Clergy & Politics: UK Gov Minister Slams Anglican Leader

[wolram]

http://uk.reuters.com/article/UKNews1/idUKL0790681320080208

LONDON (Reuters) - A government minister accused Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams of concocting "a recipe for disaster" for suggesting the introduction in Britain of some aspects of sharia was unavoidable.

Main political parties distanced themselves from Thursday's comments on Islamic law by Williams, the spiritual leader of the world's 77 million Anglicans, who is already battling divisions within his church over gay priests.

"You cannot run two systems of law alongside each other. That would be a recipe for chaos," said Culture Secretary Andy Burnham, joining a chorus of condemnation for Williams.

I think most Brits are sick of issues such as this and now this guy pokes his nose in, what does he want civil war.

 

[lisab]

I heard this on the radio this morning. At first I thought, oh great, are they going to allow stoning or honor killings? But the story went on to describe something different.

For example, apparently sharia law doesn't allow interest payments. So some banks have come up with alternative mortgages that allow a Muslim to purchase a house but not pay interest. No, they don't get interest-free loans. From what I could understand, it goes something like this: the bank buys the house, and charges the would-be-purchaser a monthly fee to live there. After an agreed upon number of payments, the bank transfers ownership of the house to the purchaser. That way, the bank gets the equivalent of interest, and the Muslim purchaser doesn't break sharia law.

I guess they had to change some laws to allow this.

 

[wolram]

I think it goes far deeper than interest payments lisab, i have no references but have heard of musslims enacting their own laws, one case i know of is gangs tracing errant musslim women who decided they did not want have arranged marridges and forcibly taking them home.

 

[lisab]

Yikes. That sounds closer to the honor killings that I first thought of when I heard this story. In your opinion, do you think the Muslim immigrant community is making strides to be integrated into mainstream society? Are they doing so any slow than other immigrants?

Do you think this sort of thing is happening just among first-generation immigrants, or does it extend into second- or third-generations? I would be surprised if it goes much further beyond the first generation.

 

[TVP45]

He was, of course, talking only about family law. Orthodox Jews do much the same thing, as well as property law, in places. Here in the United States we face the same challenge as fundamentalist Christians seek to infuse the law with Christian values and practices. The question, and it was not reported here, is whether there will a way to guarantee there is no coercion.

 

[f95toli]

Yes, his comments were taken out of context. He was, according to all acounts, referring to family law and other civil matters; NOT criminal law.
Arbitration -used by both orthodox jews and muslims in the UK- is already offically recognized to some extent but obviously have to operate within UK law.

I don't agree with him, but this has been blown out of proportion thanks to the tabloids.

However, his main line or reasoning is sill quite interesting. If one accepts the notion that all citizens of a nation should feel that the laws are both relevant and just (which at least most politicians seem to imply), there is an obvious conflict between religion and modern secular society.
Williams also used the recent example of catholic adoption agencies here in the UK, according to the law they have to accept applications from gay couples but the fact that they are catholic makes it -by defintion- impossible for them to follow that law with good conscience.

That said, it is hard to see how legal "pluralism" could actually work. Personally I would prefer to see a complete separation between religion and state instead, religious organizations should simply not be involved in activities where there can be a conflict between religion and law.

 

[wolram]

Yikes. That sounds closer to the honor killings that I first thought of when I heard this story. In your opinion, do you think the Muslim immigrant community is making strides to be integrated into mainstream society? Are they doing so any slow than other immigrants?

Do you think this sort of thing is happening just among first-generation immigrants, or does it extend into second- or third-generations? I would be surprised if it goes much further beyond the first generation.

The one case i know of involved second generation, the woman 22yrs old was born and educated in the UK, she ran away from her family and started a new life with a friend of mine, her mistake was going back to colledge, this how she was traced.

 

[CaptainQuasar]

I'm kind of skeptical that the Archbishop of Canterbury was recommending that Muslims be allowed to lynch people.

⚛​

 

[wolram]

http://www.westernresistance.com/blog/archives/002305.html

There should only be one set of laws for every one to follow in the same land.

 

[CaptainQuasar]

I'm not saying that there aren't all sorts of really horrible customs and laws in lots of Muslim countries and within Islam itself, there certainly are. Like for example decapitation as a punishment for just about any reason (being an atheist myself, I am eligible for that punishment). I'm just saying that I doubt the Archbishop of Canterbury was talking about complete institution of some form of sharia law.

 

[wolram]

No arguments there Captain, but as the link above shows in the eyes of the law musslims are all ready treated differently and to me that is wrong, why should the abduction of a
musslim woman be treated any differently than a christian woman.

 

[russ_watters]

For example, apparently sharia law doesn't allow interest payments. So some banks have come up with alternative mortgages that allow a Muslim to purchase a house but not pay interest. No, they don't get interest-free loans. From what I could understand, it goes something like this: the bank buys the house, and charges the would-be-purchaser a monthly fee to live there. After an agreed upon number of payments, the bank transfers ownership of the house to the purchaser. That way, the bank gets the equivalent of interest, and the Muslim purchaser doesn't break sharia law.

Whatever let's them sleep at night (it doesn't really affect me and isn't offensive like honor killings, so whatever...), but to me, that's just doublethink. If one really believes in God, they should believe that God doesn't play games with technicalities like that. They are still paying interest - they aren't fooing him or anyone else by changing the label on a line item on a piece of paper.

 

[jaap de vries]

[QUOTE/]Whatever let's them sleep at night (it doesn't really affect me and isn't offensive like honor killings, so whatever...), but to me, that's just doublethink. If one really believes in God, they should believe that God doesn't play games with technicalities like that. They are still paying interest - they aren't fooing him or anyone else by changing the label on a line item on a piece of paper.[/QUOTE]

Good point! For people to accept this one has to believe these people have nothing but intellectual contempt for their own god.

It doesn't really mater, since second generation Muslims in Europe don't listen to any law, may it be civil, criminal or sharia. Unless off course there is an offensive cartoon because then they're first in line to implement the wrath of their god.

People need to realize the negative emotions that are raised by calling for Sharia law and I think you cannot blame the public since ones opinion has been formed by many gruesome examples.