Sectarian Division Quotes

The reality of life in Northern Ireland is that if you were Protestant, you learned British history, and if you were Catholic, you learned Irish history in school.

We have warned and continue to warn against calls for the division of Iraq, which come up now and then, calling for sectarian rights or minority freedoms.

There is a difference between Iraq, where you have Sunni, Shia, and Kurds put together after the First World War by the Western powers. It doesn't work. It needs to break up into three parts.

Irish nationalists can never be the assenting parties to the mutilation of the Irish nation. The two nation theory is to us an abomination and a blasphemy.

One American said that the most interesting thing about Holy Ireland was that its people hate each other in the name of Jesus Christ. And they do!

If you were to really look for major shared space [by Catholics & Protestants] in Belfast, I think you’d find it quite problematic to locate them.

Why do they kill people of other religions because of religion? Why do they hate the Israelis and despise their right to exist? Why do they hate each other? Why do Sunnis kill Shiites? How do they tell the difference? They all look the same to me.

Unless people who voted for unionist parties are suddenly going to vote for a united Ireland, which I don't believe will happen, a border poll will be defeated.

A truly vibrant and creative culture depends on a system of education which is not divided along class and sectarian lines.

The feeling of being an Iraqi unites all ethnic groups within this country. Even the Kurds, who have traditionally pushed for their own state, see the benefits of the current situation. They enjoy an autonomous status in Kurdistan, while at the same time participating in decisions in Baghdad. But if neighboring states were to push for a partition of Iraq, it would be a horrible mistake.

At this moment, when Ireland seems about to break into something new, we thought it was worth looking back at a time when people seemed to have found a way out of the sectarian division of the country.

There can be no such things as an Irish nationalist accepting the loyalist veto and partition. You cannot claim to be an Irish nationalist if you consent to an internal six county settlement and if you are willing to negotiate the state of Irish society with a foreign government.

In the United States, if a political character attacks a sect, this may not prevent even the partisans of that very sect, from supporting him; but if he attacks all the sects together, every one abandons him and he remains alone.

There cannot be a permanency in the Constitution of Ireland unless the Protestants of Ireland will lay aside their prejudices, forgo their exclusive preeminence, and gradually open their arms to the Roman Catholics.

Today, the Muslim world is injured and corrupt. People who are the enemies of all Muslims are trying to cause disunity in the Islamic world by intensifying ethnic difference and separating people under names such as 'Shia and Sunni', 'Arabs and non-Arabs'.