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

Description

This is the book that took France by storm upon its publication in the fall of
2015. It was praised by some for its rare combination of tough-mindedness and
moderation and attacked by others for suggesting that radical secularism could
not provide the political and spiritual resources to address the Islamic
challenge. The book is even more relevant after the Parisian terror attacks of
November 13, 2015. It is a book that combines permanence and relevance, that
addresses a pressing political and civilizational problem in a manner that
will endure.Responding to the brutal terror attacks in France in January 2015,
Pierre Manent has written a learned, passionate essay that reflects broadly
and deeply on the political and religious situation of France and Europe. He
freely acknowledges that the West is at war with fanatics who despise liberal
and Christian civilization. That war must be conducted with prudent tough-
mindedness. At the same time, serious thought must be given to the Islamic
question at home and abroad. Concentrating on the French situation, Manent
suggests that French Muslims are not entering an “empty” nation, defined by
radical secularism and human rights alone. France has a secular state, as do
all the nations of the contemporary West. That is a heritage to be cherished.
But the Islamic question will not be “solved” by transforming Muslims into
modern secularists devoid of all religious sensibility. It must be remembered
that France is also nation of a “Christian mark” with a strong Jewish
presence, both of which enrich its spiritual and political life. Manent
proposes a “social contract” with France’s Muslims that is at once firm and
welcoming. Rejecting radical secularism, the effort by certain “laicists” to
completely secularize European society, to create a society without religion,
Manent calls for a defensive policy that will allow Muslims to keep their
mores, save the integral veil and polygamy. In exchange, they must accept the
fact that they live in a society of a Christian mark and they 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 are henceforth participants in the common
life of the French nation. They must become citizens in a nation that does
more than defend individual or communal rights, as crucial as those rights
are.Beyond Radical Secularism also provides a luminous reflection on the
necessary coexistence of the liberal state and a nation of a Jewish and
Christian mark in a Western liberty worthy of the name. Europeans have
succumbed to passivity in no small part because they reject the nation which
is the indispensable framework of democratic self-government. They no longer
have confidence in human action, in the elemental human capacity “to put
reasons and actions in common.” That faith in individual and collective action
ultimately depends on belief in “the primacy of the Good,” or in theological
terms, in faith in a benevolent and Providential God. The West at its best
combined the pride of the citizen and the humility of the believer.
Europeans—and Americans, too—governed themselves in a “certain relation to the
Christian proposition.” The nation was the instrument par excellence for
combining the cardinal virtues—courage, prudence, justice, moderation—and the
confidence which is specific to the Christian religion. A capacious sense of
Europe and the West, one that acknowledges its Christian and Jewish mark, is
ultimately necessary to face the Islamic challenge. The Jewish idea of the
Covenant provides a powerful reminder of the ultimate ground of democratic
self-government and of deliberation and action that respect limits while
acknowledging the full range of human possibilities in a world where the good
is not ultimately without transcendent support. Only by recovering something
of the European faith in a higher ground of freedom will the nations of Europe
be able to muster the realism and the hope necessary meet the challenge of
Islam. Read more

Features:

Product Details:

• Publisher ‏ : ‎ St. Augustines Press; 1st edition (July 20, 2016)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 160 pages
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1587310740
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 44
• Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 12.1 ounces
• Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6 x 0.7 x 9 inches
• Best Sellers Rank: #1,990,819 in Books (See Top 100 in Books) #2,004 in Terrorism (Books) #3,277 in European Politics Books #7,413 in History & Theory of Politics
• #2,004 in Terrorism (Books)
• #3,277 in European Politics Books