Receive the challenge of religious fundamentalism and terrorism as useful feedback from which to learn. It is an opportunity – a challenge to our complacency, materialism, secular fundamentalism, our attitude to sex, family, morality, God, economics and identity. It is guiding us to snap out of cultural relativism and self-hatred. One reason that religious fundamentalists and imperialists are a threat to Western Civilization is because some of what they say is true. We have lost our spiritual core. We don’t prioritise families or children. We don’t respect our elders. We factory farm them in soulless old people’s homes run by strangers. We have sex disconnected from love and reproduction. We abort millions of human lives every year. We use the resources of the planet as if there were no future generations. We have lost our sense of right and wrong, good and bad. We have lost our self-confidence as a winning team able to attract and integrate new members. The meaning of life isn’t just to buy products and watch TV. The purpose of work is not only to increase shareholder value. We gave up physical slavery only to willingly submit to financial slavery. Our politicians keep launching wars which our military knows are foolish and counter-productive. Our science and business so far have failed to effectively measure and value much of what is important in life: life itself, being, spirit, love, relationship, security, family, justice, fairness, trust, respect and so on. So we need to put those things right quickly before others force us to do it their way.

Military and security measures alone can never be adequate response to religious fascism and can be counter-productive. Our opportunity is to rejuvenate the spiritual core of our civilization and to make it so attractive that the vast majority of people want to join us or align with us. Sincerely religious people anywhere in the world should never perceive us as a threat because we should never interfere in their religious faith.

The core wound of Western Civilization is dehumanisation. Our materialistic and relativistic culture has devalued the essence of what makes us human, whether you call it God, spirit, being, soul, energy or love. We need to restore humanity by making these things sacred and central in our way of life, beliefs and institutions.