Islamicists are often accused of elevating political conflicts into cosmic ones. They can’t help “religionizing” conflict, given their pre-modern, irrational, non-secular assumptions.
Then Andrew Sullivan writes, shortly after 9/11: “What is really at issue here is the simple but immensely difficult principle of the separation of politics and religion . . . . We are fighting for the universal principles of our Constitution – and the possibility of free religious faith it guarantees. We are fighting for religion against one of the deepest strains in religion there is [i.e., fundamentalism]. And not only our lives but our souls are at stake.”
Thus far the wild-eyed secular prophet. Cosmic war, anyone? Will the real “religionizer” please stand up?
