September 11th 2001 drew the transatlantic alliance together; but the mood did not last, and over the five years since it has pulled ever further apart. A recent poll for the German Marshall Fund shows that 57% of Europeans regard American leadership in world affairs as "undesirable". The Iraq war is mainly to blame. But there is another and more intractable reason for the growing division: God.
Europeans worry that American foreign policy under George Bush is too influenced by religion. The "holy warriors" who hijacked the planes on September 11th reintroduced God into international affairs in the most dramatic of ways. It seems that George Bush is replying in kind, encouraging a clash of religions that could spell global catastrophe.
Dominique Moisi, a special adviser at the French Institute for International Relations, argues that "the combination of religion and nationalism in America is frightening. We feel betrayed by God and by nationalism, which is why we are building the European Union as a barrier to religious warfare." Josef Braml, of the German Institute for International and Security Affairs, complains that in America "religious attitudes have more of an influence on political choices than in any other western democracy."
The notion that America is too influenced by religion is not confined to the elites.
Three in five French people and nearly as many Dutch think that Americans are too religious—and that religion skews what should be secular decisions. Europeans who think that America is "too religious" are more inclined to anti-Americanism than their fellow countrymen. 38% of Britons have an unfavourable view of America, but that number rises to 50% among people who are wary of American religiosity.
Is America engaged in a faith-based foreign policy Religion certainly exerts a growing influence on its actions in the world, but in ways more subtle and complicated than Europeans imagine. It is true that America is undergoing a religious revival "Hot" religions such as evangelical Protestantism and hardline Catholicism are growing rapidly while "cool" mainline versions of Christianity are declining. It is also true that the Republican Party is being reshaped by this revival. Self-identified evangelicals provided almost 40% of Mr. Bush’s vote in 2004; if you add in other theological conservatives, such as Mormons and traditional Catholics, that number rises closer to 60%. All six top Republican leaders in the Senate have earned 100% ratings from the Christian Coalition.
It is also true that Mr. Bush frequently uses religious rhetoric when talking of foreign affairs. On September 12th he was at it again, telling a group of conservative journalists that he sees the war on terror as "a confrontation between good and evil", and remarking, "It seems to me that there’s a Third Awakening" (in other words, an outbreak of Christian evangelical fervour, of the sort that has swept across America at least twice before). And Christian America overall is taking a bigger interest in foreign policy. New voices are being heard, Such as Sam Brownback, a conservative senator from Kansas who has led the fight against genocide in Darfur, and Rick Warren, the author of a bestseller called The Purpose-Driven Life, who is sending 2 000 missionaries to Rwanda.
Finally, it is true that religious figures have done some pretty outrageous things. Pat Robertson called for the assassination of Hugo Chavez, the president of Venezuela. Lieu- tenant-General William "Jerry" Boykin, deputy under-secretary of defence for intelligence, toured the country telling Christian groups that radical Muslims hate America "because we’ re a Christian nation and the enemy is a guy named Satan". He often wore uniform.
The author evidences his own notion by advancing （）
A. four facts
B. far-fetched pretexts
C. random hypothesis
D. powerful preachers
