The Lure of Theocracy

From an article of the same title by Christian author Philip Yancey in Christianity Today:

Several years ago a Muslim man said to me, "I find no guidance in the Qur'an on how Muslims should live as a minority in a society and no guidance in the New Testament on how Christians should live as a majority." He put his finger on a central difference between the two faiths. One, born at Pentecost, tends to thrive cross-culturally and even counterculturally, often coexisting with oppressive governments. The other, geographically anchored in Mecca, was founded simultaneously as a religion and a state. As a result, in strict Muslim countries, religion, culture, and politics are unified. Whereas in the U.S. school boards debate the legality of one-minute nonsectarian prayers at football games, in Muslim countries commerce and transportation screech to a halt at the call to prayer five times a day. Many Muslims seek the official adoption of Shari'ah law, derived from sacred writings and similar to the all-encompassing code in the Pentateuch... Theocratic culture also opens up the potential for moral coercion-as Christians know from our own history. In Algeria, radical Islamists cut off the lips and noses of Muslims who smoke and drink alcohol. In some Muslim countries, the morals police publicly beat women who dare to ride in a taxi unaccompanied by their husbands, or who drive a car alone. Adultery or conversion to Christianity may warrant a death sentence... Hearing firsthand about Islamic culture increased my understanding, but it also made me nervous about my own society. The very things we resist in Islam, some Christians find tempting. We, too, seek political power and a legal code that reflects revealed morality. We, too, share a concern about raising our children in a climate of moral decadence. We, too, tend to see others (including Muslims) as a stereotyped community, rather than as individuals. Will we turn toward our own version of the harsh fundamentalism sweeping Islam today?