quote:

Islam has overtaken Roman Catholicism to become the world's largest single religious denomination, according to L'Osservatore Romano, the Vatican newspaper. In an interview with the paper Monsignor Vittorio Formenti, compilier of the Annuario Pontificio, the Vatican yearbook, said "For the first time in history, we are no longer at the top: Muslims have overtaken us." He said that figures for 2006 showed that Catholics accounted for 17.4 per cent of the world population while Muslims accounted for 19.2 per cent. Asked for an explanation Monsignor Formenti observed that "While Muslim families, as is well known, continue to make a lot of children, Christian ones on the contrary tend to have fewer and fewer". He said the figure for the Muslim global population was derived from data submitted to the United Nations by Muslim countries. However Christians as a whole, including Catholics, Orthodox, Protestants and Anglicans make up 33 per cent of the world population. Mosnignor Formenti said Latin America remained "the stronghold" of Catholicism, and the American continent as a whole had nearly half the world's total. He noted the decline in numbers of Catholic priests, and said the number of nuns was also suffering a "drastic reduction". The figures were released as both the Vatican and Muslim leaders sought to pursue a recently initiated Muslim-Catholic dialogue despite tensions over Pope Benedict XVI's high profile baptism at Easter of Magdi Allam, a converted Italian Muslim journalist of Egyptian origin. Father Federico Lombardi, the Vatican spokesman, said the opinions of Mr Allam, an outspoken critic of Islam as inherently violent and repressive, were not in any way "the official expression of the positions of the Pope or the Holy See". The Vatican puts the number of Catholics in the world at 1.13 billion people, while the figure for Muslims is estimated at around 1.3 billion. Rome has Europe's largest mosque, opened in 1995 and paid for by Muslim countries, mainly by Saudi Arabia, which at present bans Christian worship but is reported to be considering allowing the construction of a church on Saudi soil as part of negotiations for the establishment of diplomatic relations. In a provocative short story entitled "The Last Christmas" (L'Ultimo Natale) the popular Italian writer Valerio Massimo Manfredi imagines a future in which Islam has become the dominant religion in Italy, with the Pope obliged to leave St Peter's and make way for an Imam

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/ne...icle3653800.ece

Living in a Catholic country where Islamism is practically non-existent, I was stunned to hear this. Apparently, it's hard to figure out what's the proportion of Sunnis and Shiites, but it's likely that the Catholic population is still larger than the Sunni population in general. Not for long though, I imagine...

Are there any muslims here other than Shaolin? What do you guys think of this expansion? Will it lead to a diversification similar to that which happened to Christianity during the 16th century?

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It's easy Lira, most of those Muslims are from 3rd world countries where they breed like rabbits because of a high mortality rate (aka Africa).
It's a numbers game they play to ensure, well, their name cares on basically.

And lets hope that diversification comes sooner than later because God (Mohamed?) knows they need it...

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I'll bet you Christianity still has the highest conversion-to rate.

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Islam is already pretty fractured - I think it is misleading to call it a single "denomination" - even within Sunni and Shia you have various sects and traditional belief systems. Wahhabism, Sufism, etc.

And Fir3start3r... that didn't even make sense.

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quote:

Originally posted by Lebezniatnikov Islam is already pretty fractured - I think it is misleading to call it a single "denomination" - even within Sunni and Shia you have various sects and traditional belief systems. Wahhabism, Sufism, etc.

But why is it that Islamism is seen as a unified religion then?

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quote:

Originally posted by Lebezniatnikov And Fir3start3r... that didn't even make sense.

Sure it does, think about it.
Islam as a religion is going down the same road Christianity did hundreds of years ago.
This thought isn't mine - there are lots of articles on this, just Google it.

Can Islam honestly house the radicals and the moderates under the same roof without consequence? They would only undo themselves in their current state with birth rate as their only salvation.

___________________
"...End? No, the journey doesn't end here. Death is just another path...one that we all must take.
The grey rain-curtain of this world rolls back, and all change to silver glass...and then you see it...
...white shores...and beyond...the far green country under a swift sunrise."

quote:

Originally posted by Lira But why is it that Islamism is seen as a unified religion then?

I suppose it's easier to demonize that way. Honestly I don't know, but the media portrayal of Islam in the US has always been extraordinarily poor. I would wager that 95% of Americans couldn't explain the difference between Shia and Sunni forms of Islam, much less the various sub-categories within each.

But the way Islam is practiced and the theology that takes root is drastically different from place to place. Wahhabism, the most radical and extreme variant of Sunni Islam, seems to be taken as the de facto norm in the Islamic world by Western media - they're the ones who want radical forms Shari'a criminal law and so vigorously oppose what is viewed as Western decadence.

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Originally posted by Fir3start3r Sure it does, think about it. Islam as a religion is going down the same road Christianity did hundreds of years ago. This thought isn't mine - there are lots of articles on this, just Google it. Can Islam honestly house the radicals and the moderates under the same roof without consequence? They would only undo themselves in their current state with birth rate as their only salvation.

I was referring to your "breed like rabbits in Africa" theory. The majority of Muslims live in Indonesia, Bangladesh, China, India, and Pakistan. The percentage of Muslims that live in the Middle East as a proportion to the total population is actually quite small. For instance, more Muslims live in Russia than Iraq.

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I'll throw out one theory on Islamism.

The region of central Eurasia has been the scene of a lot of oppression and injustice at the hand of despotic regimes and foreign occupation. So, like the rise of the working class in the 19/20th centuries in socialism/marxism/leninism in Europe and Oriental Asia, Islamism has become the socialism of the Muslim world. Examining Islamist movements throughout the world, notice how not just do they center their ideology around Islam, but their economic policies are socialist in nature, and some are extremely nationalist. I consider many Islamist movements in central Eurasia to be synonymous to Maoist/Marxist/Communist movements of the today and the past.

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My only fear is that the rapid growth of vastly different religions and cultures being forced to live side by side will bring increased animosity and eventually hostility.

Now if this coming together brings about understanding, and an integration into one another; then I think it's about time for some diversification.

Hopefully we will eventually be able to move toward a more secular and world encompassing culture that sees religion as merely a source of ethics and not a way of life.

quote:

Originally posted by Lebezniatnikov I suppose it's easier to demonize that way. Honestly I don't know, but the media portrayal of Islam in the US has always been extraordinarily poor. I would wager that 95% of Americans couldn't explain the difference between Shia and Sunni forms of Islam, much less the various sub-categories within each. But the way Islam is practiced and the theology that takes root is drastically different from place to place. Wahhabism, the most radical and extreme variant of Sunni Islam, seems to be taken as the de facto norm in the Islamic world by Western media - they're the ones who want radical forms Shari'a criminal law and so vigorously oppose what is viewed as Western decadence.

I thought so... but are these variants are as different as, let's say, Catholicism and Lutheranism? There's a human tendency to dismiss differences in groups other than our own, and I wonder if this is the case.

And I'm glad Brazilian media has actually tried to make Islam look good this decade

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quote:

Originally posted by Lira I thought so... but are these variants are as different as, let's say, Catholicism and Lutheranism? There's a human tendency to dismiss differences in groups other than our own, and I wonder if this is the case. And I'm glad Brazilian media has actually tried to make Islam look good this decade

I've only taken one course on Islam, but my understanding that the difference is pretty great, comprising various theologies and philosophies on religion, jurisprudence, and even science. I think the largest religious difference is that the Shia follow the religious guidance of the descendants of Mohammed, whereas the Sunnis adhere more rigorously to the word of the Quran and the Hadiths. The Shia also prioritize the five pillars of Islam somewhat differently than Sunni do in order to incorporate elements of mystical Sufism that are incompatible with the strict interpretation of Shari'a preferred by Sunnis.

I can't remember any specifics, but I believe the Shia also believe in a Hidden Imam that will reveal him/herself to be the descendent and heir to the Prophet sometime in the future.

edit: yep.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad_al-Mahdi

So I think the difference is fairly significant. I mean, they're fighting wars over it, right?

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