Um... during the dark ages it was Christian Europe in the dark. muslim Northern Africa and muslim Spain were actually very enlightened and much more advanced.
I am not trying to be a jerk or anti-Christian here but these are just facts and I really would not want to see a fellow conservative make a fool of themselves by making this sort of statement.
Yup. Islam wasn't always the benighted culture it is today. It was pretty violent, but it hardly had a monopoly on that.