IRELAND'S FIRST MINISTER DEFENDS PASTOR WHO CONDEMNED ISLAM

The government leader of Ireland has come to the defense of the pastor who panned Islam as satanic:

Northern Ireland's Equality Commission has expressed concern at remarks by Stormont's First Minister defending a controversial evangelical preacher who said he did not trust Muslims.

Democratic Unionist leader Peter Robinson, who has attended Pastor James McConnell's church in Belfast, said he supported his right to criticise the Islamic faith.

Police are currently investigating the contentious sermon made by the pastor earlier this month to see if its contents constituted a hate crime.

Mr McConnell, who is a fundamentalist Protestant preacher at the Whitewell Metropolitan Tabernacle Church in north Belfast, branded Islam a heathen doctrine during a fiery address.

"People say there are good Muslims in Britain - that may be so - but I don't trust them," he said.

"Islam is heathen, Islam is satanic, Islam is a doctrine spawned in hell."

Mr Robinson insisted claiming not to trust a section of society was not a hate crime.

I'd say he's right. Why should people adhering to nazism and communism be trusted either? McConnell's opinions are no different from what somebody wary of those two ideologies would feel. Robinson was right to speak in his defense.