Letters to the Editor
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Same law for everyone
Even if these religious "courts" would only apply to marital or other civil matters, this does not make them any less bad. Women in the west fought long and hard for representation in our political and legal systems, and to have men like the archbishop recommend religious courts--which women would be pressured by their communities to use and where they would not be subject to the idea of equal treatment under the law--is a travesty.
To have societies within societies opt out of the legal system is nuts. Jewish, Christian, Islamic--none of these religions see women as the equals of men. To accept these courts is to toss new immigrants and the religious into the imperfect history we have been working our way out of. A government is its laws, and if people don't want to be citizens of a country of secular laws, they should go elsewhere.
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So polygamy is good to go?
Because that's Sharia too. So is giving custody of male children over the age of 7 to the father in all cases of divorce and custody regardless of the circumstances.
In truth the CoE is running scared because in the UK there are more Catholics than Anglicans, so Williams is looking to balance that fine line between absolute tolerance of everything, that he's famous for, and a desire not to be the LAST head of the CoE as it simply loses all its followers.
I for one welcome the eventual Sharia-ization of Britain. It's very vogue now as there are several members of the House of Lords who are Muslim. Coupled with their political hatred of all things Israeli it's a match made in heaven, so to speak.
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Munich Agreement Redux
Rowan Williams seems to have a regrettable tendency to capitulate to people who embrace narrow, intolerant versions of their religions. Accommodating differences in the interests of inclusiveness and peaceful concord can be a good idea, but it's a futile gesture if it involves implicit (or explicit) validation of oppression or abuse that is, in fact, antithetical to the principles one supposedly espouses. Williams appeased the virulent homophobia of African Anglican bishops and some of their American peers, by threatening the main body of the American Episcopal Church with expulsion from the Anglican Communion for daring to ordain an openly gay bishop. The current Archbishop of Canterbury reminds me of a former British Prime Minister. I think Neville Chamberlain learned to his horror and endless regret that a policy of appeasement to fanatics will not keep the peace.
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The Sharia defenders are here!
Boy, it didn't take long and the Sharia defenders are here, accusing us all of ignorance and not knowing what we are talking about. Poor old misunderstood Sharia law, it gets such a bad rap when its so wonderful and enlightened really.
I'm a liberal, but this misguided aspect of the liberal stance galls me.
Look, if this were an article about Mike Huckabee wanting to amend the constitution to bring it in line with the Bible, would ANY of you be defending that? Would there be ONE person writing about how judicious and fair and "advanced for its time" (gotta love that one) the undiluted Mosaic law is?
*crickets chirping*
So WHY are you defending other religious nuts? There isn't one Imam on this planet who's any more palatable than Huckabee and a lot of them are much worse. Grow UP, people. Just because some bigots who are anti-human rights are brown skinned doesn't mean they are any better than the white bigots who would strip away all your rights and freedoms.
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The archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, is just another royal lackey who facilitated the marriage of Prince Charles and Camilla Parker-BowlesIt's a fairly complicated system but it's all about inerited privilege,
The Queen is the head of the Church of England but the Archbishop of Canterbury is the theologian of choice. As a member of the royal family and future king, Charles, was forbidden marrying his mistress and a divorced woman, Camilla. These were the rules as stipulated by the Anglican Church (Episcopalian in the US) and his mother is head of that Church. A massive theological/constitutional/legal poring over documents began so that Charles could fulfill his heart's desire - and he did. Camilla Parker-Bowles is now Duchess of Cornwall and the Archbishop of Canterbury, who is Welsh and has fashioned himself to look like a Druid, blessed the (official union), However, Mohammad al-Fayed, owner of Harrods and a very wealthy Egyptian who's been living in England for many years, is still kicking up a dust about the car-crash in Paris in which his son, Dodi, and Princess Diana died. He is convinced, and so are many British people, that Ml6 was behind the crash because Diana had taken Dodi as her lover and had become an embarrassment to Prince Charles. An inquest on what happened that night in Paris over ten years ago is only taking place now. I don't know what game the Archbishop is playing but it's rebounded badly on him, with irate citizens bombarding radio/television statements about his phillipcs.. In Britain, Sharia law is associated particularly with s0-called "honour killings" in which a father, brother, any close male relative feels it incumbent to kill a woman who flouts the strictures of the most extreme interpretation of the Koran. The British value their civil liberties, do not want to commit cultural suicide just to be politically correct, and cannot understand how civil law could work in tandem with laws which prevail in utterly different societies. Not one British politician of any consequence has supported the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Queen is reported as being "embarrassed". It's all gone quiet now but Ronan Williams will retire and be given the title "Lord Williams" which will allow him to sit in the Second House of the British Parliament with all the others who are put out to grass where they can graze contentedly at the expense of the British taxpayer.
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Correction
"inherited privilege".
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He's right it IS inevitable
Britain as a British land, is dying and will soon be over. They can't jump over each other fast enough embracing hyphenation, multiculturalism and open ended tolerance of everything from Islamic inspired violence to the BNP. Everything is everything and there are no bad ideologies, only mean people who object to them.
So given that the western tradition in its entirety as conceived in the Enlightenment and classical liberalism is slowly eroding in Britain, why not embrace something else? Why not Sharia? At least it's a belief system as opposed to institutional therapeutic-nihilism-nanny state-ism. If that means a two tiered society of Muslims and Dhimmis, if that means a new Inquisition, that seems like a small price to pay for such a revolution. After all Liberals in the west have proposed far worse with far more bloodshed as an acceptable path to revolution.