In Reply to: Nice try posted by CK on March 29, 2006 at 09:44:30:
"I can preach, teach and practice nonviolence in the good old USA all I want, and nobody sees me as an enemy of the state--yet."
That may be true if you are acting alone. However, if you were to organize on a mass scale and challenge the state on a particular issue you would probably move to the head of the "enemy of the state" list, even if you advocated nonviolence. That's what happened to Martin Luther King.
If I understand correctly what you are saying in this post, then I agree with your premise that it is the union of church and state that leads to the type of religious extremism we now see in certain Islamic states. One point I've been trying to make in several posts on this subject is that it is not Islam (a religion) that is the problem, but the perversion of Islam by puritanical, fundamentalist religious leaders who, having gained political power either directly, or through their puppet regimes, rule their country as a theocracy. [Note to Acheick: theocracy is a form of government, not a religion. Islam is a religion, not a form of government.]
It is difficult to discuss this issue of the separation of church & state much further on this board, though, because all hell will break loose if I try to provide counter points to your examples of Islamic theocracies by discussing policies of the current U.S. administration.