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I personally think that the main seperation between the "Western" religions and the Muslim world is that 2 major changes have never happened for Islam, the Reformation, and the "Age of Enlightenment."
Think about Christianity before the Reformation and think about common thought before "Enlightenment." Not so different than what is often reported from Islamic religious leaders.
Islam has never been forced to review and discard those non-religious practices that have no use in the world. Much of what is reported as Islamic "backwardness," etc. has its roots in tribal society and not theology. It needs a reformation to clean out the excesses.
Islamic society also has not severed the ties between the state and the church as western countries have. There is no secular power to reign in the demigods of ISlamic extremism - it is all about power.
The Aussie Muslim cleric and his comments matches the current fracas in the UK over wearing of veils, and is no coincidence.
Muslim traditionalists deny their ambition is to create two religious blocs around the world, warily eyeing one another with thinly veiled suspicion. But their tactics are undeniably an effort to keep Muslims "pure", separate and living apart from the rest of the world.
If such an attitude fostered only monastic devotion, that might offer a countervailing argument, but the regular result of an isolated muslim community is suspicion, anger, alienation and despair. Not surprisingly, a ghetto against the world is too often a synonym for much of the MidEast