Islamic Terrorism: is religion/belief no matter how misguided, the main motivator?

[Damocles]

OK without Islam the world would be a safer place

Without humanity it would be even safer.

 

[MadchesterCity]

Without humanity it would be even safer.

Very true but it's currently a very high proportion of a certain flavour of human who is hell bent on murdering children, genocide and massacring people

 

[BlueAnorak]

That's funny

You're right of course. We're sick.

The Catholic Church on the other hand has nothing to answer for. They were as Christian as they come the last time I studied religion.

Keep cherry picking the bits of the medieval book/doctrine you like, and ignore the ones you don't. I think that's the 'enlightenment' referred to earlier.

In your dreams. Meanwhile in the real word...

So-called Christians still abuse this. And your response will be "Ah but they're not really Christians". Not to you or many others they aren't but they certainly see themselves as such. There are people in power here and the USA who apparently believe in God and class themselves as committed Christians yet they have no qualms about bombing people in other countries and they convince themselves and others that they're carrying out the will of God. And that's the problem here.

But they aren't real Christians. Don't blame the book for the actions of those who cherry pick.
I should also point out that the number of people killed by Christian 'Crusades' Pograms and other Christian related wars tops out at 30m.
Neither will I blame Marx and Engels for the mass murder of 95-120 million under Atheist communist regimes.
Uncle Adolph despatched 20m in 10 years (that is some going), The Mongols too killed more 20m-50m but most of all the Black Death dispatched a whopping 450m souls.

 

[Machiavelli]

In your dreams. Meanwhile in the real word...


But they aren't real Christians. Don't blame the book for the actions of those who cherry pick.
I should also point out that the number of people killed by Christian 'Crusades' Pograms and other Christian related wars tops out at 30m.
Neither will I blame Marx and Engels for the mass murder of 95-120 million under Atheist communist regimes.
Uncle Adolph despatched 20m in 10 years (that is some going), The Mongols too killed more 20m-50m but most of all the Black Death dispatched a whopping 450m souls.

Does that overriding commandment to love each other you mention earlier include homosexuals?

 

[Magicpole]

Sex

The winner close the thread now.

****, I was going to say that. :)

 

[Damocles]

Let's not descend into a false moral equivalence here. Salafist jihadism is a very real problem but is a small sect and doesn't reflect on the Five Pillars of Islam any more than any Christian atrocities don't reflect on the day to day experiences of Christianity.

My (non)religion is more holy than your religion is a very silly argument hole to descend into

 

[Damocles]

Very true but it's currently a very high proportion of a certain flavour of human who is hell bent on murdering children, genocide and massacring people

There's 2,000,000,000 Muslims in the world. I don't believe Salafist jihadists make up 0.001% of that. That is not a high proportion.

 

[Cityfan]

Its as much human nature and how it can be manipulated that causes these problems as religion and when you try and suppress religion you generally make it's adherents more ardent.
But Hitler didn't need religion to send millions to the gas chambers Stalin didn't need religion to slaughter millions of his fellow country men Mao didn't need religion to starve millions of Chinese. Pol Pot didn't need religion to slaughter his fellow Cambodians Or the Hutus to kill the Tutsis.
Not saying religion is irrelevant but it is usually an excuse rather than the cause.

 

[BlueAnorak]

Does this new overriding commandment in John 13:34 extend to homosexuals?

Actually yes. But that doesn't mean Christian faith has to accept homosexul practices.
And most of the disconnect comes from homosexual rape during historical conquest and there is a clear difference between that and homosexual love.
A number of Christian faith groups now accept the latter and others will move that way. The Church of Scotland will probably agree to it within 6 years.
Christian liturgy and practice moves at a glacial pace.

 

[andyhinch]

Very true but it's currently a very high proportion of a certain flavour of human who is hell bent on murdering children, genocide and massacring people

If Islam wasn't here chances are there'd be another group of nutter's filling the void, unfortunately that is human nature.