The Archbishop of Canterbury has boldly gone where other other religious leaders fear to tread, and politicians daren’t hardly ever go. Cutting straight across the liturgical denials of those who preach that terrorists who blow themselves up crying ‘Allahu Akbar!’ are “not Muslims“; and those who believe that slicing people’s throats on London Bridge shouting ‘This is for Allah!’ is “nothing to do with Islam“, Justin Welby has sounded a trumpet from his holy mountain.
On BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, he was asked directly by Justin Webb about the origins and inspiration of what we now call Islamism or Jihadism: “But when politicians have told us, as they have done, this is nothing to do with Islam,” Justin Webb ventured, “you’re saying that is a mistake, it’s a cul-de-sac, it’s not getting us anywhere?”
The response was unequivocal: “I don’t think it is getting us anywhere,” responded the Archbishop. And he went on to talk about the need to take responsibility for the theology of terrorism, that is, the Islamic theology of Islamism: [Archbishop Cranmer] Read more
