Young Muslims and Christians in a Secular Europe: Pursuing Religious Commitment in the Netherlands

Revivalist-oriented Christians and Muslims – particularly evangelicals and Salafis – are among the most vibrant and fastest growing religious groups in the Western world. Challenging secular norms and assumptions, they are at the midst of renewed public and academic concerns about religion. Scholars have so far barely given attention to the potential convergences between these groups because the study of Islam and Christianity has been largely divided by longstanding disciplinary boundaries. Precarious Faith, by contrast, offers a comparative ethnographic study of religious commitment among young, revivalist Protestant Christians and Sunni Muslims in the Netherlands, commonly recognized as one of the most secular countries in Europe. Based on in-depth ethnographic fieldwork, Daan Beekers shows that these young Muslims and Christians embark on highly reflexive projects of cultivating personal piety. These pursuits of religious commitment, however, are rife with struggles, setbacks and doubts. As the religious convictions and practices of these young adults are challenged by competing modes of imagining and living in the world, their faith continuously risks moving to the background of their everyday lives. This study demonstrates that this shared predicament of a 'precarious faith' is shaped by these young people's active participation in today's high-capitalist, secular society. Strikingly, this close engagement with secular culture does not only constrain their religious commitment but also, paradoxically, bolsters it. The interplay between religious pursuits and prevalent secular dynamics results, among both the young Muslims and Christians, in a reinvigorated and self-conscious religious commitment that, as its flipside, demands constant nourishment.

• | Author: Daan Beekers
• | Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic
• | Publication Date: January 14, 2021
• | Number of Pages: 240 pages
• | Language: English
• | Binding: Hardcover
• | ISBN-10: 1350127310
• | ISBN-13: 9781350127319