Religion’s record

The situation in Iraq – where the Christian communities and the Yazidi people are facing a dreadful fate at the hands of the Islamic State – is only yet another situation where the underlying cause is religious intolerance.

The current tragedy is just the latest appalling genocide in a list that includes the 
Crusades, the Inquisition, the expansion of the Muslim and the Spanish empires, the Reformation, the Holocaust, the Moslem Hindu riots in the post-war Indian Subcontinent, the endless hostilities in Palestine, the continuing Shia/Sunni bombings in Iraq and many more.

It is not surprising that, despite the good works that many religious organisations do, so many people may feel that the world might be a better and happier place without any religions at all.

HUGH M MACKENZIE

Bonnethill Road

Pitlochry