In what seems a direct response to a statement Pope Francis made in August, Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby recently argued that we must stop saying ISIL (or ISIS) has “nothing to do with Islam.” We cannot understand religious violence in the Middle East or Europe’s major cities in this way, the Archbishop said in a lecture at the Catholic Institute of Paris. “If we treat religiously-motivated violence solely as a security… or a political issue, then it will be incredibly difficult—probably impossible—to overcome it.” Comparing ISIL to Christian militias in the Central African Republic and Hindu violence in South India, the archbishop insisted that we must recognise the extremists’ religious motivations for their actions in order to effectively counter them. “A theological voice needs to be part of the response,” he added, “and we should not be bashful in offering that. Until religious leaders stand up and take responsibility for the actions of those who do things in the name of their religion, we will see no resolution.”
