by Zoë Pollock
Karen Barkey relays the main thesis of Olivier Roy's new book:
[T]he major religious movements of today — Pentecostalism, Protestant evangelicalism, and Islamic Salafism — are setting themselves free from their cultural moorings. These religions have not lost their importance, but they have become universal and less affiliated with any one territory, and more personal and private, increasingly embodying a spiritual search for self-fulfillment. Although they acknowledge what Roy calls "floating cultural markers — halal fast food, eco-kosher, cyber-fatwa, halal dating, Christian rock, transcendental meditation" — he claims that they are fundamentally separating from the cultures in which they developed. … Individuals throughout the world are being presented with a religious market in which they can choose whatever product they want.
Barkey offers a strong but simple rebuke:
When religion is no longer inherited but chosen, its adherents are much more willing to relate it to all aspects of life: social, cultural, and political; and they more readily engage in the public sphere.
The Dish 