matter the rhetoric employed.  And the same for Islam.

Sense of history, guido, as has been mentioned.  Crusades started in the 1000's AD.  Inquisition was in the late 1400's.  (11th and 15th centuries)

Roughly coincide with the 'dark ages', the end of which was occurring at the time of the Inquisition.  Perhaps the new enlightenment and education that started to come about as the dark ages ended also helped put an end to the more grotesque forms of religious extremism of the time.  Maybe we are coming out of the darkness of religious extremism we have been embroiled in for the last few hundred years.  

Or not....

[Red Arrow]

I found a brief synopsis of the Crusades.  I'm not so sure why the Muslims are still so vengeful.  They pretty much kicked butt over the Christians after the 1st Crusade.  The 4th Crusade pretty much opened the opportunity for the Muslim takeover of Constantinople.   The Christians' justification of the 1st Crusade seems on the order of the modern Muslims' outrage over everything associated with the "West".

Running for cover now.....

[guido911]

Yeah,  I saw on TV that all the Protestant Christian leaders and the Pope were actively supporting the LRA.  They threatened any one opposed with a death sentence. It was on FOX.  
/sarcasm

Threadwinner thus far to RA once again?

[nathanm]

Yeah,  I saw on TV that all the Protestant Christian leaders and the Pope were actively supporting the LRA.  They threatened any one opposed with a death sentence. It was on FOX. 
/sarcasm

You think that all the Muslim leaders are in favor of terrorism, or was that supposed to be an attempt at humor rather than a sarcastic rebuttal?

[guido911]

That's pretty much what I was trying to get at. The point being that, yes, OBL and his merry band got incredibly lucky on 9/11, much to our dismay, but there are plenty of other nutsos around the world doing equally nutso things.

In case anybody is under the impression that crazy Christians are a relic of the past, I give you the Lord's Resistance Army. They're doing their God's honest best to implement theocracy in Uganda.

Well, I did not know you wanted to go international on terrorism. Funny you chose to focus on Christians and overlooked:

2004 Madrid train bombing:  21 killed
2002 Bali bombing:  200+ killed
2005 London Bombing:  50+ killed, 700 injured

Here is what has happened in just the past two months:

Mazah Village is still counting its casualties following an attack in the early hours of 16 July by armed Fulani Muslims that left an estimated ten dead and churches and homes burned to the ground.

Mazah is the ancestral home of the Anaguta people of the troubled area of Jos North, in Nigeria's Plateau State. While the exact number of casualties is still unclear, children are known to be among those killed and seriously injured. The victims were frightened out of their homes with gun shots, then hacked with machetes by their attackers once they were outside. Similar tactics were used in attacks on the villages of Dogo Nahawa, Ratsat and Zot in March.

http://au.christiantoday.com/article/nigeria-children-amongst-injured-in-village-attack-in-jos/8681.htm

And finally, the Ramadan 2010 Scorecard:

Ramadan 2010 Scorecard

Latest Offerings from the Religion of Peace
"He who fights that Islam should be superior fights in Allah's cause"
Muhammad, prophet of Islam

2010.09.12 (Batak, Indonesia) - Holy Warriors beat a pastor with a board and stab a worshipper in the stomach as there are on their way to church.
2010.09.12 (Makhachkala, Dagestan) - Muslim extremists shot a man to death in his car.
2010.09.12 (Helmand, Afghanistan) - Two locals are taken down by a bomb. A rocket attack elsewhere injures ten family members.
2010.09.12 (Buhriz, Iraq) - A woman and two children are among the casualties of a vicious bombing.
2010.09.12 (Baquba, Iraq) - Two Iraqis are blown up by Jihadi bombers.
2010.09.12 (Hudayyeb, Iraq) - Two men are shot, one of them an elderly man by his own al-Qaeda sons.

http://www.thereligionofpeace.com/

By all means, let's focus on the Christian terrorist problem.

[nathanm]

Is there a particular reason you're still trying to defend the idiotic claim that all Muslims are terrorists?

[guido911]

Is there a particular reason you're still trying to defend the idiotic claim that all Muslims are terrorists?

No you stooge, if you (and especially our resident Christian-basher cust) cannot see the lunacy of your drawing an equivalency between extremist Christians and extremist Muslims, then I cannot help you.

[nathanm]

No you stooge, if you (and especially our resident Christian-basher cust) cannot see the lunacy of your drawing an equivalency between extremist Christians and extremist Muslims, then I cannot help you.

So you don't think that mass murdering and conscripting children to fight is as bad as what extremist Muslims do? There is an equivalence there, but with both religions, the extremists make up a small minority of their adherents. Both extremist groups are just as nutty. Sorry you are unable to see that.

[guido911]

So you don't think that mass murdering and conscripting children to fight is as bad as what extremist Muslims do? There is an equivalence there, but with both religions, the extremists make up a small minority of their adherents. Both extremist groups are just as nutty. Sorry you are unable to see that.

But you are unable to see that this drift began with me pointing out that two very high placed members of the Iranian ruling clerics in a country with a population of 72 MILLION Freakin people (small minority in your mind I guess) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Iran issued death fatwas against those burning Korans. Are those guys, persons with leadership roles in a country, "extremists" comparable to Eric Rudolph or the LRA? Hell No. So stop with your bs.

[nathanm]

But you are unable to see that this drift began with me pointing out that two very high placed members of the Iranian ruling clerics in a country with a population of 72 MILLION Freakin people (small minority in your mind I guess) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Iran issued death fatwas against those burning Korans. Are those guys, persons with leadership roles in a country, "extremists" comparable to Eric Rudolph or the LRA? Hell No. So stop with your bs.

Does a death penalty for gays not count as extremist?