Extremist groups Hamas and Hezbollah continue to receive mixed ratings from Muslim publics. However, opinions of al Qaeda and its leader, Osama bin Laden, are consistently negative; only in Nigeria do Muslims offer views that are, on balance, positive toward al Qaeda and bin Laden.

Hezbollah receives its most positive ratings in Jordan, where 55% of Muslims have a favorable view; a slim majority (52%) of Lebanese Muslims also support the group, which operates politically and militarily in their country.

But Muslim views of Hezbollah reflect a deep sectarian divide in Lebanon, where the group’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, is threatening violence if a United Nations tribunal indicts Hezbollah members for the 2005 assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. More than nine-in-ten (94%) Lebanese Shia support the organization, while an overwhelming majority (84%) of Sunnis in that country express unfavorable views.

In neighboring Egypt and Turkey, attitudes toward Hezbollah are generally negative. Just 30% of Muslims in Egypt, and even fewer (5%) in Turkey, offer favorable views of the Lebanon-based organization. Outside of Turkey and the Middle East, many Muslims cannot rate Hezbollah, but views are on balance positive among those who do offer an opinion of the group in Nigeria and Indonesia.

The survey, conducted April 12 to May 7 by the Pew Research Center’s Global Attitudes Project, finds that the Palestinian organization Hamas, which, like Hezbollah, has been classified as a terrorist organization by the U.S. and other Western governments, also receives mixed ratings across the Muslim publics surveyed. Jordanian Muslims express the most support — 60% have a favorable view of Hamas — while Muslims in Turkey offer the least positive ratings (9% favorable and 67% unfavorable). Opinions of Hamas are nearly evenly split in Egypt and Lebanon.

In most countries, views of Hamas and Hezbollah have changed little, if at all, since 2009. In Indonesia, however, more Muslims express favorable views of both groups now than did so last year; 39% now have positive views of Hamas, compared with 32% last year, and 43% have favorable opinions of Hezbollah, compared with 29% in 2009. And among Nigerian Muslims, favorable views of both Hamas and Hezbollah are now less common than they were in 2009 (49% vs. 58% and 45% vs. 59%, respectively).

While views of Hamas and Hezbollah are mixed, al Qaeda — as well as its leader, Osama bin Laden — receives overwhelmingly negative ratings in nearly all countries where the question was asked. More than nine-in-ten (94%) Muslims in Lebanon express negative opinions of al Qaeda, as do majorities of Muslims in Turkey (74%), Egypt (72%), Jordan (62%) and Indonesia (56%). Only in Nigeria do Muslims express positive views of al Qaeda; 49% have a favorable view and just 34% have an unfavorable view of bin Laden’s organization. (Findings regarding opinions of al Qaeda and bin Laden were previously released in “Obama More Popular Abroad Than at Home, Global Image of U.S. Continues to Benefit,” June 17, 2010.)

The survey also finds that Muslim publics overwhelmingly welcome Islamic influence over their countries’ politics. In Egypt, Pakistan and Jordan, majorities of Muslims who say Islam is playing a large role in politics see this as a good thing, while majorities of those who say Islam is playing only a small role say this is bad for their country. Views of Islamic influence over politics are also positive in Nigeria, Indonesia, and Lebanon.

Turkish Muslims express more mixed views of the role Islam is playing in their country’s political life. Of the 69% who say the religion plays a large role, 45% see it as good and 38% see it as bad for their country. Among the minority of Muslims who say Islam plays a small role in politics, 26% consider this to be good for Turkey and 33% say it is bad.

When asked for their views about democracy, majorities in most of the Muslim communities surveyed say that democracy is preferable to any other kind of government. This view is especially widespread in Lebanon and in Turkey, where at least three-quarters of Muslims (81% and 76%, respectively) express a preference for democratic governance. Support for democracy is less common in Pakistan, but a plurality (42%) of Muslims in that country prefer democracy to other types of government; 15% of Pakistani Muslims say that, in some circumstances, a non-democratic government can be preferable, and 21% say that, for someone like them, the kind of government their country has does not matter.

Also of Note:

• Many Muslims see a struggle between those who want to modernize their country and Islamic fundamentalists. Only in Jordan and Egypt do majorities say there is no such struggle in their countries (72% and 61%, respectively).
• At least three-quarters of Muslims in Egypt and Pakistan say they would favor making each of the following the law in their countries: stoning people who commit adultery, whippings and cutting off of hands for crimes like theft and robbery and the death penalty for those who leave the Muslim religion. Majorities of Muslims in Jordan and Nigeria also favor these harsh punishments.
• Eight-in-ten Muslims in Pakistan say suicide bombing and other acts of violence against civilian targets in order to defend Islam from its enemies are never justified; majorities in Turkey (77%), Indonesia (69%) and Jordan (54%) share this view. Support for suicide bombing has declined considerably over the years. For example, while 74% of Muslims in Lebanon said these violent acts were at least sometimes justified in 2002, just 39% say that is the case now; double-digit declines have also occurred in Jordan, Pakistan, Nigeria and Indonesia.

Continue reading the full report at pewglobal.org.

Speaker: Tariq Ramadan, Professor of Islamic Studies, St Antony’s College, Oxford University, president of a Brussels-based think tank, European Muslim Network, and author of more than 20 books.

Moderator: Luis Lugo, Director, Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life

In the following edited excerpt, ellipses have been eliminated to facilitate reading. Find the complete transcript at pewforum.org.

 Tariq Ramadan

TARIQ RAMADAN: [T]he title for today’s discussion, “Islam, the West and the Challenges of Modernity,” is in fact the title of a book, where I’m trying to deal with Islamic issues and principles and objectives in Muslim-majority countries. I have a series of books on this, so it’s really about what is going on in the Middle East, in Asia, about the contemporary challenges for Muslim-majority countries.

The other series of books is really about Western Muslims. I started by writing a book at the beginning of the ’90s about Muslims in secular societies and then, To be a European Muslim and then, Western Muslims and the Future of Islam.

Radical Reform: Islamic Ethics and Liberation is a book from within the Islamic tradition. It’s to go from what I think are the limits of dealing with fiqh issues, which is Islamic law and jurisprudence, to the fundamentals. And this is across the board. It’s for Muslims living in Muslim-majority countries, as well as Muslims living in the West. These are common challenges, and what I am trying to propose here is a radical reform in the way we deal with the scriptures — rethinking the classical way of reading the scriptural sources and also addressing the contemporary challenges of promoting and applying Islamic ethics for our time.

We need to go from adaptational reform to transformational reform, which is not to adapt ourselves to the way things are, but to propose applied ethics to change them for the better. So it’s with the contribution of Muslim scholars in Muslim-majority countries as well as with the contributions of scholars in the West that we can come to a better understanding of the very meaning of reform.

Having said that, what is also important is to promote a shift in the center of gravity of authority in Islam. And this is what I am trying to advocate in the book, that we cannot rely on scholars of the text. We need to bring on board scholars of the context if we want to be serious about contemporary challenges. This is quite important, but it has to do with a shift in the center of gravity of authority. Why? Because what we are used to is the Islamic answer only coming from scholars of the text.

[I am treating] seven practical areas in the second half of the book, case studies, where I am saying, Muslims are doing good in medicine, but they are not doing so good in anything that has to do with social sciences, with education, with women, with economy, with philosophy and politics. I’m trying to come up with a new framework for Islamic applied ethics. I am saying from within that there is only one Islam, but there are many interpretations and many Islamic cultures, and what we are dealing with today in the West will have and already has had tremendous impact in what is going on in Muslim-majority countries.

With my position at Oxford, I’m trying to establish a double network of scholars in the West and in Muslim-majority countries talking to each other at different levels to promote this applied ethics. It’s a kind of practical translation of the main statements of that book.

My main concern is to go for [an] Islamic applied ethics for contemporary challenges and connecting the Muslim-majority countries with the West, knowing that what we are coming [up] with as responses to our challenges is read and listened to in Muslim-majority countries. This is what I am experiencing when I go to Morocco, to Jordan — in the countries where I can go that are Muslim-majority countries. [I]t’s really clear that our contribution coming from the West is heard even in Malaysia, for example; recently I was there. The Singaporeans’ experience when they speak about the Singaporean Muslim identity is exactly what we are saying about us being European and Muslims at the same time or American and Muslims at the same time.

So this is what I’m trying to do and what I’m trying to promote from within. There is this critical discussion from within with Muslim scholars, Muslim intellectuals and this critical dialogue, and an open dialogue with the surrounding society in the West, but also in Muslim-majority countries.

 Julia Duin

JULIA DUIN, The Washington Times: Mr. Ramadan, you spoke of providing ethics to make things better. Does that mean some form of sharia law in the West?

RAMADAN: No. This is why it’s quite important to read what I am trying to say because I’m quite critical [of] the way we are translating sharia law. For me, the sharia is translated in the book I wrote, Western Muslims and the Future of Islam, as the way towards faithfulness, as in which way we are respectful towards some of our objectives and purposes and aims.

For example, when I am in the United States of America or European countries, where I have the laws saying that we are equal before law, this is my sharia. I don’t need anything else. It’s not two closed systems. This is why I am challenging some of the Islamic trends from within by saying this closed or narrow understanding of what is sharia is something which is wrong.

You can get the sense of what I was trying to say in the discussion we had in the U.K. For example, when the Archbishop of Canterbury was asking for sharia to be accepted, what he was saying is that within the latitude given by the common law in Britain, Muslims can find their way within the law. This is what the Christians are doing, the Jews are doing, the Muslims are doing.

I tried to explain that he was not rightly understood. Muslims don’t need a parallel system. They just abide by the common law, and within the latitude of this law and the flexibility of the Islamic legal tradition, we can find our way. [L]ook at the great majority of Western Muslims in the States, in Canada, in Australia or in European countries that just abide by the law and don’t have a problem. They are not asking for specific laws. I would say that as to the objectives, we are closer to some of the Islamic ideal in Western countries than in the great majority of the Muslim-majority countries.

 Kim Lawton

KIM LAWTON, Religion & Ethics Newsweekly: You spoke, Professor Ramadan, about dealing sometimes with tensions between Western issues and Muslim-majority countries. One practical way where this has played out has been at the international level on the lines between free speech and defamation of religion. [F]or you, where [are] those lines between freedom of speech and when it’s inappropriate, insulting or defaming someone else’s religion. And are those lines universal or do they vary from region to region?

RAMADAN: I think that we have to be fair to our history and to understand from where all these stories are coming. When it comes to the legal framework, I am saying to the Muslims, we don’t need new laws against blasphemy or things like this. I think that what we have now, it’s enough. We don’t want to limit freedom of expression.

I was in Denmark at [the] very moment when the issue about a cartoon satirising the Prophet Muhammad. Then here [and] now is this new story about cartoons. Just take an intellectual critical distance: This is legal. To ridicule religions is something that is part of the Western culture. It has to do with the history. So we don’t want to go for something which is, oh, we need laws to prevent people from doing this. I think that the Muslims should understand where they live, and I would like this also to be understood in Muslim-majority countries, that we don’t have to go against this. I think that we just have to stick to the laws and say, this is legal.

We also know that there are things that are illegal because they are connected to racism and statements that are not acceptable. [W]hen it comes to insulting people, racist statements, we need laws to prevent this from happening. But we all agree on this.

Now, there is something which is much more psychological. Our culture and the way we read law has to do also with our memory. And when we had, for example, Muslim groups in Europe saying the way to show that there is no equality in the way religions are treated and no freedom of speech is to insult the Jews, I told them this is the wrong way forward. Why? Because you have to deal with sensitivity and you have to deal with collective psychology. Yes, it’s legal to insult the Jews and to laugh at their suffering. But it’s wrong ethically and because of the collective psychology.

This is why I am saying to Muslims, take a critical distance but let the people around you understand that even if it’s legal, you don’t like it. React by saying, I don’t like this. It’s not part of me.

I’m saying exactly the same to the French today on another issue. I say, you are responding to the burqa and the niqab with law restricting freedom, and I think that’s not going to work. It’s not the way forward. Speak more about education, psychology. Changing mentality takes time.

I would prefer them to understand that from within we can do the job as Muslims by saying, the niqab or the burqa are not Islamic prescriptions. This is what I believe the mainstream believes as well. So I would say we have to be very cautious not to translate every sensitive issue into a legal issue.

LUIS LUGO: Ross? Speaking of “South Park.”

 Ross Douthat

ROSS DOUTHAT, The New York Times: Speaking of “South Park,” Professor Ramadan, just sort of as a follow-up to Julia’s question, I wonder if you could talk a bit more about what you do think Islam has to offer to the West. I think it’s a very interesting and subtle idea, the idea that reform is something that moves in both directions.

RAMADAN: I’m not speaking about the Islamic economy. I’m not speaking about Islamic finance, Islamic medicine. I’m speaking about Islamic ethics in medicine, Islamic ethics in finance.

Meaning what? That we have a common ground, a common area, where the Christian ethics, the Jewish ethics, the Muslim ethics, the humanist ethics could provide something in that field to reform this for the better. This is where we have to come together. It’s for me to break this perception that we have our sciences — Islamic sciences, Islamic finance — and we have an alternative — which is not true. We don’t have an alternative.

We have some principles and some objectives. But when I deal with Christians, when I deal with some humanists on the ground, I can see that they have the same objectives. So this is, for example, to say, you have to be involved in education in the West not by creating Islamic schools, which are mainly schools for Muslims. It’s to come to the principles about knowledge. So it’s for us when we understand Islam the right way to ask ourselves what our Islamic tradition is giving us to think about spirituality in a consumerist society, for example. It’s always to think about the ends: Why are we doing this?

In economy, for example, just to say we have an alternative Islamic economy by thinking with no riba, no interest, no usury — this is a dream; it’s not working. In fact, we are changing the words, but we are doing exactly the same, seeing the same results with other names. And I think that this is hypocritical.

The way we deal with justice, the way we deal with no discrimination in the job market, the way we deal in your country with some people who are saying there is a second-class citizenship in this country when you are black American or you are Latino — there is something that you have to question here. And I think that this has to do with our ethics, applied ethics. [N]ot something which is specifically Islamic, but something that Islam could be involved in when it comes to a discussion of the ends. Ninety-nine percent of my lectures to the white American or European or Western audiences are always about, oh, you as a problem. I want to change that. It’s me as a contribution.

DOUTHAT: Do you think there is a religious or spiritual crisis in Europe that Islam could be part of the answer to?

RAMADAN: No, I think that we are all facing a crisis from within. I have been dealing for 25 years with the Muslim communities in the West and even in the States. I can tell you something: we are facing a crisis from within — an identity crisis: Who are we, what do we want, how are we going to have a blossoming personality and to be coherent with all our universes of reference? This is something which is common to all of us.

So the people who are now saying, Islam is the solution — I think that this is wrong. It’s not because the number is increasing at an exponential rate. I’m not at all happy with the quality that we are having from within. So I would say that this is where the Muslims should be self-critical.

 Alan Cooperman

ALAN COOPERMAN, Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life: How central or primary do you think the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is to the challenges that the Obama administration faces all around the world?

RAMADAN: Look, it’s quite clear to me that I have been banned from this country exactly for my positions on that: the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but also the Iraq war because when I went to the American Embassy in Switzerland, 80%, 85% of the questions were around my position and why I was critical of the unilateral support of the United States of America towards successive Israeli governments. I said, you have to be more balanced; it’s not going to work like this. And then, your war in Iraq is illegal, and I think that this is not the way forward.

I think the Palestinian resistance is legitimate, the means are not — killing innocent people, I’ve said it for years. This is something which is quite important for me — to be clear on that.

Now, yes, I really think that it’s central. It’s central psychologically speaking, politically speaking and in the way that you feel at home in this country. Because at the end of the day, you can get social integration, intellectual integration, but miss psychological integration because something is missing, which is the sense of belonging.

The sense of belonging is what I call critical loyalty. I’m loyal to my government when I am able to say, I abide by the law, I love this country, but I don’t like your policies, and not see my citizenship or my belonging questioned because I’m critical. I think that this is where we have to be together — you and me. This is what I call the “new we,” where we are citizens and we are critical.

While I think that what should come now from the new administration is really to deliver on that, it’s quite difficult. I said this from the very beginning. First term, what we got as the first speech one year ago from President Barack Obama was a very good speech — very good. I commented on this by saying, this is the first time we see someone speaking in that way: very cautious with the wording, very cautious also by not only addressing this to Muslims in Muslim-majority countries but also to Americans by telling them Islam is an American religion and Muslims are contributing to the future of this country. He was talking about a “we” as the American nation, and this is very important. Then, to speak about the suffering of the Palestinians and about the fact that we have to look at this issue seriously.

Now, I think that what we got during the last weeks and months is really tension between the Israeli government, Prime Minister Netanyahu, and the Obama administration. Still, now, these are words and things are going on there. I would say that within this term, it’s going to be difficult. Next term, I think it’s quite important to see things moving in support of Palestinian rights.

What I am saying to the Muslims is, just don’t assess the Obama administration or any American administration only on that because this obsession with this foreign policy is not helping us to be citizens and to be involved in all the discussions. So I would say, at the same time as we are expecting something from the Obama administration, we also have to say to the American Muslims, you have to be involved in all the discussions.

When it comes to health, for example, what happened in this country is just tremendously important for all the American citizens. You have to be involved in this; you have to be involved in education. You have to acknowledge the fact that there are constructive steps when it comes, for example, to meeting with entrepreneurs and Muslims and trying not to be obsessed only with the idea that Islam means we talk about terrorism.

But I would like, yes, the American administration to be more balanced on Palestinian rights. And it remains central even though I think Muslims should be much more involved in everything which has to do with global politics, beyond only this issue.

 Michele Kelemen

MICHELE KELEMEN, NPR: I wonder how you assess the Obama administration’s outreach to Muslim communities?

RAMADAN: I would say that it’s quite clear that the Obama administration is much more well-perceived by Muslims around the world in Muslim-majority countries. It’s not so difficult after what we got for eight years. But I would say that yes, something is changing, and there is lots of hope coming from Muslims in Muslim-majority countries.

But still, they are suspicious about the room for maneuver he has to change his policy and the way he is dealing with some lobbies here — pro-Israeli lobbies — and is he able to change anything as to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, or to go beyond words?

DUIN: Tomorrow there’s going to be a big report coming out on religious freedom around the world. And as you know, one of the West’s biggest values is freedom of religion and the right to change your religion. I think that all four schools of Islamic thought say that if a Muslim changes his religion, it’s punishable by death. In your dialogues with other Muslims, is this something you’re bringing up? And if so, have you been able to get anywhere in terms of talking about religious freedom and the right to, if you’re Muslim, leave your religion?

RAMADAN: Yes, this is why it’s good to read what I’m trying to say and not to Google my name. In a book I wrote in the beginning of the ’90s, and then in another book in ’97, and then in another book recently, and even on The Washington Post and Newsweek‘s “On Faith,” we were asked a few years ago about our position on women and on religious freedom.

My position is clear, and I have said it many times: from the very beginning, scholars during the 8th century, including one of the main scholars, Sufyan al-Thawri, have said that it’s possible, according to Islam, to change your religion. This understanding of the Islamic traditions [making it punishable by death is] a very narrow understanding and out of context because it has to do with people changing their religion in time of war, coming to the Muslim community and taking information and being, well, betrayers [of] the community. But nowhere do we have in the Islamic tradition, and even in the Prophet’s life, anything saying that he killed someone because he changed his religion, or she changed her religion. If you look at my book on the Prophet’s life, you can see that I mention three main cases where they changed their religion and were not killed, and he knew about this.

Read the full transcript at pewforum.org.

Moderator: Michael Cromartie, Vice President, Ethics & Public Policy Center

In the following edited excerpt, ellipses have been omitted to facilitate reading.

PETER BERGER: We live in an age of overwhelming religious globalization, and I don’t think that one has to justify that statement to this group. Coming down here from Boston I realized I could be in Istanbul if it were a direct flight. But before that, I was in Los Angeles about five weeks ago, and three weeks ago I was in Europe, and both [trips] had to do with religious globalization.

In Los Angeles, the Templeton Foundation ran a very successful conference on global pentecostalism to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Azusa Street Mission, the origin of modern pentecostalism. [Now] in terms of worldwide pentecostalism, the estimates range between 250 million and 450 million adherents, which must be the fastest growth of any religious movement in history. It’s an unbelievable phenomenon.

My first stop in Europe was Amsterdam. A little factoid: the majority of children in the incoming grade school class in Rotterdam public schools are Muslim. I think there is no major world religion that is not globalizing in an impressive way. The Roman Catholic Church actually could be called the oldest global institution, and certainly is continuing this today, although it is very much changing its character. Many of you, I’m sure, know Philip Jenkins’ writings on the new Christendom. The geographical and demographic center of Christianity is moving from north to south, and within a very few years European and North American Catholics, and Christians of any sort, will be in the minority in the world.

We — and when I say “we,” I don’t mean the royal “we,” I mean our research center at Boston University — use the term “popular Protestantism,” which is a little vague, but when you see it you know it. So for example, the Mormons, who most people would not consider exactly Protestant, are still very similar to this broad family of religious groups in terms of social characteristics. Mormonism today is probably the fastest growing denomination worldwide — pentecostalism is not just one denomination. The explosion of Islam, especially in Europe, doesn’t have to be elaborated upon here, but the same is true of every other major religion. Judaism is certainly globalizing, American Hasidic agents have been very influential in Eastern Europe — “agents” is the wrong term; missionaries or whatever you want to call it. Buddhism is spreading in the oddest places; the estimate now is that about 800,000 Americans are converts to Buddhism from other religions. Hinduism is spreading through a number of organizations like the Hare Krishna movement, [and] the Sai Baba movement, in a very interesting way.

I suppose that of the major world religions, the only one that does not globalize is Shinto: It can’t, it’s too linked to Japan. Even Confucianism, if you want to call it a religion, is globalizing and for a short and rather inglorious period, it became the state ideology of Singapore.

[M]y major thesis this morning is that what is happening with the globalization of religion is a globalization of pluralism. Pluralism, which was a much more geographically, much more limited phenomenon 150 or 200 years ago, has become a global phenomenon, and that has enormous implications. What is pluralism? The term, as far as I know, was coined by Horace Kallen, an American philosopher of the 1920s, whom I think has justly been forgotten. I don’t want to be unkind. I once tried to read Kallen and I found him unreadable, but he used the term pluralism in a very normative sense, to celebrate the peaceful coexistence of different ethnic, racial and religious groups in the United States.

The term pluralism [can also be used] in a less value-laden sense, simply as a value-free description of a situation. And I would define pluralism very simply as the coexistence in civic peace — that’s very important — of different racial, ethnic and religious groups, with social interaction between them. That, I think, is very important. You can have a plurality of religious groups that do not interact, and then it’s a little confusing to talk about pluralism.

I recently was on a panel with a very good Turkish sociologist and I talked about modern pluralism. She said, well, pluralism existed in the Ottoman Empire, the millet system where you had Christians and Jews and various groups being sort of self-contained and given certain rights; that was pluralism. And I said, well, not really, because they didn’t interact very much. Or India for example: Many Hindus are very proud of the fact that India has always been pluralistic. Well, there’s the caste system, which made it extremely difficult for people to interact. The interaction is important in my concept of pluralism because as people talk to each other, , they influence each other, and that is the real challenge of pluralism.

Now, my proposition is that modern pluralism is different not because it’s unique, but because of its global spread and its pervasiveness. There have been pluralistic situations, as I defined pluralism, in earlier periods of history – [and they were] very important for the history of Western civilization. The late Roman Empire was pluralistic. Not so incidentally, Christianity came in at that period.

So if you were in metropolitan centers of the Roman Empire — like, let’s say, Alexandria — you had a very pluralistic situation. Or in the Book of Acts when the Apostle Paul went to Athens, he found temples and altars to every conceivable god. And if you look at the literature from that period, it strikes us as very modern. But stay with the example of Alexandria: If you went up the Nile for 50, 60 miles, I think you would have come on a world of villagers and towns which were totally non-pluralistic, which were very self-contained. Today it is extremely difficult to find places in the world that are self-contained in that way. And also the speed with which pluralization occurs today is unique.

Now, I would also argue that in terms of the effect on religion, pluralism is about the most important global fact to look at — not secularization. Until quite recently, most scholars who dealt with religion in the modern world adhered to the so-called secularization theory. So did I, by the way, when I started work as a sociologist of religion. And I was not alone: Most people had the same idea. The idea was very simple: the more modernity, the less religion.

This was not a crazy idea, there were some reasons for saying that. [But] I think it was wrong. And I, along with most people in the field, changed my mind about 25 or so years ago, not for some philosophical or theological reason, but simply because the empirical evidence made it impossible to adhere to this theory. There are few people who heroically maintain the theory. The most prominent one died recently: very nice, very intelligent man, Bryan Wilson, All Souls College in Oxford. But most scholars of religion today, I think, would agree that secularization theory has been massively falsified. We don’t live in an age of secularity; we live in an age of explosive, pervasive religiosity.

Now, there are two exceptions to this statement about the religious character of our age: one is sociological, the other one is geographical. The sociological exception is that there is a relatively thin, but very influential stratum of people internationally that indeed is secular. In many countries including the United States, this intelligentsia or cultural elite is very much in conflict with the religious populace. It is a very important fact in many countries.

The other is the geographical exception, which to my mind is the most interesting question today in the sociology of religion. Western and Central Europe is the only important part of the world that is highly secularized. There’re some others: Australia apparently [is] highly secularized. Very interesting place not very far from here is Quebec, which rapidly secularized itself in recent decades. But I think in both cases we’re really dealing with extensions of Europe.

And, again, why Europe is so secularized is a fascinating issue — I’m doing a book with a British colleague on this topic, and between us, we came up with seven reasons why Europe is the way it is. It’s fascinating. People who deal with the sociology of religion have to deal with Iranian mullahs — people like that. Well, the Iranian mullahs have been around for a long time, we know how they work basically and why. The interesting things, from a sociologist’s point of view, are not Iranian mullahs, but taxi drivers in Stockholm and sociology professors in Paris. Okay, back to pluralism.

One reason why secularization theory collapses under its own weight is the United States, a strongly religious country. If modernity is the key variable, are you going to seriously argue that the United States is less modern than Stockholm? Some people would say, oh, it’s an exception. Well, it’s too big an exception to keep the theory going. Something’s wrong with the theory.

While secularity is not a necessary consequence of modernization, I would argue that pluralism is. And the reason has to do with some very basic processes of modernity: mass migration, mass travel, and probably most important, mass communication — films, television, the internet, you name it. What does globalizing communication means? Everybody talks to everybody else, and as everyone talks to everybody else, a highly pluralistic situation is enhanced by technology and people begin to influence each other.

Now, let me give a rather personal illustration of what I’m talking about. I’m not just talking about interfaith committees sitting around tables like this. My older son married a woman from India who’s a non-practicing Hindu — and he’s a sort of non-practicing Protestant, but it is still a very interfaith marriage.

When my granddaughter was about six, the people across the street were missionaries for Jews for Jesus, and the two little girls had theological conversations with each other that were absolutely fascinating. I wasn’t present at any of them, but I got the reports. I would say inter-religious communication by 5-year-old, 6-year-old little girls is sociologically more significant than interfaith committees set up by the Vatican because there are many more little girls than there are theology professors or whatever. It’s a massive phenomenon, and I would say inevitable with modernity.

Now, what does that mean for religion? It means that both institutionally and individually, any particular religious tradition can no longer be taken for granted. And this has immense implications for religious institutions and for individual human beings. I have argued before in different contexts that modernity in its essence means an enormous change in the human condition, from fate to choice. For much of human history all kinds of practices, beliefs and institutions were simply an individual’s destiny. You were born into a particular situation and that accidental birth determined almost everything you did, including your beliefs.

Modernity means choices, beginning with many choices in terms of technology. Your tribe used one hammer for a particular task for hundreds of years. Now instead of one hammer, you have three technological systems. And there are choices in terms of consumption, production, marriage, occupation and, most dramatically, even identity.

This movement from fate to choice affects not only individuals but also institutions. I would say in the pluralistic situation whether religious institutions like this or not, they become de facto voluntary associations. The prototypical modern, institutional form of religion is the voluntary association. Obviously this voluntariness is enhanced when you have a political and legal system that guarantees religious freedom. [But] even if you look at regimes that try to limit religious freedom — I would say Russia is a good example, China is a good example — of course they suppress the voluntariness, but they can’t suppress it completely. And you have all kinds of things springing up which the authorities do not like and cannot control.

Another term to use here is “denomination,” a peculiarly American term. Richard Niebuhr, a church historian — not to be confused with his brother Reinhold — said that denomination was a new form of religious institution peculiar to the United States. He defined it not as a sect, but a church which recognizes de facto, if not de jure, the right of other denominations that do exist. Take the Roman Catholic Church as a very important example. Certainly it couldn’t think of itself as a voluntary association, but it has de facto become one. Probably first in the United States, and then after Vatican II internationally, it has now officially accepted that position with its very impressive doctrine of religious freedom.

Even Judaism: It is not easily understood as a voluntary association with its linkage of religion and ethnicity, [but] in the United States, it has become denominationalized. No matter how you count it, there are at least three Jewish denominations in the United States, and depending on what concept you use, there may be actually five or six.

Now, this leads to very significant changes. It obviously leads to changes in the relationship between religious institutions and the state. It changes the relations of institutions to each other. They become competitors in what in effect is a market, and it changes the relationship of religious institutions and their functions to the laity very significantly.

That’s very briefly, the institutional consequences of this globalizing pluralism. There are also very interesting consequences for the individual — again a movement from fate to choice. And increasingly you find individuals who put together their own particular religious profile. You find this very much in North America and in Western Europe. You find it elsewhere as well. Robert Wuthnow, who I think is one of the best sociologists of religion in the United States, has used the term “patchwork religion”: People put together different elements of their own tradition and other traditions and say, “Well, I’m Catholic, but –.” The “but” is very important and there are many things [included] there.

For example, the belief in reincarnation. An enormous number of people in Europe and America believe in reincarnation, which is not exactly Christian doctrine. So that’s part of “I’m Catholic, but I believe I’ve been here many times before,” or something like that. Danielle Hervieu-Léger, a French sociologist of religion uses the term “bricolage,” which means tinkering. It’s like a Lego, you create your own little version of whatever it is you want to call yourself.

Another topic that I find very important is the interaction of two phenomena, relativism and fundamentalism. The pluralistic situation inevitably relativizes. If you lose the taken-for-granted status of the tradition, it becomes relativized, and actually our language says this very well. For example, one might say, “I happen to be Catholic” — an extremely interesting phrase. Or a more sort of Californian: “I’m into Buddhism.” Which, of course, suggests that tomorrow I might be out of Buddhism, and in fact chances are that I will; I’ll discover something else.

I suppose the climax of this relativism in religion and in other things is the so-called postmodern theory. We all have our narratives. There’s no way of saying that one narrative is superior to another, and the real virtue here is tolerance. We should all tolerate each other’s narratives. This, by the way, is fine as long as you deal with religion that is empirically not falsifiable. When you’re dealing with morality, [relativism] is a recipe for social disintegration. Just take a simple example: You’re talking to a victim of rape and you say, well, there’s the rapist’s narrative and there’s your narrative, and you know, you have to respect — well, you can’t. If you do that, society will cease to exist. So relativism is a very dangerous direction.

Fundamentalism can be defined in different ways. I would define it as an attempt to restore or create anew the taken-for-grantedness of a particular worldview, of a particular religious tradition, against a relativization of the modern world. And that’s a very difficult project.

Let me simply say there are two models of fundamentalism. One is [what] I call the “reconquista” model. That was the term used in the endless war between Christians and Muslims in Spain when the Spanish Christians were going to re-conquer Spain from Islam. The reconquista model of fundamentalism is to impose the restored taken-for-grantedness on an entire society. The Catholic Church has long given up this project. The role it had during the Spanish civil war would be unthinkable today.

Unfortunately, there are significant elements in the Muslim world that do want to do that. It’s a very difficult project because for the project to succeed, you have to control and eliminate the pluralistic dynamic, and that’s very hard to do. As I’ve mentioned before with Russia and China, even if you have a totalitarian state, it is difficult to do.

The more modest, and therefore more possible, model for fundamentalism is a sort of micro-totalitarianism. You don’t try to impose your ideas on the society as a whole, but you create a community within which it becomes possible. This is the sectarian or sub-cultural possibility. It’s also difficult because the pluralistic dynamic is very strong and you have to have very strong isolation of your community from the surrounding society, which you have decided can go to hell because the truth is now within your community. But at least compared to the reconquista model, it is feasible.

In the dialectic between relativism and fundamentalism, looking at it now from the point of view of the healthy society or a healthy democracy, it seems to me both are equally destructive possibilities: relativism because it makes social order in the end impossible; fundamentalism because it creates either civil strife or, at worst when it succeeds, some kind of tyranny. And I think a very important intellectual and indeed political purpose would be to clearly define and occupy the middle ground, which is neither relativistic, in which all questions of truth become obsolete, nor a fundamentalist, militant adherence to absolute truth.

I would say in most western countries, most people indeed occupy that middle ground. I think if you look at survey data you’ll find that most Americans are somewhere in the middle on most of the neuralgic issues of the culture wars. So it’s not an impossible project.

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There is a considerable divide between people in the West and those in predominantly Muslim countries. Many in the West see Muslims as fanatical, violent, and as lacking tolerance. Meanwhile, Muslims in the Middle East and Asia generally see Westerners as selfish, immoral and greedy – as well as violent and fanatical.

The latest survey by the Pew Global Attitudes Project, conducted among roughly 14,000 people in 13 nations, finds that publics of predominantly Muslim nations have an aggrieved view of the West – they are much more likely than Americans or Western Europeans to blame Western policies for their own lack of prosperity. Generally, Muslim publics feel much more embittered toward people in the West than vice versa.

Large percentages in nearly every Muslim country attribute several negative traits to Westerners. In one of the survey’s most striking findings, majorities in Indonesia, Turkey, Egypt, and Jordan say that they do not believe groups of Arabs carried out the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. Anti-Jewish sentiment remains overwhelming in predominantly Muslim countries.

For their part, Westerners are broadly skeptical of Muslim values. Many Westerners – including solid majorities of the general publics in Germany and Spain – say that there is a conflict between being a devout Muslim and living in a modern society. And Westerners are less optimistic about the prospects for democracy in the Muslim world than are Muslims themselves.

Other key findings include:

European Muslims’ More Moderate Outlook

For the first time, the Global Attitudes Project conducted interviews with Muslim minorities in four Western European countries – Great Britain, Spain, Germany and France. While Europe’s Muslim minorities are about as likely as Muslims elsewhere to see relations between Westerners and Muslims as generally bad, they more often associate positive attributes to Westerners – including tolerance, generosity, and respect for women. European Muslims also are less likely than non-Muslims in Europe to believe that there is a conflict between modernity and being a devout Muslim.

Muslim Support for Terrorism has Declined

In Jordan, Pakistan and Indonesia, there have been substantial declines in the percentages saying suicide bombings and other forms of violence against civilian targets can be justified to defend Islam against its enemies. The shift has been especially dramatic in Jordan, likely in response to the devastating terrorist attack in Amman last year; 29% of Jordanians view suicide attacks as often or sometimes justified, down from 57% in May 2005.

Flashpoints in Relations

Western publics, by lopsided margins, do not think of Muslims as “respectful of women.” In turn, Muslims in predominantly Muslim countries say the same about Westerners. And perhaps no issue highlights the divide between Muslims and the West more clearly than their responses to the uproar this past winter over cartoon depictions of Muhammad. Muslim publics blame the controversy on Western nations’ disrespect for the Islamic religion. In contrast, majorities of Americans and Western Europeans more often say Muslims’ intolerance to different points of view is more to blame.