Wolf Lepenies on Europe's soul

In his acceptance speech for the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade, German sociologist and journalist Wolf Lepenies stressed the importance of focusing on Europe's ties with Islam rather than the differences. "Those who oppose Turkey's accession to the European Union have serious arguments: human rights violations, the lack of protection for minorities, the dangers of demographic imbalance and of European institutions not being able to cope. It is not the danger of losing its Christian soul that Europe must fear if Turkey becomes a member state. Europe never had a pure soul; this is one of its strengths. Nor can Islam claim to be 'pure'. Islam was not just a religious culture; it was also an aesthetic and secular culture, and above all it was not a monolithic culture but a fractured one. And for a long time and in many places in the world, it had close ties with Christian values and the Jewish world. To say this openly is a scandal and a blow to Islamic fundamentalists."

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