Weigel questions whether Europe can give an account of itself while denying the very moral tradition through which its culture arose: "Christians who share this conviction (that it is the will of God that Christians be tolerant of those who have a different view of God's will) – can give an account of their defense of the other's freedom even if the other, skeptical and relativist, finds it hard to give an account of the freedom of the Christian." This is a theme sounded clearly by Marcello Pera and Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (from 2005 to 2013 Pope Benedict XVI), in their book "Without Roots: the West, Relativism, Christianity, Islam", for which Weigel authored the foreword. In 2005, he expanded the article into a book, "The Cube and the Cathedral: Europe, America, and Politics Without God".