Religious violence rocks Liberia's capital

Muslim-Christian violence engulfed Liberia's war-battered capital Friday, with machete-wielding mobs rampaging through the streets and UN peacekeepers firing warning shots and tear gas to restore order.

Interim head of state Gyude Bryant ordered a round-the-clock curfew in Monrovia, where the bodies of the dead and wounded lay bleeding near torched churches and mosques.

By dusk, at the end of a day that marked some of the worst violence in the capital since the end of a rebel war last year, the crumbling seaside city was largely quiet apart from the rattle of sporadic gunfire. It was unclear how many people were killed and injured, but some residents put the death toll at five.


http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2004/10/31/2003209099

Many people's religion is based on their best economic interest, for example during the English Civil War (1640s) you can call it religious in nature but the three sides also represented three economic groups in England in the 1600s. First you had the Middle Class whose dominate religion was Puritanism, than you had the Nobility i.e. "The"Cavaliers" who tended to be Church of England, and than you had the poor who tended to be Catholic (Through many went to Church of England Services and where thus under the control of the Nobility). Thus while the War was religious on its face, underneath the War was between the Nobility and the Raising Middle Class over who was to rule England.

Similarly During the American Revolution, Followers of Puritanism tended to support the Revolution while Quakers and follows of the Church of England tended to Back England. Most Americans do NOT view the Revolution as religious in Nature, but in Political Organization it was.

Just like the above situations where the cause of the Conflict was NOT religious in Nature but policial, even through both conflicts were Religious in Organization, the same is incurring in Liberia. Christians tend to be tied in with the descendent's of Ex-US Slaves sent to Liberia in the Early 1800s. The Muslims tend to native tribesmen from the Northern Part of the Country. Thus Religion is one way to tell the sides apart, but in the Case of Liberia it is the same problem Liberia has had over the last 40 years (and in ways since Liberia was founded in the early 1800s). The problem is who is to rule the country? The descendent's of Ex-US Slaves (who tend to live near the Coast) or the Natives Tribesmen who are descendant from the original tribes of the Country?

My Point here is a reader MUST avoid seeing Religion as the REASON for the Fight and understand that the religion is just how the two sides in the political fights identify themselves. The fight is NOT over Religion but over who is to rule Liberia, the coastal Christian Population or the Northern Muslim Population.

religious terrorism.

n/t

Bush made it "fresh" again

The world is in turmoil again about religion!!!!

2000 years ago, we where not any further.........


HOW MUCH I HATE ORGANIZED RELIGION......I CAN"T STAND CHURCHES


When I want to talk to "my God" I do it by myself, nobody has to be witness.

Organized religion is all about money, power and pressure people into their directions.............think it through..........it's worth , you find answers.......!!!!