It is three years since Senator Barack Obama pronounced that America “is no longer a Christian nation—at least, not just.” The words sounded harsher than he intended: he meant to make the point in a more positive way, stressing that the United States was as much a Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu or non-believing polity as a Christian one. In Turkey in April the president seemed to turn the formula on its head, declaring that “We do not consider ourselves a Christian nation or a Jewish nation or a Muslim nation” but “a nation of citizens” bound by values.

And in a warmly received speech in Cairo on June 4th, which repeatedly cited the Koran, he called for a “new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world” based on the “truth that America and Islam are not exclusive, and need not be in competition.”

The philosophy may not be perfectly coherent, but the mood music is clear—absolute opposition to sectarianism, to any emphasis on religious difference rather than commonality. And quite a lot of Muslims seem willing to hear it.

Take the reaction to a recent appointment that caused far more interest outside America than inside it. When Dalia Mogahed, an Egyptian-American social scientist, was invited in April to join a White House advisory panel, the press in her native land gushed with excitement.

This was not just because Ms Mogahed, who analyses the Islamic world for Gallup, a polling organisation, is a devout Muslim. Her appointment (to a 25-strong panel on “faith-based and neighbourhood partnership”) was also hailed as an endorsement of her argument that Islamic and Western values are more compatible than civilisational warriors think.

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