From A New Dark Age Is Dawning:
PARIS - Al Fath Mosque is in a scruffy immigrant neighborhood not far from the neon-lit kitsch of Pigalle. On Friday afternoons the mosque is jammed, and the overflow of worshippers - all men - spills into the streets.
Tourists who stumble on the scene reflexively reach for their cameras, struck by this unusual public manifestation of religiosity in a country where Christian belief has become passe.
In France and in almost every other European country, Christianity appears to be in a free fall. Although up to 88 percent of the French identify themselves as Roman Catholic, only about 5 percent go to church on most Sundays; 60 percent say they "never" or "practically never" go.
But Islam is a thriving force. The 12 million to 15 million Muslims who live in Europe make up less than 5 percent of the total population, but the vitality of their faith has led some experts to predict that Islam will become the continent's dominant faith.
Princeton University historian Bernard Lewis, the dean of American Middle East scholars, flatly predicts that Europe will be Islamic by the end of this century "at the very latest." In France, Islam and secularism spread as Christianity lapses by Tom Hundley
4 comments:
Well, yes, I think that is the way it is in Europe. I don't think the same could be said of the United States. Do you?
Islamic da'wa in Europe is aimed at filling the spiritual void left by the disappearance of Christianity (unlike in North America where Islam is in competition with Christianity).
But it is difficult to judge how much progress Islam is making in converting the general native secularized European population, although conversions within jails are proceding rapidly.
Christianity in Western Europe seems to be in terminal decline, with, for example, the Church of England tearing itself to pieces, and its future head saying be wants to be the defender of all faiths, no matter how mutually contradictory.
Christianity is healthier in Eastern Europe, where it was strengthened by communist persecution.
But it is very difficult to imagine what a Western European Christian revival would look like. There have been such movements in individual countries in the past, but none since the First World War.
Pastorius,
I'm not sure. Many Christians whom I know won't stand up for the faith because of various fears.
Why are you relating this to the French Resistance? What sort of resistance are you referring to?
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