On Saturday 16 June, a one day conference on ‘Religion and Politics in the Construction of the European Union’ was held at the London School of Economics. This international event was supported by the Department of Government and the European Institute and was organised by John Madeley and Lucian Leustean, both of the Department of Government. The programme addressed a wide range of issues including secularism, the role of Christian democracy, European enlargement, church–state models, whether Europe has a soul, the place of Islam in the EU, and religious lobbying in the EU. There were 22 presentations during the day, divided between a morning plenary session and two sets of parallel afternoon sessions. The conference was attended by 90 participants from 15 countries, including historians, philosophers, political scientists, sociologists of religion, canon lawyers and students of religious studies. The variety of disciplinary approaches made the discussions particularly valuable and stimulating. A selection of the papers is due to be published in two double issues of the journal Religion, State and Society at the end of 2008, and as an edited book to be published by Routledge.