The European Union (EU) has recently emerged as a significant player to promote freedom of religion and belief (FoRB) in its
external policy and to build a coordinated approach of counter-radicalization (CR) in internal affairs.On both issues, public
authorities at all levels of governance are led to define a ''good religion'' congruent with democratic and social norms to be protected
and a ''bad religion'' that must be kept under control. The EU is no exception even if it has no direct competencies on FoRB as well
as on CR and meets its usual difficulties to deal with value-loaded issues.The purpose of GOODGOD is to explain the reasons,
modalities and effects of this new role of European institutions and arenas; and what is says about the contemporary recombination
between the member states and the EU on one hand; between politics and religion on the other hand. The main hypothesis is that what
happens at the level of the EU reflects andadapts slightly societal and political trends at work at national level: the
'securitization of religion', managed as a risk factor; its 'culturalization', as a mere symbolic resource to assert the legitimacy of public
institutions and collective identity.Overall, it would mean that the EU has a limited transformative influence and is in the
continuity of national secularisms and secularization.