The Challenges of Contemporary Religious Discourse: A Study of the Phenomena of Atheism and Excommunication (Apprehension Plans and Treatment Methods

Abstract

This paper investigates “the dilemmas of contemporary religious discourse”, their motivations, causes, and consequences through the key contemporary challenges represented in “the phenomena of atheism and excommunication (takfīr)”.

 The inductive, descriptive and critical analytical approaches will be implemented in order to identify the most important setbacks of religious discourse in dealing with these phenomena. This paper identifies the status of Islamic religious discourse and the challenges that constitute a dilemma and a methodological impasse for its renewal, mainly the phenomena of atheism and excommunication. That is imputable to their dual dialectical relationship that constitutes a great weight on Islamic thought, impacting its understanding, acceptance and development.

Keeping up with these challenges and confronting them depends on the process of renewing religious discourse and the extent of its adaptation and suitability to reality, its response to the challenges of its time, the openness of its horizons, and the development of its mechanisms and methods for expressing its topics and finding solutions for them. This paper is a serious attempt to dismantle two phenomena that pose a major challenge to contemporary religious discourse, while seeking to propose possible solutions through a clear plan that can be followed in addressing them.