It's wrong to claim ISIS has nothing to do with Islam, says Archbishop of Canterbury as he calls on religious leaders to 'take responsibility for the actions of terrorists'

The Most Reverend Justin Welby said leaders cannot simply claim the actions of Islamic State extremists have 'nothing to do with Islam'.

In a speech in Paris, the Archbishop also said people across Europe needed a better understanding of religion in order to combat 'barbarous acts of terrorism'.

Archbishop Welby delivered

the speech at a ceremony at the Catholic Institute of Paris, in which he was awarded an honorary doctorate.

He also called for a 'catholic' future for Europe, adding he did not mean Roman Catholic, but a continent which is 'broad, flexible, comprehensive, with a fundamental drive towards inclusion.'

Referring to the recent commemorations of last year's Paris attacks - which included the massacre at the Bataclan concert hall on November 13, 2015 - the Archbishop said: 'Watching the anniversary celebrations in England we felt again the horror and wept.'

He said the world had not 'experienced religion as a contributing factor in global politics since the Wars of Religion in the 15th and 16th centuries'.

Archbishop Welby said Europe must come to understand the mind-set of those who perpetrate violence which was motivated by religion, adding: 'How can we expect to respond effectively to religiously-motivated violence across our continent if we don’t have the ability to understand it?'

He had been surprised, he said, to have been accused in September of appeasing terrorists when he said we must understand how they think. 

The Archbishop said in his Paris speech: 'However depraved it may be, groups like ISIS have an ideology, indeed a theology – which is at the heart of their propaganda, and therefore the driving force – which holds an apocalyptic understanding of human history, not as a loose term but in its strictest technical terms: they believe that the world is about to end, that the Prophet will return with Jesus, and will defeat the western powers.'