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NAJAF, Iraq Since Sunni militants of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria overran large parts of Iraq, the country's most prominent Shiite cleric has fundamentally altered his spiritual role and has plunged straight into politics, weighing in on government policy and the fight against the extremists.

The shift by the Iranian-born Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani underlines the key role played by religion in post-Saddam Hussein Iraq and takes the troubled country down a potentially dangerous path, given its deep sectarian and ethnic tensions. His role falls well short of Iranian-style theocracy, in which the top cleric has the final word on everything, but Iraq's government clearly feels it must listen to him.

Al-Sistani saw it as a necessity to step in with his moral authority, given the failures of politicians and the collapse of the military when the Islamic State group overran much of the north and west in the summer, an aide said.

"It is his legitimate right, but he did not seek to exercise it. It was forced upon him," an aide in the holy city of Najaf, south of Baghdad, told the Associated Press, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the news media. "People wait from one Friday to the next to hear what Sayed al-Sistani has to say."

But Alireza Nader, senior policy analyst at the RAND Corporation, said that even if it is seen as necessary, "heavy intervention by the clergy means that Iraq's government is not going to be secular any time soon, although not theocratic either. But perhaps something in between."

In June, al-Sistani pushed for the removal of then-Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, seen even by many of his fellow Shiites as to blame for the meltdown. Al-Maliki stepped down in August, replaced by Haidar al-Abadi, a fellow Shiite politician who promised a more inclusive administration.

The 87-year-old cleric also swiftly called on all able-bodied Iraqi men to join a jihad, or holy struggle, against ISIS, and hundreds of thousands overwhelmingly Shiites responded.

In the months since, the grand ayatollah has weighed in on matters in unprecedented detail, often through sermons delivered by his representative, Sheikh Abdul-Mahdi al-Karbalaie, in the holy city of Karbala, south of Baghdad.

Al-Sistani holds the title of "al-marjaa al-akbar," or the "greatest object of emulation," and is venerated as a voice of reason in Iraq and among the more than 200 million Shiites worldwide.

He works in austere reclusion, almost never seen in public, from his modest home in Najaf's old quarter.

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Iraq's top Shiite cleric exerts political influence as religious leader