The news that Charles Taylor has won the Templeton Prize has helped highlight the inadequacy of a secular world-view and reminds us that religion can be the solution as well as the problem.

Taylor’s belief that a reliance on a secular analysis of human behaviour has led Western nations to faulty conclusions, and that people have a hunger for meaning in life, cautions us against neglecting religion. The 'war on terror' is unlikely to succeed if it fails to take religion seriously in both its life-affirming and life-denying forms.

There is a strong case for a better understanding of religion in international politics beyond whether Ruth Kelly belongs to Opus Dei or whether George Bush and Tony Blair pray together.