This chapter focuses on the problem of the assimilability of Islam in France, artificially represented as an immutable, monolithic whole, in the very abstract environment of laïcité (secularism). It argues that the future of laïcité depends on its capacity to develop — beyond the institutional issue of religion that was its historical reference — a robust public sphere in which new forms of individual and collective religious identity and practice can unfold within a democratic context. From this point of view, Islam is not an absurd case requiring a specific solution. It is the foremost test of the ability of our institutions and political culture to face the challenges of religious modernity.
Keywords: Islam, Muslims, France, religion, denominational, secularism, laïcité