http://www.nypost.com/seven/02112008/postopinion/opedcolumnists/british_bishops_islamic_idiocy_847964.htmFebruary 11, 2008 -- NOTHING can have prepared Dr. Geoffrey Rowan Williams, the archbishop of Canterbury, for the row that has broken out in Britain over his comments last week that the British adoption of some aspects of sharia law is "unavoidable" and that there is a case for "plural jurisdiction"
........But there are clear limits. Private litigation exists within public law and must conform or yield to it. Private courts can't try criminal law breaches such as a stabbing (though the judgments of medical courts may sometimes lead to criminal prosecution). They can't legalize polygamy. If two parties take a dispute to such a court, both must do so voluntarily.
The public broadly senses that these conditions aren't met in the case of sharia: that informal sharia courts decide criminal cases; that their rulings often offend against civil law; and that some litigants - in particular,
Muslim women in marital cases - are taken to such courts against their will and compelled to surrender their rights under British law. It's this widespread unease that explains the strong continuing public reaction to the archbishop's remarks: He seems to be blessing a creeping development in British life that would divide the nation into religious ghettoes, reduce women's rights and abolish one of Britain's proudest achieve- ments: a rule of law that applies equally to everyone
