Originally Posted by
coqauvin
Well, yes, but this is a comparison of the best of one field to the worst of another. An accurate comparison would be one made between violent extremist groups in Islam and violent extremist groups in Christianity. Comparing a moderate, easy-going sect of Christianity with a violent extremist group is going to give an obvious result. I realize that you're making a comparison between groups in power, but the heart of the organizations in power is the real differentiator here. If the moderates of Islam were in power and the extremists of Christianity were in power, the same comparison between the two is still faulty.
It's still, at its heart, the same issue - religions being used to encourage violence. The particulars of justifications are more means to an end in this situations. In this case, this is how Christianity is used to encourage violence, although other examples exist in history, such as, most famously, the Spanish Inquisition. The assumption made before was that Christianity is a religion solely of peace and does not encourage violence, but there are plenty of historical and modern examples of it being used in these ways, the same as Islam. As Christ himself said, "He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone." Condemning another religion as violent without first looking at your own religion, and this still goes for anyone who lives in the Western world, because they all have close ties with Judeo-Christian ideology on a cultural level, is a foolish thing to do.
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