NUNTIATORIA

The Restoration We Have Refused: Islamism, Multiculturalism, and the Necessity of Christian Civilization

The Islamist Strategy
For more than two decades Western governments have congratulated themselves on victories against al-Qaeda and the Islamic State, while failing to confront the deeper ideological threat: da’wah Islamism. This is not jihad with bombs and knives, but a slower, more corrosive project—capturing schools, mosques, universities, charities, and political platforms to advance the same goal by peaceful means: the replacement of Western order with sharia.

Politicians call it “religious expression.” In reality, it is sedition. To treat political Islam as simply another faith tradition is to mistake an openly totalitarian project for legitimate piety.

Multiculturalism and the Guilt of Elites
The dogma of multiculturalism, embraced by figures such as Tony Blair, Angela Merkel, and more recently Emmanuel Macron, has been to sacrifice truth for the idol of “diversity.” Assimilation was denounced as oppressive; parallel societies were permitted to flourish. The price is now visible in “sharia-lite” enclaves from Paris to Birmingham, Malmö to Brussels.

Behind this failure lies a paralysing guilt. European elites, obsessed with the Holocaust and colonialism, have persuaded themselves that to criticise Islamism is to repeat the sins of their grandfathers. Angela Merkel once declared multiculturalism a failure, yet pursued immigration policies that guaranteed its continuation. In Britain, successive governments, Labour and Conservative alike, hid behind “community cohesion” while allowing Islamist networks to dominate civic life.

But guilt is not repentance. It is cowardice disguised as virtue. Augustine long ago observed that “two loves have built two cities—the love of self to the contempt of God, and the love of God to the contempt of self”¹. By exalting the love of self—our own image as tolerant liberators—Western elites have abandoned God and imperilled civilization.

The Inversion of Justice
The case of Shamima Begum revealed the moral collapse of our ruling class. Debate centred on whether she should keep her passport. Almost no one dared to ask: who radicalised her? Who were the imams, the teachers, the parents who encouraged her departure?

Justice has been inverted: children are blamed, adults excused. Catholic moral theology recognises that culpability increases with authority. Yet the radicalisers are untouched, while the deceived minors bear the brunt of public punishment.

Constitutions as Suicide Pacts
Europe’s liberal constitutions—so often invoked by judges, journalists, and bishops—have become weapons against their own societies. Article 9 of the European Convention on Human Rights is routinely used to protect Islamist schools that indoctrinate children against the very nations funding them. In the Netherlands, in Germany, and in Britain, state money supports madrassas that denounce secular law as illegitimate.

This is what Leo XIII foresaw in Immortale Dei: liberty divorced from truth degenerates into “a most fatal liberty, that is, of perdition”². When freedom is reduced to license, it serves only the enemies of order.

The Shrinking Options of Civilization
Europe faces two possible futures: sharia by the ballot box, or chaos in the streets. In France, the growing Muslim electorate already swings elections. In Britain, the Green Party and Labour field candidates who openly shout “Allahu Akbar” in their victory speeches. In Germany, radical mosques form community blocs that wield more influence than elected councils.

The alternative future is no better: violent clashes between jihadists, far-right militants, and anarchist mobs, while the state—paralysed by political correctness—abandons the centre ground. In such chaos, Islamist movements often prevail, as they have in the Middle East and Africa.

The Complicity of the Church
Even more damning is the complicity of ecclesiastical leaders. Pope Francis, by blessing the adulterous union of Charles and Camilla and by praising Islam as “a religion of peace,” has blurred doctrine into diplomacy. Cardinal José Cobo of Madrid writes letters of “inclusion” to LGBT activists while ignoring the persecution of Christians in Islamic countries. Cardinal Mario Grech openly suggests laypeople could replace priests. These are not shepherds but hirelings, silent while the flock is devoured.

The modern Church’s embrace of relativism has left youth defenceless. Chesterton was right: “The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting; it has been found difficult and left untried”³.

The Failure of Secularism
The New Atheists—Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, Sam Harris—promised emancipation from superstition. Instead they delivered a vacuum. A generation raised as “children of Dawkins” has found itself without meaning, without hope, and without community. Into that void has rushed Islamism, wokeness, and despair.

Benedict XVI, in his famous homily before the 2005 conclave, diagnosed this collapse: the dictatorship of relativism, where nothing is true and only power remains⁴. His warning was ignored by the very bishops who elected him.

The Necessity of Restoration
The only antidote to the cult of death—whether Islamist or woke—is the faith of life: Christianity. Islam proclaims paradise for those who kill and die; Christianity proclaims that Christ died so that man may live. The contrast is absolute.

To recover, we must restore what has been abandoned:

• the Christian family, grounded in fidelity and fruitfulness;
• the Christian state, recognising that liberty is ordered to truth, not license;
• the Christian Church, unashamed to preach the Gospel of life against all false religions.

Without this restoration, Europe will collapse, not by external conquest but by internal surrender. The Civitas Dei cannot be replaced by the idols of tolerance, diversity, or secular reason. Only a return to the Kingship of Christ can preserve our civilization. 🔝

1. Joseph Ratzinger (Benedict XVI), Homily before Conclave, April 18, 2005.
2. Augustine, City of God, Book XIV, ch. 28.
3. Pope Leo XIII, Immortale Dei (1885), §31.
4. G.K. Chesterton, What’s Wrong with the World (1910), p. 48.