Beyond Radical Secularism - How France and the Christian West Should Respond to the Islamic Challenge

This is the book that took France by storm upon its publication in the fall of 2015. It waspraised by some for its rare combination of tough-mindedness and moderation andattacked by others for suggesting that radical secularism could not provide the politicaland spiritual resources to address the Islamic challenge. The book is even more relevantafter the Parisian terror attacks of November 13, 2015. It is a book that combinespermanence and relevance, that addresses a pressing political and civilizational problemin a manner that will endure. Responding to the brutal terror attacks in France in January 2015, Pierre Manent haswritten a learned, passionate essay that reflects broadly and deeply on the political andreligious situation of France and Europe. He freely acknowledges that the West is at warwith fanatics who despise liberal and Christian civilization. That war must be conductedwith prudent tough-mindedness. At the same time, serious thought must be given to theIslamic question at home and abroad. Concentrating on the French situation, Manentsuggests that French Muslims are not entering an "empty" nation, defined by radicalsecularism and human rights alone. France has a secular state, as do all the nations of thecontemporary West. That is a heritage to be cherished. But the Islamic question will notbe "solved" by transforming Muslims into modern secularists devoid of all religioussensibility. It must be remembered that France is also nation of a "Christian mark" with astrong Jewish presence, both of which enrich its spiritual and political life. Manentproposes a "social contract" with France's Muslims that is at once firm and welcoming.Rejecting radical secularism, the effort by certain "laicists" to completely secularizeEuropean society, to create a society without religion, Manent calls for a defensive policythat will allow Muslims to keep their mores, save the integral veil and polygamy. Inexchange, they must accept the fact that they live in a society of a Christian mark andthey must stop hiding behind charges of Islamophobia. In liberal and Christian Europe,there must be total freedom of criticism, including criticism of the Islamic religion.Muslims must forgo funding from Arab Islamic states (not to mention extremist movements) and must recognize they arehenceforth participants in the common life of the French nation. They must become citizens in a nation that does more thandefend individual or communal rights, as crucial as those rights are. Beyond Radical Secularismalso provides a luminous reflection on the necessary coexistence of the liberal state anda nationof a Jewish and Christian mark in a Western liberty worthy of the name. Europeans have succumbed to passivity in no smallpart because they reject the nation which is the indispensable framework of democratic self-government. They no longer haveconfidence in human action, in the elemental human capacity "to put reasons and actions in common." That faith in individualand collective action ultimately depends on belief in "the primacy of the Good," or in theological terms, in faith in a benevolentand Providential God. The West at its best combined the pride of the citizen and the humility of the believer. Europeans-andAmericans, too-governed themselves in a "certain relation to the Christian proposition." The nation was the instrument parexcellence for combining the cardinal virtues-courage, prudence, justice, moderation-and the confidence which is specific tothe Christian religion. Acapacious sense of Europe and the West, one that acknowledges its Christian and Jewish mark, isultimately necessary to face the Islamic challenge. The Jewish idea of the Covenant provides a powerful reminder of theultimate ground of democratic self-government and of deliberation and action that respect limits whileacknowledging the fullrange of human possibilities in a world where the good is not ultimately without transcendent support....