[The Avon Lady]

Originally Posted by scandium

I'll do one better on this one and give you a pass on it, since all religions - to continue to exist - need to expand their followers and in the process tend to spread out.

What would happen if Christian affiliation shrank world-wide?

What about Judaism? We have no urgent need to "expand their followers", as you put it.

What about Budhism?

Hinduism?

Now, what about Islam? Of course, you skirt the question - again.

Its the leap from that to your sinister Islamic world domination predictions

While I might have predictions, they are based on what Islam teaches, what Muslims are saying worldwide and what Muslim's do and the actions they take and promote. And you?

that I find rather dodgy; after all, Islam doesn't exist in a vacuum and there are other competing ideologies (theological and otherwise) that are not compatible with the formation of Islamic theocracy in the West.

Precisely. You still don't catch on. Let me give you a sample:

"As the only religion of truth that exists on earth today, Islam takes appropriate action to remove all physical and material obstacles that try to impeded its efforts to liberate mankind from submission from anyone other than God. That submission is translated in following the religion of truth, provided that every human being is given free choice. There must be no pressure either from the religion itself or from those forces putting up the physical obstacles. The practical way to ensure the removal of those physical obstacles while not forcing anyone to adopt Islam is to smash the power of those authorities based on false beliefs until they declare their submission and demonstrate this by paying the submission tax. When this happens, the process of liberating mankind is completed by giving every individual the freedom of choice based on conviction. Anyone who is not convinced may continue to follow his own faith. However, he has to pay the submission tax to fulfill a number of objectives..... by paying this tax, known as the jizyah, he declares that he will not stand in physical opposition to the efforts advocating the true Divine faith."

This small excerpt, is taken from the book In the Shade of the Qur'an, an extensive commentary on the Quran, by Sayyid Qutb, considered one of the greatest Sunni scholars of the 20th century.

For the nitty-gritty details of Qutb's popular philosophy of global Jihad, read his essay Jihad in the Cause of God, reproduced in the book Milestones.

There are hundreds more where this comes from, all from renowned and respected Islamic clergyman, based on what Islam's jurists have been saying all along for 1400 years. For heaven's sake, read some books - theirs, not ours, if you're so distrustful!

In this vein, one obstacle is our separation of church and state; another is the large christian populations which have its own expanionist (theologically, if not democgraphically via birth rate) tendencies;

So who's been boiled in oil or burned at the cross lately?

then there is the already entrenched liberalization of our societies which are at ideological odds with theocracy (Islamic or otherwise); etc.

In simpler terms, an arch-enemy of Islam. You still don't get it.

Actually from my perspective, living in this particular hemisphere where Islam is particularly marginalized and not one single Islamic government exists, I'm much more wary of the encroachment of Christian theocracy (since they are the ones here with the population, money, influence, and willingness to use all of it) than I am of any other. But even the Christian theocrats here, which are the ones with the leverage in this equation, have had very little real impact and this is why I tend to scoff at your Islamophobia I suppose.

Suit yourself.