DWill wrote:
Try this as a comparison: if you call the U.S. a Christian country, then just about any craziness that happens could be attributed to Christianity, such as the existence of the KKK. But this would be a false attribution, simply a correlation, and a weak one at that.
Really? Let me explain something to you: the KKK very definitely IS a product Christianity. There is NO WAY the Klan could EVER have formed without it. There is NO WAY it would still exist except that Christianity has prolonged it. If Christianity somehow died, the Klan would die. Christian identity was developed and spread by Klan preachers and it is the ideological glue behind the far right racist groups in America--even those that don't claim to follow Christianity because virtually all of them were CI adherents at one time or another and got their training that way. "simply a correlation"? Maybe you should look up the definition of correlation. You can't look at how strong Christianity is in the American conservative right wing, whether racist or otherwise, and tell me that this is a weak connection. The connection is direct and powerful. The left wing is openly, if not almost entirely, atheistic or agnostic. The right is overwhelmingly Christian. That's not just a coincidence. And those Christians are overwhelming climate-change deniers and evolution-deniers. Yeah, that's a correlation alright.
There are sociological distinctions that need to be preserved to avoid over-simplification of this topic, which can be summarized as "the bad things that religions do." You can call Islam or any other religion a superstition if you want, but there clearly are different sources of superstition, and some will be indigenous, as might be the case for the murderous hysteria 17 years ago in Indonesia.
Your argument is simply not holding water. Islam has a history of invading other nations and stamping out their native religions by force, by murder, under the banner of getting rid of Satanic delusions. These pogroms cannot simply be chalked up to some unknown variable of indigenous superstitions. Since Islam is not indigenous to Indonesia, I'm puzzled how you can say any of this. Christianity is just another superstition to them and that too needs to be stamped out and they would do so if they could get away with it. They have no intentions of coexisting peacefully--not even with one another--and they prove it virtually every damn day.
Who could say for sure--but for Indonesia to be a theocracy in the vein of Middle Eastern countries would take more than a slow encroachment; it would require a revolutionary takeover.
There has already been a revolutionary takeover. And someday, Christianity will die out in Indonesia. It's only a matter of time, the country is only 10% Christian. Why force the issue into a bloody civil war when you're already holding the winning hand? Even in the Philippines, the largest Christian population in Southeast Asia, the Islamic morality police go into movie theaters and remove by force any Muslims watching the movie if that movie has not be reviewed by a cleric and declared acceptable for Muslims to watch. Islam is taking over Southeast Asia bit by bit. Some Christian leaders there aren't concerned but I would say they are stupid. They damned well better be concerned because the writing is on the wall and legible to everyone except them:
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/inpict ... 48153.html
http://jakartaglobe.beritasatu.com/news ... n-muslims/
http://wikiislam.net/wiki/Persecution_o ... #Indonesia
Alexander Aan, a 30-year-old civil servant from Pulau Punjung subdistrict in West Sumatera province gave up his belief in God as he considered the current state of the world.[10] He was reportedly an active member of the Minang atheist Facebook group. He allegedly posted statements and pictures which some people construed as insulting Islam and the prophet Mohammad.
On 18 January 2012 an angry crowd who had heard about his alleged Facebook posts gathered at his workplace and threatened to beat him. Police officers intervened and took him to the Pulau Punjung Sub-District police station for his safety.
On 20 January he was charged for "disseminating information aimed at inciting religious hatred or hostility" under Article 28 (2) of the Electronic Information and Transaction (ITE) Law, religious blasphemy under Article 156a(a) of the Indonesian Criminal Code and calling for others to embrace atheism under Article 156a(b) of the same code.
His trial began at the Muaro District Court on 2 April 2012. On 14 June the court sentenced him to two and a half years' imprisonment and a fine of 100 million rupiah (US$10,600) for violating the Electronic Information and Transaction (ITE) Law.[11]
On the morning of 22 April 2012, around 100 members of the Filadelfia Batak Christian Protestant Church (Huria Kristen Batak Protestan, HKBP) were prevented from going to their church to conduct the Sunday service. They were blocked by officers from the Bekasi municipal administrative police (Satpol PP), North Tambun sub-district police and other local government officials, who tried to persuade them to move to a place around nine kilometres away. Unable to access the church, the congregation began to conduct their service by the road. Around 500 protestors who had gathered earlier near the church surrounded them, began threatening them and demanded that they leave. Some apparently tried to attack the worshippers, but were blocked by the police. The protestors only dispersed after more police officers arrived, and a municipal administrative police officer fired a shot in the air. The previous Sunday, protestors had also blocked congregation members from getting to the church, forcing them to worship by the road. Instead of dispersing or detaining the protestors who were threatening the congregation, the police tried to pressure the worshippers to leave the area. After the service, one of protestors threatened the church leader, saying, "You're finished if you try coming back!" Members of the congregation fear that without adequate police protection, they will be intimidated and attacked at future Sunday services.[12]
On 22 January 2012, members of two radical Islamist groups – the Islamic Reform Movement and Muslim Communications Forum – gathered near the site of the Taman Yasmin Indonesian Christian Church, blocking the road with tree branches and wooden chairs. Since the church was sealed off in 2008, the congregation have conducted weekly services on the pavement outside the church, where they face continued protests and intimidation by radical groups.
On this occasion, due to ongoing fears for their safety, the congregation had decided in advance to move their weekly service to a house about 300m from the church. Protesters intimidated and verbally abused some of the congregation as they made their way to the service at the house. At 9am, around 30 minutes after worship began, at least 50 Bogor Municipal Administrative Police (Satpol PP) officers also arrived at the scene. Shortly afterwards, dozens of protesters began gathering outside the house, intimidating the congregation and shouting at them to leave. However, instead of taking steps to ensure that the service could be conducted without interference, the administrative police attempted to persuade the worshippers to leave. Despite such pressure, the congregation refused to leave while the protesters were present. This continued until the Bogor District Police Chief agreed to guarantee protection of the congregation. The congregation then left the house under police protection.[13]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_o ... _Indonesia
actly what you're basing this statement on. Surely a lack of piety doesn't equate to less hypocrisy across the board, but rather only in a religious sense. There are other ways to be hypocritical besides religiously.
I've never seen any secular organization with as huge a child-molesting scandal on its hands than the Catholic Church. And don't say the Boyscouts because they don't admit atheists. And I harbor no illusions that if we knew the extent of sexual molestation within Islam, it would make the Catholic Church look like amateurs.