The fraught relationship between church and state in France—which played itself out in the nineteenth century, culminating in their separation in December 1905—unfolded in an altogether different way in Algeria, where the majority of the population was Muslim. The French colonial administration, whether military or civilian, was unable to come to grips with a religion and culture that they deemed so alien to their own, a fact that still has echoes in France today. In Decolonizing Christianity, Fontaine sets out four overarching aims, which she argues will “provincialize” the history of Christianity. First, she examines the central role that Christianity played in Algerian decolonization. Second, she seeks to “decenter” the history of Christianity by shifting its focus from the metropole to the colony. Third, she analyzes the significance of Christian ideology in relation to French colonialism. Finally, she delineates the results of Christian activism both in Algeria and globally. The result, she argues, is “a social history of theology” (11).

The five chapters of the book, which elaborate these aims, are well researched and carefully argued, even though her claim that the leading players introduced and analyzed in the course of the book “altered the course of French, Algerian and global Christian history” may be somewhat overstated (21). The first chapter traces the development of Christianity in the colony, emphasizing that it was not until World War II that Catholics in the colony began to rethink their roles. Among the important institutions to emerge was the Mission de France, which served as a research laboratory in the theological and practical changes that took place in the church. It trained priests who chose to live communally with social rather than proselytizing aims. Similarly, the Association de la jeunesse algérienne pour l'action sociale (AJAAS), established in 1952, developed projects geared to alleviate the misery of the Algerian poor. Unlike the Catholic Church, which Fontaine declares was a major force within Algerian society, the small Protestant community was insignificant in comparison—hardly surprising given that the majority of settlers, although in possession of French citizenship by the twentieth century, had their origins in the Catholic countries of the Mediterranean, such as Spain, Italy, and Malta.

The second chapter is concerned with the crisis of progressivism within the Catholic Church which took place from 1950 to 1957, culminating in the arrest and trial of a group of progressive Christians. Although it was known that the accusations were largely false, Fontaine suggests it was a “show trial” designed to muzzle the progressives and prevent interference with the army's activities at the height of the Battle of Algiers. Fontaine does a fine job of unravelling the political ramifications of the trial and its consequences as well as explicating the role of the head of the Catholic Church in Algeria, Mgr. Duval, his exchanges with the Vatican, and his defense of Christian morality in the face of the opposition to the “progressives.”

Chapter 3 moves to the metropole and is concerned with the “decentering” of Christianity, which Fontaine argues is important as a “productive analytical model” (109). Here she examines the morality of the war and the debates that ensued around torture, the treatment of Algerian civilians, and the civil disobedience that emerged as French men and women came out against what the government termed “the maintenance or order,” thus obfuscating the nationalists' aim. The chapter ends with an analysis of the triangular relations between France, Algeria, and the Vatican during this period, leading to a rethinking of the Christian mission in Algeria.

The final two chapters of the book are concerned with the religious politics of independence and the development of relations in the postcolonial period. These two chapters, particularly chapter 5, are the most intellectually stimulating of the book. In the final chapter, Fontaine focuses on the two to three thousand settlers who remained in Algeria—the pieds-verts—and their role in trying to create a viable relationship with the Algerians after the violent rupture of the war. It was, she argues, those Christian personalities, who had attempted to reconceptualize the role of the church as a modern player in the world, who now became central to local and global efforts to decolonize Christianity. The transfer of church property to the Algerian state and the participation of Catholic and Protestant clergy and laypersons alike in the reconstruction of the new nation were the initial steps in a process that helped to change the “mission” mentality into one of “building” a new relationship with, and involvement in developing, the new nation. Although the Catholic Church's desire to convince the settlers to remain and work with the Algerians to create an independent nation failed, after independence the Christians who did remain became “a fascinating model for Christian-Muslim dialogue and for the possibilities of a Christian presence in politically challenging, non-Christian lands” (213).

Fontaine has written a worthy account of the church during the period of decolonization. Although she meticulously details the activities of church officials and lay persons involved in Catholic institutions and charitable organizations, a discussion of the differences in the Catholicism as practiced in Algeria and France is glaringly absent. To be sure, she states that the church was a major force in Algerian society, but she overlooks the significance of the fact the majority of the settler population came from fervently Catholic countries. Many had never set foot in France before the final exodus. The struggles between church and state may have echoed in Algeria, but the colonial situation partially shielded the church from the anti-clerical/clerical split that prevailed in France by focusing religious conflicts on Muslims and Jews. Furthermore, while church attendance steadily declined in France, it did not happen at the same pace in Algeria. Were not these background facts relevant? The relationships between church and state in France and between church and colonial state in Algeria were different. Did these divergences, and the devout Catholicism of the settler population, play a role in providing the church with the necessary conviction to “decenter” and “provincialize” the church? Perhaps Fontaine's subsequent work will seek to answer these questions.