Originally Posted By: iggy
 Originally Posted By: the G-man
You want to give some specific examples? And then show us where as seems to be the case Afghanistan, they were govt or church sanctioned?


Here's a big one for you: The second iteration of the Ku Klux Klan. Sanctioned and allowed to hold membership drives in protestant churches nationwide.

Unlike the original Klan of the Reconstruction South, this one focused mainly on ant-Catholic and Jewish sentiments and reached estimated membership of six million ...


So, the best example you could come up with a group that reached its zenith nearly a century ago and whose membership had bottom out approximately ten years before WWII...largely in response to revulsion over the group's violent tactics?

(The above link being from the Anti-Defamation League, who ought to know a thing or two about religious persecution, btw).