Since September 11, fundamentalism has pressed against the world with renewed urgency. We know that fanatic Islamic fundamentalism supported the terrorists who acted on that day. We have been confused to learn that many of the terrorists were educated, from middle class, if not wealthy families, and wealthy countries like Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. They seem to defy our understanding of the oppressed, poverty stricken fanatic fundamentalist.

I know that many of you looked forward to this sermon because you kept asking about it. There are some answers for the events of September 11th in patterns of fundamentalism, but not a full explanation. There will never be a full explanation. Fundamentalism itself cannot explain why some individuals turn towards violent fanaticism. We carefully walk in this mysterious place of human choice that leads from love to hate and murder.

In his essay, the Fundamentals of Fundamentalism, Marty explains that the word "fundamentalism" was first used in the United States in 1920, during a controversy among conservative Protestants. The name was chosen by the more conservative members, who were proud of their adherence to the "fundamentals" of faith. I assume the choice of term also reflects a judgment against the more innovative or progressive members (As in, we are the keepers of the true faith, you are not).

In our reading for this morning, we heard Martin E. Marty's eleven fundamentals, or characteristics, of fundamentalism. Marty maintains that first, fundamentalism occurs within traditional cultures. Second, people tend toward fundamentalism when they feel a sense of threat. Third, fundamentalism flowers when the general population experiences uneasiness, discontent, fear of identity diffusion, or loss of focus.

One hundred years ago Jerry Falwell's fundamentalist, Christian group, the Moral Majority, would not have been fundamentalist, would have had no reason to exist, because the majority of Americans shared the views they espouse today (abortion, homosexuality). Fundamentalists like the Moral Majority are holding on to the past. The world moves on, theology and religion evolve, but the faith of certain individuals does not and these individuals feel threatened because they used to be the traditional majority and are now a minority.

But as much as these groups hold on to the past, or their interpretation of the past, they have innovated. For example, they often master modern communication and media. (Moral Majority and televangelism, Al Qaeda and the Internet). Karen Armstrong, author of The Battle for God, argues "these movements are not an archaic throwback to the past; they are modern, innovative, and modernizing." Both Marty and Armstrong are correct. Fundamentalism lifts up the past as a model, yet in order to support this model, they have used modernity to their advantage.

Marty's second and third points are that fundamentalists feel a sense of threat, and the population as a whole feels uneasy or a loss of identity. Armstrong explains that fundamentalism is rooted in fear, a terror of extinction. This fear is so extreme that it can't be reasoned with or coerced away. Marty also notes that fundamentalists see compromise as an enemy. They are involved in a fight for survival. Therefore, fundamentalism is expressed by individuals and groups who are extremely fearful, confused, and entrenched. (Anwar Sadat in Egypt)

Marty's first three qualities are just precursors to fundamentalism. By themselves, they are not characteristics of fundamentalism (Many populations feel uneasy, individuals feel threatened, and traditional cultures change). Reaction against the majority is what makes fundamentalism distinct. His fourth characteristic is that leaders and followers take conscious steps to react, to innovate, to defend. Marty makes two other points that emphasize this characteristic, fundamentalist insistences offend, and they become aggressive.

Marty makes the clarifying point that the Amish are traditionalists, not fundamentalists, which helps us to understand that it is possible to be conservative, orthodox, or traditional without being fundamentalist. Amish views were once those of the majority, but times changed, certain individuals felt a sense of fear and uneasiness, and chose to withdraw from society. Yet, the Amish have neither reacted, offended, nor become aggressive, even when they become entangled in difficult struggles with the larger society, which is why they are not fundamentalist (medical treatment of children, Amish response points to choices, all will someday feel times have changed, fear, uneasiness, how do we respond, growing older, choices, living with pluralism and diversity).

Even under Marty's eleven characteristics, fundamentalist groups are not monolithic. Each group chooses fundamentals that separate it from non-fundamentalists, fundamentalists of other faiths, and even fundamentalists groups within the same religious tradition and country. In addition, fundamentalists groups differ based on history, geography, economy, and politics.

Karen Armstrong maintains that fundamentalism in the United States is not as dramatic as Islamic or Jewish fundamentalism. She attributes this to the fact that Americans live in a democracy, which provides choices and protection that de-escalates a sense of threat, and that most American fundamentalists, particularly fundamentalist leaders, have access to money. She also notes that Americans share neither a Holocaust history, nor a history of intense economic and political repression, all of which fuel Jewish and Islamic fundamentalist groups.

One mistake non-fundamentalists have made, is to accept the language and framework given by fundamentalism. We have accepted their language and framework, or chosen to counter them, as if they were true, rather than the misleading attempts of desperate people. Fundamentalists, particularly in the United States, have blamed their dissatisfaction on secular humanism. We have been foolish enough to accept this as true.

Now, I agree with Armstrong, that there is an escalating spiral of hostility and recrimination in fundamentalist/non-fundamentalist relationships. However, I don't believe that this spiral is between secular humanism and fundamentalism. The spiral is between modernity, civil rights, pluralism and fundamentalism.

In an essay on the New Christian Right in America, Sociology professor Steve Bruce explains


The NCR (New Christian Right) sees the state imposing a coherent ideology which it calls "secular humanism." This is profoundly mistaken. What is actually imposed is not so often the alternative dogma but the dogma of alternatives.

Bruce points out that our acceptance of secular humanism as the problem has allowed fundamentalists to define the problem, which has then allowed them to claim a persecuted minority status while persecuting another minority. According to American fundamentalists, a powerful group, known as secular humanists, is oppressing them. The truth is that within America as a whole, there aren't that many secular humanists, and they aren't that powerful.

Bruce notes that fundamentalist definitions of secular humanism are actually definitions of a modern, pluralistic democracy. They include qualities like diversity of religious and moral belief, and sexual lifestyle, feminism, socialism, and questioning everything including fundamentalism. These might be qualities or beliefs that secular humanists affirm, but these qualities hardly define secular humanism itself.

Fundamentalists are not persecuted, they are unhappy with pluralism and choice. They have chosen to blame their unhappiness on secular humanism rather than our democracy. It's really a misleading buy one, get three or four for free deal for fundamentalists. Blame the secular humanists, make them act out and look bad, propose yourself instead as a persecuted minority, while in the meantime slowing the wheels of modernity and backhandedly challenging the basis of our country. It's not about an alternative dogma or secular humanism, but rather a dogma of alternatives.

There is a similarity between this misleading fundamentalist construction in America, and what we hear from fundamentalists in the Middle East. In America, Christian fundamentalists have told us their struggle is with secular humanism. In the Middle East, Islamic fundamentalists have told us their struggle is with the West (particularly America) and Israel. Again, I think the struggle is with modernity and pluralism, compounded by a painful history of colonialism, economic and political oppression, the collapse of the Soviet Union, authoritarian governments (both those supported by America and those not supported by America), and unsuccessful attempts to modernize in Western ways. In this chaos, suffering, and dislocation, people are holding on to what is familiar from the past, Islam.

Yet, I sometimes wonder how long and intensely Islam can bear this never-intended weight and scrutiny before it collapses in hypocrisy. American Christianity faced a similar dilemma in the 1980's and early 1990's. [elab] Within Islam and the Middle East, some cracks are already showing, or perhaps they have been there for a while, and are finally becoming public.

Obviously, we have all seen signs of Muslim unity across Middle Eastern countries, and hatred directed at the United States and Israel. Yet, less reported are the emerging differences; Iran is Shi, Afghanistan is Sunni, Iraq is secular. Women in Iran have more freedom that woman in Saudi Arabia, who have more freedom that women in Afghanistan. Egypt and Jordan made peace with Israel; Syria has not. Islam and the Middle East have many choices ahead.

Marty's characteristics offer us a framework for understanding fundamentalism, yet they do not explain how fundamentalists can become fanatic fundamentalists. Religious fundamentalism exists all over the world. There are Christian, Jewish, Hindu, Islamic, even just a few Buddhist fundamentalists. But largely they react, they offend, but are not violent. There is an enormous chasm between the fundamentalism of Jerry Falwell, no matter how verbally hateful or inciting he is toward certain groups, and the religious fundamentalism of individuals who murder doctors who perform abortions.

What is that click that moves fundamentalists from fearful self-preservation to violent fanaticism? I do not know. But I know that it has little to do with religion, and much more to do with human weakness and choices.

Last week I heard an interview between Terry Gross, host of NPR's Fresh Air, and Professor Mamoun Fandy, author of Saudi Arabia and the Politics of Dissent. Fandy is an Egyptian who interviewed Osama Bin Laden's second in command within the last three years. Fandy noted about him and other Al-Qaeda members:

Marty explains that for "Fundamentalists the past was grand, the present in cloudy, but the future is assured. This philosophy of history grants fundamentalists . . . motivation . . .to follow prescriptive paths and actions in the present." This is close as we can come to understand the words in the last will and testament of hijacker, Mohamed Atta. And yet, even fundamentalism cannot fully explain this dance of death. Neither can history, culture, politics, economy, nor military force. We could live a thousand years and never understand how several human beings could hijack a plane and fly it into a densely populated civilian center.

If human choice is a source of such pain, it is also our source of hope. Because there are among us, regular people, who would rather fly a plane into the ground, than kill one more innocent person. If I lived a thousand years, I could never fully understand such bravery and self-sacrifice. That such potential exists, gives me hope and courage.

I spoke to a friend about the contents of this sermon and she suggested I title it "How to Recognize the Fundamentalist in You." I keep coming back to this premise. Ultimately fundamentalism is not about God or religion. They are convenient props. Fundamentalism is about human choice. In order to understand fundamentalism we need to understand truths about ourselves, about the potential for fundamentalism and fanaticism that we all share.

Each of us will find times when we are afraid, when we don't trust, when our world has changed, when we don't feel safe. Will we lash out and shackle God, religion, Westernization, the ACLU, homosexuality, Christianity, or conservatives with our offense or aggression? Or will we struggle to graciously live with duality, civility, democracy, pluralism, and even our own minority status?

I would like to close with words from Shakespeare's King Lear. They are spoken by Edmund, who is both ruthless and cunningly aware of the power of choice: