Europe at the crossroads. “Either she will be a Christian or she will be baptized in cancel culture”. The new book by Pierre Manent

“The perplexity and doubt that increasingly mark the self-awareness of Europeans (who are we?) Is largely due to a cause that is almost never mentioned: Europeans do not know what to think or do about Christianity”. Thus opens “Blaise Pascal et la proposition chrétienne” (Grasset), the new book by Pierre Manent, the disciple of Raymond Aron (of whom he was assistant at the Collège de France) and one of the greatest French intellectuals, in which, in the light of author of “Thoughts” addresses the issue that is dearest to him, namely the decline of Catholicism in our society (Chantal Delsol will also talk about it in “The end of Christianity and the return of paganism” published by Cantagalli).

Manent’s book, born in 1949, son of Communists from Toulouse, is a great reflection on de-Christianization. “Just as Israel was formed in the Covenant and in the loving dispute with her God, the dynamics of European history took place in an incessant confrontation with Christianity”. However, Europe has decided to declare this possibility precluded. “She has decided to be reborn. But this baptism is cancel culture. She declares it publicly, she demonstrates it with her actions: Europe is not Christian, she does not want to be. It wants to be something else, it is open to all other possibilities, even to be nothing, but not to be Christian ”.

From secularization we pass to de-Christianization. “The neutrality of the state has extended to society itself and to all institutions founded on a certain ‘idea of ​​the good'”. Today the state and science, which began their supremacy in Pascal’s time, are reaching the pinnacle of their ambition. “Nothing escapes the surveillance of the welfare state and the intrusion of the scientific gaze. The European project is based on the decision to reject any continuity between the new Europe and the one that preceded it, as if to protect itself from contamination. A nativity scene is acceptable in public space only as a folkloric residue “.

It is not just about attachment to old churches, roadside crosses and religious expressions that have become part of everyday language. According to Manent, more and more people can go through their entire lives without encountering the question of their relationship with Christianity. “The term de-Christianization is too abstract. It is more of an apostasy, a weariness, an indifference, at times a palpable aversion ”.

But at the same time as it empties the European public space of the signs of Christianity, Europe unconditionally welcomes Islam. “Islam is the religion that asserts itself in conquering public forms, questioning the great narrative of secularization. It challenges the self-awareness on which modern Europe’s self-confidence has been based ”.

• Giulio Meotti

• Giulio Meotti has been a journalist of Il Foglio since 2003. He is the author of numerous books, including Non stop dancing. The untold stories of the martyrs of Israel (Premio Capalbio); They killed Charlie Hebdo; The end of Europe (Capri Award); Israel. The last European state; The suicide of Western culture; The tomb of God; Notre Dame burns; The Last Pope of the West? and Europe without Jews.