I was watching Boris Johnson's BBC2 TV programme The Dream of Rome this evening, marvelling at his re-invention in yet another new guise as telly presenter, when I nearly fell out of my armchair having heard him say that the Christians who martyred themselves for their faith under the Romans were the equivalent of modern Islamic suicide bombers. What astounding moral illiteracy. The Christians were real martyrs; that is, they were killed, or sometimes actively sought their own killing, for their faith. The Islamic suicide bombers are mass murderers; they kill others for their faith. The Islamic suicide bombers use their bodies as lethal weapons to do mass murder. That is not martyrdom but homicide.

Shouldn't the Tories' higher education spokesman know the difference?

Posted by melanie at February 5, 2006