...
Islam is a religion and a religion only.
Ignorance and intolerance are very ugly traits to show, especially in public. ...
There are exceptions to every rule and rules that just do not fit some people, but as a general rule religion has played a major role in power struggles and governments going back to the beginning of recorded time and there is evidence that is was occurring even before recorded time.
From:
The Catholic Question in the Eighteenth Century
"The Protestant ethos of the British State
In the context of British politics, the question of political and religious rights for Catholics could be no ordinary political issue: not only did it raise matters which affected all religious groups – including Jews, Quakers and Presbyterians – who refused to subscribe to the established church and who suffered consequent disadvantage, but in so far as it related explicitly to Catholics it directly challenged the Protestant ethos of the British state. Important as the Catholic question undoubtedly was in British politics, however, it was still possible to view it more or less dispassionately: such detachment was not possible in Ireland and there the question was seen by most Protestants as a matter of life and death.
Like Britain, eighteenth-century Ireland was a Protestant country in which all political power and most social and economic consequence was confined to those who conformed to the established church; but unlike the situation in Britain, Irish Protestants were keenly aware that they constituted a minority of the Irish population; although they might like at times to disguise, ignore or forget this unpalatable fact by claiming to be the ‘Protestant nation’, the ‘whole people of Ireland’, or even the ‘Irish nation’, such claims were more notional than real. Irish Protestants were well aware that the sole basis of their claim to be not just a people but the people of Ireland lay in the destruction of Catholic power, the confiscation of Catholic land and the concurrent denial to Catholics of social and political authority. Hence their anxiety when something called the Catholic question emerged in Ireland in the late 1760s."
Religion has always been a part of politics or organizational structure. Whether it be the Roman-Catholics of early European, Middle Eastern areas, or the
Incas, Mayans and Aztecs of Central/South America. You are correct in saying that Islam is a religion,
but it is not only a religion to many extremists and terrorists.
The aim of ISIS is to create an Islamic state across Sunni areas of Iraq and in Syria.
Islamic State of Iraq and Syria I am not being intolerant or ignorant of the facts with my posting. I have provided links to NEWS articles. I did not give ISIS its' name or mission statement, nor do I harbor any ill feelings towards civilized people who are members of the Islamic religion.