"Arab civilization - that sounds like a good idea"

[Indy Texas]

Can Islamism make the jump that Christian Democracy did in Europe to accommodate its minorities?

I'm not going to lie, the Shia-Sunni division really confuses me. I know it all started over bickering over Muhammed's successor for caliph, a position which now hasn't existed for several years. Do they have any serious disagreements in ideology that justifies this stupid proxy war?

It's even weirder considering how decentralized and non-hierarchical Islam is anyway. The Catholic-Protestant split made far more sense because you had a very powerful pope who was a threat to the authority of Protestant kings and heads of state.

But yeah, any Forum Mohammedans or other informed parties care to explain this divide to we Infidels?

[Indy Texas]

So what about the many Western converts to Islam? Clearly any branch of Islam doesn't coincide with their "ethnic identity". Hell look at my Congressman for a textbook example, I think he's Sunni, but he was raised Catholic, so he clearly isn't from a "Sunni family" or "Shia family".

I'm sure the Middle East is just teaming with African- and European-descended people who converted to Islam from other faiths.