Anders Breivik's despicable act of Christian terrorism earlier this week is provoking right wing denial. For some on the right the notion of "Christian terrorism" is simply too much to handle. Christian terrorism shatters the comforting yet naive and simple minded world view of right wing conservatives, a world view that assumes Islam is the religion of terror, and that Christianity is the religion of peace.
Fox News on air personality Bill O'Reilly personifies this right wing denial. Both Monday and Tuesday night O'Reilly aired segments on his program dedicated to the proposition that Breivik was not a Christian. O'Reilly argues passionately that Breivik was not a Christian, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary.
And O'Reilly is by no means alone in his seemingly pathological denial of the patently obvious. A writer for Andrew Breitbart’s right wing BigPeace website writes:
Brevik (sic), the Norwegian mass murderer of non-Muslims, is an isolated monster with no Christian religious affiliation whatsoever.
Indeed, the right wing is busy trying to deny Breivik's Christianity, despite Breivik's own claims to the contrary. Breivik self identifies as a Christian over and over again in his writings, and claims his act of terrorism is in fact the beginning of a new era of Christian crusades.
Christian terrorism is nothing new
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