Religion baffles me.

Pope offends Muslims by siting some ancient text that called Islam “evil and inhuman.” As can be expected this angered people in the Muslim community. The Pope then refuses to apologize and gives the old, "I am sorry you misunderstood me" line which is probably more insulting than saying anything at all.

So to show that slanted speech and calling Muslims violent is wrong thousands of Muslims take to the streets burn effigies of the pope and fire bomb churches. In Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, called the pope’s remarks “the latest link” in the “chain of conspiracy to set off a crusade.”

Am I the only one that sees a bit of hypocricy here? Pope gives an insensitive speech using some 14th century quote from Byzantine emperor Manuel II as some sort of current analogy to todays Islam (I think he missed the fact that that shit is over 600 years old, its 2006 son, not 1391, things have changed). By doing this the Pope has only further boosted Muslim fears of a new crusade. This fear and anger results in violent backlash by fundamentalist Muslims. The logic of the entire thing escapes me.

This is why I find relegion so puzzling. It always seems to be at the root of some type of anger, some type of unrest. Each side claims that their God is peaceloving and just, but so much hatred, violence and distrust hemoragies from both sides as they claim to be right. Its so unfortunate that fundamentalists from both sides drown out those who teach tolerance and actually look for constructive dialogue between the two religions.