Hidden in the Burgundy hills on the site of an old summer camp, the main institute to train Muslim prayer leaders in France hardly looks like an idea whose time has come.
The tree-shaded campus centre resembles a country inn and its mosque a converted garage. There are seven full-time faculty members for 160 students.
The full course of study takes eight years - two for Arabic, four for theology and two to memorise the Quran - and the prospects for a paid job afterwards are dismal.
Even so, the half-dozen imams who graduate each year feel they are the wave of the future. The French government, keen to counter radical Islam preached by foreign imams, has begun pressing for prayer leaders born and trained in France.
"The training of imams must match the requirements of the republic," Interior Minister Dominique de Villepin declared last month in urging the five-million-strong Muslim minority - Europe's largest - to develop a moderate "French Islam."
Among the imams in France's 1,500 mosques, 90 percent are foreigners and half speak little or no French. Most come from Arab states and preach views ranging from traditionalist to radical, with scant relevance to life in Western societies.
Worried by a small but extreme faction in France's second religion, the government is considering ways to boost the number of home-grown imams and educate prayer leaders working here to ensure they preach a moderate Islam.
Although modest in size and scope, the European Institute of Human Sciences (IESH) in this village in eastern France is the largest of three centres training imams in this country.
The second is a small IESH annex in a Paris suburb and the third an even smaller programme at the Grand Mosque of Paris, which traditionally imports imams from its sponsor Algeria to preach at about 100 mosques affiliated with it.
While he already has plans to expand, IESH director Zuhair Mahmood cautions against expecting any quick fixes. "I don't see any immediate solution," the 52-year-old from Iraq, who has been living in France for the past 30 years, told Reuters.
"The Muslim community is getting organised, but it needs time and money," he said, noting that most of the institute's initial funding came from Gulf states but tuition and contributions from French Muslims now cover three-quarters of the budget.
"Maybe in 10 years, Muslims will be more able to finance centres like this one," said Mahmood, whose institute is backed by the large Union of French Islamic Organisations (UOIF).
The IESH opened its doors in 1992, when the Muslim minority was changing from a marginalised community of predominantly North African immigrant workers to a minority of fully-fledged French citizens with names such as Abdullah or Fatima.
Mosques and prayer halls appeared quickly and imams had to be brought in from Arab states or Turkey to lead prayers and preach in Arabic. Older Muslims felt at home but younger ones born and bred in France were increasingly cut off.
"A natural process of integration was setting in and we saw that these Muslims would need imams," said Mahmood. These new imams should be able to preach in French and know France well so they can help young Muslims integrate here, he said.
While this seems to match the government's concerns, Mahmood was careful to establish a clear distance from politicians he thought wanted to mould Islam for their own purposes.
"Certain politicians still have a colonialist vision, one of superiority over Islam," he said. "They think they can choose which kind of Islam suits them...one that is emptied of its content and renounces its values."
The most visible of those values is the headscarf, which the IESH defends as a religious duty for all Muslim women but France has banned from its state schools. "Some want us to say this is not part of our religion, but we refuse this," Mahmood said.
In Paris, the French chapter of the United States-based International Institute of Islamic Thought (IIIT) is studying the feasibility of launching a theology faculty combining Koran study with courses in French sociology and history.
"Many practising imams have no possibility of continuing training, either in the Islamic tradition or in the reality of Islam in France," its director Mohamed Mestiri told Reuters.
"The primary role of the new institute would be continuing education and the secondary one to train imams," he said.
By splitting the Koran study from the sociology and history courses, the secular state could subsidise the social science department without violating the separation of church and state. It already does this for Catholic universities, Mestiri noted.
This project, which seems to enjoy official favour, is still in its early stages. Any final plan would have to be approved by the French Council of the Muslim Faith (CFCM), where the UOIF and the Grand Mosque of Paris compete for influence.
All this seems far away to IESH students. Many come to this campus just to learn Arabic or to study their faith.
Youcef Yalaoui preaches occasionally back home in Belfort in eastern France but doubts he could make a living that way.
"Many imams live off welfare," Yalaoui, 26, explained. "The imam in Belfort gets a monthly salary of only about 1,300 euros ($1,570). I have a university degree in biology, so I could teach that and work as an imam on the side."
Ridvan Tekir, one of a handful of foreign students, said job prospects were only slightly better in Germany, where he was born to Turkish parents 20 years ago.
"I'd like to teach Islam in a German school," said Tekir, who'd have to move from his native Regensburg in Bavaria to Berlin to do that because the capital is the only place in Germany to include Islam in its public school curriculum.
"The second option is to become an imam, but an imam doesn't earn much money in Germany," he said.
The job outlook is even tighter for the women who make up 40 percent of IESH students. Since there are no female imams in Islam, many hope to teach religion or Arabic in Muslim associations or schools expected to open in coming years.
Myriam Ramdane, a 21-year-old from Tours, wants to teach but has no illusions about her chances in a French school.
"If I studied at university to become a history teacher, do you think they'd take me with my headscarf?" she asked.
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