The book under review is a paperback edition of the original, published in 2007 and widely praised for its breadth and depth of research, independent perspectives on controversial issues, and coherence of argument. Although the discourse focuses primarily on Christianity and Islam in the European context in both historical and contemporary frames of reference, its main purpose is to predict likely dimensions of future European religio-cultural, social, and political life. A central reality of “Europe's Religious Crisis” is the tensions today between deeply established Enlightenment-inspired modern secularism and traditional forms and expressions of religious authority, still viewed as foundational by many if not most Muslim immigrants, in determining and regulating proper social, cultural, and moral life.
The increasing numbers of Muslims migrating to and settling in Europe over the past half-century—and continuing steadily—has led to considerable anxiety about the Continent becoming, as Jenkins states, “Eurabia, a word that provides a concise shorthand for an array of cultural and ethnic nightmares” (4). Europe's Christian bodies have become increasingly marginalized over recent decades with regular church attendance in traditionally Protestant-majority countries now at record low levels (for example, 15 percent in Britain, 12 percent in Germany, and below 5 percent in Scandinavia) compared to about 40 percent in America. Church attendance continues to be higher in some European Catholic majority countries (for example, Poland, Ireland, Slovakia), although in France only 12 percent and in Spain 18 percent attend mass today. Jenkins provides considerable research data on church attendance with respect to its social, cultural, ethnic, and national dimensions (see 27–32).
There is a strong tendency today to view Christianity in Europe as a dying tradition. Jenkins provides evidence that refutes this while acknowledging profound changes in the religious environment compared with the past. Although it is true that a considerable proportion of immigrants to Europe are from Muslim nations, there are also many Christians coming from Africa and Asia with great evangelical energy and missionary commitment to spiritual renewal and member growth in their new national communities. “At the least, their swelling numbers provide an important counterweight to booming Muslim populations. In many ways, too, their experience replicates that of Muslim communities, sharing many of the same diasporic issues and conflicts and, perhaps remarkably, in receiving much of the same disdain and suspicion from the mainstream society” (87). Jenkins's survey of a wide variety of “New Christians” in Europe is one of the book's most important and intriguing contributions. He writes: “Whatever the denomination, global South Christian churches usually have a powerful charismatic quality, a belief in miracles, healings, and visions” (96). An important dimension of the charismatic-renewalist emphasis of so much of immigrant Christianities in Europe is that increasing numbers of Anglicans, Roman Catholics, and members of other denominations are also cultivating charismatic evangelical piety and spiritual practices within their traditional parishes. Jenkins considers this to be a possible bridge to the new Christianities developing in European diasporic communities. He notes that European media are “far more secular than their U.S. counterparts and indeed more hostile to any form of organized religion, which is commonly seen as a problem to be solved. In consequence, European accounts of religious life all but ignore significant trends or events, and this lack of attention means that these movements receive little attention elsewhere. It is thus easy for North American commentators to assume that European Christianity is not just near death, but that there are no signs of remission or revival” (86).
Jenkins devotes considerable attention to demographic matters, such as the higher birth rates among immigrant Muslims as well as the scope of ethnic diversity across the entire landscape of immigrant diasporas in Europe today. He addresses, with considerable insight with regard to their causes and likely outcomes, various forms of Muslim extremism in Europe, whether in the industrial midlands of England or in the suburbs of Paris and across France as well as in other places. A particularly dramatic example is the assassination by a Muslim of the Dutch filmmaker Theo Van Gogh and the assassin's ensuing death threats against his Muslim co-producer, Somali-born Aayan Hirsi Ali, a female Dutch legislator who cooperated with Van Gogh in making the intensely critical film Submission about the sufferings of women under Islam. Jenkins also discusses the issue of whether, and to what extent, people may publicly characterize and criticize religious figures, particularly the Prophet Muhammad, as in the twelve cartoons of the Prophet published in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten in 2005, one of which depicted him with a turban in the form of a bomb. This event inspired a “cartoon jihad,” as some American conservatives characterized the outcome around the Muslim world, with some nations boycotting Danish goods. Open violence occurred in some countries, resulting in dozens of deaths.
Although Philip Jenkins has a generally positive, if not quite optimistic, view concerning Europe's future as a secular society that provides religious and other freedoms for its increasingly diverse populations, he does acknowledge serious potential problems and challenges along the way. “For many Muslims, the encounter with Europe has produced a sudden and often shocking immersion in modernity and has, in addition, created a hothouse atmosphere of controversy and free speech. Though the resulting intellectual and spiritual turmoil contributes to political extremism, the long-term pressures are likely to create an ever-more adaptable form of faith that can cope with social change without compromising basic beliefs. Whether or not we call it Euro-Islam, such a development would be of immense benefit not just to European societies but to neighboring regions of Africa and the Near East as well” (287).
