We are already experiencing the middle stages of a crisis in which the West, dominated by extreme tolerance and acceptance of ideas, is under attack by a religion which – as religions are prone to do – intolerantly does not accept the outside world or values contrary to itself. It seems that one of three things must eventually happen – the material benefits and advancements achieved in the liberal, democratic West will be so amazing that the Muslim world will accept the ways of the West (this doesn’t seem to be happening) or the West will be taken over by an Islamic invasion it refuses to even acknowledge because it accepts foreign people and ideas (this is happening) or there will be a great war; a “Clash of Civilizations” as Huntington described it. Or possibly even “Armageddon” as described in the Bible’s Apocalypse – the final war between followers of Christ against a false religion led by the Antichrist – as noted in the Islamic Antichrist theory noted by authors like Joel Richardson.
Fareed Zakaria hopes that the Islamic world will moderate and come to be known for tolerance and enlightenment once again. He hopes that the West will not view all Muslims through the lens of the extremist minority. But many question how small that minority really is – how large it really is – and how much truth there is to the “joke” – a fundamentalist Muslim wants to kill you for not believing Islam is the true religion, while a moderate Muslim wants a fundamentalist Muslim to kill you. Yes, Christianity is also guilty of many crimes like the Inquisition, the Crusades, and the destruction of native American culture. But I believe these are examples of the followers of Christ abandoning Christ’s teachings… while the Qu’ran repeatedly promotes violence, including Mohammad’s suggestions on the crucifixion or beheading of non-believers. I don’t see any “fix” unless followers of Islam stop taking the Qu’ran seriously.
Since they are unlikely to abandon their religion as a whole anytime soon, I still assume we will see a great war between these two religions very soon, as described in Huntington’s book, or many others, including my recent take on end times prophecy: Antichrist 2016-2019