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Governance, Citizenship, Rights & Obligations article

Contending Conceptions of Democracy


The recent wave of violent reactions in Africa, Asia and the Middle East to the online video mocking the Prophet Muhammad may be taken as the most recent example of a clash between “contending modernities.”

The US-based moviemaker is sometimes taken to represent the values of “Western democracy” and “free speech,” while the protesters in places such as Libya and Pakistan are taken to represent “extremism” and “illiberalism.” Of course, neither the US-based moviemaker nor the Muslim protesters are necessarily paradigmatic of their wider societies or cultures.  Furthermore, they arguably represent not a clash of “democracy” vs. “extremism” but a clash between rival — and plausible — conceptions of modern democracy.

Contending Liberties

On one side, the defenders of largely unrestricted free speech and freedom of expression champion a democratic model that generally refuses to grant special privilege to religion or religious sensibilities. On the other, the religiously offended prefer a democratic model that includes the right of a community to be free from grave insults to its identity and values. Indeed, such a view is in keeping with a robust norm of popular sovereignty — “Vox populi, vox Dei”!

The moviemaker and the rioter thus embrace stereotypical and exaggerated versions of “secular” and “religious” conceptions of democracy. We know that secular approaches, which emphasize free expression, need not be hostile to religious sensibilities, beliefs or practices; just as we know that religions can and do preserve the dignity of sacred figures and sites without recourse to violence or even to censorship.

Beyond Clashing Civilizations

As some analysts have pointed out, this clash is not simply between Muslims and Christians. The terrain is more complicated.  For example, Coptic Christians in the region compared the release of the movie on Muhammad to that of The “Da Vinci Code,” the 2006 movie that they not only found offensive but which they succeeded in restricting in Egypt and elsewhere in the Middle East. And in the wake of the recent protests a number of Christian leaders — including Maronite Catholic Patriarch Bechara Rai and four Anglican bishops — have expressed support for international bans on religious defamation and blasphemy. At the same time, of course, dozens of Muslim thinkers have condemned the violent riots as obscurantist and inconsistent with Islam.

Both models of democracy presuppose a different conception of the relationship between religion and the State. But, one may ask, is there something each can learn from the other? Is there a middle ground in which both freedoms of expression, and from sacrilege, can be respected and guaranteed?

We invite responses to these and related questions!

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Paula Bernardini
Paola Bernardini is Adjunct Professor of Philosophy and Global Perspectives at the Holy Cross College in South Bend, Indiana. She was previously the Associate Director for Research for Contending Modernities. Paola received a Ph.D. in Philosophy from the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas, Rome, Italy, where she was a Russell Berrie Fellow in Interreligious Studies. Her past publications include Natural or Political Man? The Foundation of Human Rights in Martha C. Nussbaum (2009), and Multiculturalism and Adult Dialogue Education (2003). Paola received an Ed.M. from the Harvard Graduate School of Education, with a concentration in human rights and conflict resolution education.
Authority, Community & Identity article

The Tyranny of Practice


It is characteristic of Western modernity that in discussions of schooling and business and politics there is a common truism: “theory into practice.” At the very least, the underlying assumption of this truism can readily be found there. Nowhere is this more prevalent than in schools of education, teacher education programs, and the institutional teaching and learning efforts of higher education. This saying yields a soft hammer, a gentle reminder that the theory must always be “grounded in practice” in order to be worthwhile — and profitable.

It seems harmless enough.

But if you work in an academic setting (as I do), then you probably know that this is more than a harmless attitude. It has teeth. I will not try and argue that the saying is harmful. I want to take issue with what the slogan ultimately shows: the way “theory into practice” has evolved into a powerful modern ideology, with devastating and widespread consequences in and out of the academy.

Common Sense Makes No Sense

The common sense of “theory into practice” is a powerful and dogmatic position that distorts both theory and practice. On the one hand, theory is elevated above the practical and becomes an inflated, empty routine of intellectual self-aggrandizement. Conversely, practice becomes the endpoint for all thinking, the anchor grounding the human imagination, on the other. This is not only metaphysically amiss; it is also a disastrous mistake.

In short, the ideology of “theory into practice” draws and quarters life into a binary of thinking and doing. There is certainly something to be said for understanding the difference between the vita activa and the vita contemplativa, but even these rich, religious notions have their limits.

Thinking Practically, Practicing Thoughtfully

THINKING, thought, contemplation, creative imagination — all of these words that describe the same reality — are wildly active. That is what having an “active mind” is all about. Thinking is dynamic and deeply practical (if by ‘practical’ we mean the usual sense of the term, related to action).

PRACTICE, praxis, action, and practicality are not thoughtless. Nor are they final. Practice is surely not an end in itself. (Since when did something practical become detached from thinking and anything more than instrumental?) In many ways, practice is a tool for theorizing. Action sometimes stimulates thought just as thought occasionally informs action. Or, to put it normatively: action ought to stimulate thought just as thought ought to inform action. Perhaps more.

At the very least, we should also be asking how practice meets the standards of imagination, vision, dreams, and other beautifully creative ways of thinking. How does practice conform to and ground itself in theory? Are theory and practice real things that we can point to here and over there as we would to bananas and oranges in a fruit bowl? Do they exist in the world as things?

Losing More Than Our Head

The tyranny of practice has infected the groupthink of many places that directly affect our lives in and out of academia. The effects are not just mental or psychological. They are also emotional, cultural, and spiritual.

The ideological commitment to subordinate thinking to practice not only devalues thought; it also affects our valuation of feeling, becoming, and transcendence. In misplacing the head under the authority of the hand, we are also forgetting the heart, the public square, and the soul.

For example, the quiet, ongoing loss of the fine arts is a cultural torture that is not unrelated to the tyranny of practice in our lives. Tell me: how do music, dance, painting, and sculpture submit themselves to practice? When will they buy us groceries, create more miserable jobs, or increase standardized test scores or performance measures? Not anytime soon. At least not in a way that would satisfy the “practitioners.”

But everyone knows — even if they don’t know that they know it — that life without pure art, art for the sake of art, beauty for beauty’s sake, isn’t life at all. Thinking might get us into trouble and dreamers have not all been saints, but that is no reason to put them under the service of that (false) god, Practice. It would be like preventing forest fires by cutting down all the trees.

Oddly enough, the tyranny of practice has inflicted violence upon itself by devaluing practices like work and labor. The only practices to be respected, according to the “theory into practice” paradigm, are the ones that have been infused with high-minded theory. (A sort of theory that is entirely different from the thoughtful and imaginative species we find in the arts and elsewhere.) Without poppycockery and psychobabble, without another groundbreakingly new (and expensive) study, practice has no art of its own. The simple craft of sweeping has no place in this regime; the ordinary thought found in the rigors of laying brick and sanding wood and making a bed have no value in the world of “theory into practice.”

On a Personal Note

The most intimate reality for me, a philosopher of education, is that the tyranny of practice is a major occupational hazard. Philosophical and other humanistic approaches to education are being rapidly displaced.  In the ascendancy are social-scientific approaches more suited to feeding the “theory into practice” machine. In colleges and universities, we see more and more business students while enrollment in the arts and humanities dwindles.

We surely need theory that is practical and practice that is theoretical. The (not so) funny thing is, when you look at them closely, they already are. The hand, heart, head, and soul are a powerful community, with no need for petty tyrannies of practice.

My personal intuition on the matter is that this whole thing is purely semantic. I suspect that theory and practice are just two words that describe differing aspects of the exact same thing: life.

1 Comment on The Tyranny of Practice Array
Sam Rocha
Sam Rocha is Associate Professor of Philosophy of Education University of British Colombia as well as president of the Society for the Philisophical Study of Education. He is also the author of Things and Stuff, an edited collection of blog posts, and an unprofessional musician. For more information, see his website: www.samrocha.com. 
 
Authority, Community & Identity article

An Interfaith Encounter with America (Part 3)


Believers in a religion such as Islam can scarcely hope to speak for all Muslims, let alone for all humanity. They must accept the authority of a public sphere in which people are free to make their case to their fellow women and men on the basis of culturally normative modes of discourse. This sounds exactly like the manner in which prophets used to operate back in the day. Moses defeated the magicians in pharaoh’s court, and Muhammad outdid the Arab poets on their home turf.

America and the Prophetic Voice

It also sounds a lot like America, a place in which the prophets of old would have loved to operate as God’s messengers, freely able to propagate their visions to the rest of the world, enduring any persecution that might come their way. But in assessing the legitimacy of present-day prophet-citizens in America, there is good news and bad news.

Here is the good news: As I see it, America already has ideals — life, the pursuit of happiness, justice for all — that are not in tension with my Islamic faith. The notion of political liberty is more complex, but these ideals may be affirmed, negotiated, and reconciled in light of a particular understanding of the human condition that is rooted in revelation. The opportunity exists for fruitful learning on both sides. Whereas Muslims may certainly learn to appreciate notions of liberty in light of Western experience, they may also teach the West to balance it with appeals to responsibility and restraint, sensibilities that are deeply entrenched in the Islamic tradition.

But there is also bad news: America fights too many wars. We disregard our delicate balance with nature and poison our children with images of sex and violence. The gap between rich and poor continues to grow. And we have sometimes built our greatness on genocide, slavery, and imperialism.

Common Dilemmas

What should a Muslim in America, who finds himself loyal to Islam while appreciative of a tremendous privilege as an American, do in light of this complex set of historical circumstances? My solution is to embrace the privilege and use it to strive for good in the world. It is a dilemma, but not one that is unique to American Muslims. Many Christians, for example, see little or no tension between their Christian identities and American citizenship. They feel comfortable with bringing perspectives from their churches into the public sphere.

Some unabashedly advocate for the shaping of laws based on religious ethics and values, some offer “prophetic voices” of dissent, and some even go to battle on the frontlines in the name of Jesus. Some object to the use of tax dollars for initiatives that contradict religious values. Mike Huckabee, a former Republican candidate for president, famously said: “[Some of my opponents] do not want to change the Constitution, but I believe it’s a lot easier to change the Constitution than it would be to change the word of the living God, and that’s what we need to do is to amend the Constitution so it’s in God’s standards rather than try to change God’s standards.”

Perhaps someday a Muslim presidential candidate will have the courage to say the exact same thing with respect to the Qur’an and Sunna — only to wind up with a lucrative talk show on a major news network when the campaign folds!

What I have said so far makes sense largely for a political understanding of Islam. There are, of course, many more Muslims who believe in Islam as a private religion. For them, the questions being posed are irrelevant, in the same manner as the faith-based concerns of people like Huckabee are irrelevant to many Christians. Muslim citizens of America are free to define their faith how they please, form associations, preach, enter into alliances with other organizations, advocate to end war, reform the entertainment industry, or simply live out their lives without thinking deeply about any of these things in private devotion to a personal conception of the Divine. America, therefore, is the perfect soil for humanity — and Islam — to flourish, perhaps just as it was intended by God.

Oddly, I find myself to be somewhat in alignment with the words of President George W. Bush: “The liberty we prize is not America’s gift to the world; it is God’s gift to humanity.” Unfortunately, I do not agree with the belligerent manner with which President Bush wished to preach his Gospel to the rest of the world. The Arab Spring has shown that oppressed peoples are capable of negotiating their own liberties, inviting or spurning outside assistance on their own terms.  But an aversion to Bush’s policies is far from being un-American. It is something I share with many “antiwar” Americans of many faiths and no faith. One particular voice that appeals to me is that of the Jewish American Rabbi Michael Lerner, who has advocated the total transformation of the tenor of American foreign policy from one of militarism to one of generosity.

This is the greatness of America, where the voice of a Jew can appeal to the Muslim who drafted this essay while he was teaching Islam at a Catholic institution, and who then went on to help start a Muslim liberal arts college in Berkeley!

Reconciliation

The notions that this essay entertains of a deep affinity between what lies at the heart of the religion of Islam and also of Western civilization are not new. Muhammad Abduh, for example, after returning from France to his native Egypt, famously noted, “I went to the West and saw Islam, but no Muslims; I got back to the East and saw Muslims, but not Islam.” The Turkish revivalist Said Nursi, after a study of European philosophy and culture, offered this assessment: “The Ottoman government is pregnant with Europe. It will give birth to a government like Europe. And Europe is pregnant with Islam; and it will give birth to an Islamic state.” The Indian poet-philosopher Muhammad Iqbal argued that the inner core of modern Western civilization is in line with the spirit of the Qur’an. It will take entirely different essays to elaborate on these sentiments, each of which flow from unique experiences and points of departure. But the pattern is consistent.

My interfaith encounter has driven me into tension with the reality of American consumerism and militarism. At the same time, it has enabled me to embrace the ideals of America. Ironically, it is my engagement with Islamic revivalist thought that has provided my most valuable insights into America, understood as both a religious “other” and a project full of promise and possibility.

Some may say that I have converted from Islamic fundamentalism to Americanism. I would say, however, that I have only come to better understand my own faith.

Isn’t this what interfaith encounters are supposed to be about?

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Mahan Mirza
Mahan Mirza was appointed teaching professor and executive director for the Keough School's Rafat and Zoreen Ansari Institute for Global Engagement with Religion on July 1, 2019.

An Islamic studies scholar and expert on religious literacy, Mirza brings extensive pedagogical and administrative experience to his roles at Notre Dame, including serving as dean of faculty at Zaytuna College in Berkeley, California, America’s first accredited Muslim liberal arts college. Prior to his appointment as Executive Director of the Ansari Institute, Mirza served as the lead faculty member for Notre Dame's  Madrasa Discourses project, which equips Islamic religious leaders in India and Pakistan with the tools to confidently engage with pluralism, modern science, and new philosophies. 

Mirza holds a B.S. in mechanical engineering from the University of Texas at Austin, an M.A. from Hartford Seminary, and a Ph.D. in religious studies from Yale University. He has taught courses and lectured on Arabic-Islamic studies, western religions, and the history of science, along with foundational subjects in the liberal arts, including logic, rhetoric, astronomy, ethics, and politics. He has edited two special issues of 
The Muslim World and served as assistant editor for the Princeton Encyclopedia of Islamic Political Thought (2018).

He is a fellow with the Liu Institute for Asia and Asian Studies at the Keough School and continues to serve as an advisor for Madrasa Discourses.
 
Authority, Community & Identity article

An Interfaith Encounter with America (Part 2)


In my spiritual quest that led to political Islam, I had one all-important stroke of fortune. Despite my zeal, I did not happen to get recruited by al-Qaeda!

Instead, I landed in a group called Tanzeem-e-Islami, a Pakistan-based movement that had a few unique elements going for it: (1) it encouraged followers to learn Arabic and engage the text of Qur’an directly for understanding and inspiration; (2) it advocated a nonviolent strategy of change; (3) it called for the “revitalization of faith with an intellectual dimension,” insisting that the ideas of the movement must appeal not merely to the masses but also resonate among the “intellectual elite” of society; and (4) it argued in rational terms that the implementation of the laws of God would lead to a more just world. I internalized these elements of Tanzeemi thought by traveling to learn Arabic, remaining true to a strategy of nonviolence, and pursuing the path of higher education.

Ironically, the fourth point — striving to make the world a better place by establishing justice — became increasingly obscure for me with academic achievement. Higher studies tend to take on a life of their own. The relationship between my life as a professor of Islam in Western academia and my original impulses for engaging higher studies as a religious actor had become tenuous until recently. Yet the desire to make my scholarship directly relevant to belief in God and a life of faith has remained a goal that is close to my heart.

While encouraging adepts to pursue the academic study of religion, the Tanzeem did not realize that the wind blows both ways. If the movement had wished for its ideas to influence the great minds and ideas of our time, it should also have been willing to accept the influence of those minds and ideas to shape and transform its own universe. Among the core lessons that I have learned from my journey is that whereas the Shari‘a may be an infallible abstract category that refers to God’s laws, the actual laws are made concrete in the minds of fallible people. Intelligent and sincere believers can and do disagree on what God wants for God’s creation. Pluralism is a fact not merely among faiths, but also within faiths.

This raises the question: to what authority does one turn in order to mediate differences among people? Clearly, this must be a neutral authority acceptable to all parties, and this authority cannot be God or a particular scripture when the interlocutors include atheists and adherents of diverse scriptural traditions. Perhaps a prophet, when present in flesh and blood, has the right to speak in God’s name. But does such an authority exist in a world without prophets?

Islam and Freedom

It might be that an appeal to reason in the public sphere is humanity’s best option. After all, the ability to choose one particular interpretation of religious sources over others requires a capacity for independent discernment. According to Islam, prophets deliver God’s message to people, but they are not responsible for the condition of our hearts or our choices. This is why the Qur’an emphasizes: “The truth is from your Lord; so let whosoever will believe, and let whosoever will disbelieve” (18:29). What purpose would such a revelation have if it did not offer a real choice? Classical Islamic theology (kalām) did not develop such verses into a universal theory of “freedom,” but rather delved into abstract notions about the nature and consequences of human acts, God’s omnipotence, and human responsibility. Instead, particularly in light of American culture and values, what if we were to see in such verses an acknowledgment of the fundamental condition of freedom in which we were created?

Consider for a moment the story from the second chapter of the Qur’an, in which the angels object to the creation of human beings as God’s vicegerents (“caliphs”) on earth because they will “cause mischief therein and shed blood” (2:30). How could this be explained if the very purpose of creation were not in some sense to explore our freedom in the process of an ever-unfolding, entangled, and contentious history of ideas and institutions?

The celebrated Orientalist Ignaz Goldziher once wrote, “Prophets are not theologians.” In my estimation, what he meant by this is that prophets act on impulses driven by the exigencies of the moment. They can live with apparent contradictions, which systematic theologians then later strive to reconcile. It is followers who try to tie everything together into a coherent system of abstract thought. Believers seek black-and-white answers in philosophic systems in an attempt to capture the conviction of Prophets, but these systems are ultimately extrinsic to the prophetic impulse.

Muslims who believe that “Islam” is the absolute truth must learn that they are not supposed to interpret it with prophetic authority. They must relativize their claims in order to contend with counterclaims made by people with alternate understandings of God’s words and ways. Fortunately, this caution is built into the Islamic religious tradition and may be considered an authentic part of the heritage of Islam. Whereas an intense encounter with modernity may lead some believers towards fundamentalism, it may also inspire others to rediscover a spirit of humility in their faith claims.

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Mahan Mirza
Mahan Mirza was appointed teaching professor and executive director for the Keough School's Rafat and Zoreen Ansari Institute for Global Engagement with Religion on July 1, 2019.

An Islamic studies scholar and expert on religious literacy, Mirza brings extensive pedagogical and administrative experience to his roles at Notre Dame, including serving as dean of faculty at Zaytuna College in Berkeley, California, America’s first accredited Muslim liberal arts college. Prior to his appointment as Executive Director of the Ansari Institute, Mirza served as the lead faculty member for Notre Dame's  Madrasa Discourses project, which equips Islamic religious leaders in India and Pakistan with the tools to confidently engage with pluralism, modern science, and new philosophies. 

Mirza holds a B.S. in mechanical engineering from the University of Texas at Austin, an M.A. from Hartford Seminary, and a Ph.D. in religious studies from Yale University. He has taught courses and lectured on Arabic-Islamic studies, western religions, and the history of science, along with foundational subjects in the liberal arts, including logic, rhetoric, astronomy, ethics, and politics. He has edited two special issues of 
The Muslim World and served as assistant editor for the Princeton Encyclopedia of Islamic Political Thought (2018).

He is a fellow with the Liu Institute for Asia and Asian Studies at the Keough School and continues to serve as an advisor for Madrasa Discourses.
 
Field Notes article

A New Covenant of Virtue


Central to the vision of Contending Modernities is the interplay between academic research and resources that can be used at the grassroots.  In east London, we are seeing the first fruits of this approach with the publication of “A New Covenant of Virtue.”  The booklet contains an essay by British and American writers on the Quranic motivation for Islamic engagement in multi-faith community organising, alongside a series of short case studies by local Muslim leaders on what this work looks like in practice.

The booklet was launched last week in east London at a multi-faith “Iftar,” the meal with which Muslims break their Ramadan fast each night.

The Iftar drew together hundreds of Christians, Muslims, Jews, and secular leaders, to celebrate a piece of community organising which has been going on during the London 2012 Olympics. This campaign has proceeded alongside the campaigns on the Living Wage, housing and jobs which I described in my previous post.

A Multi-Faith Campaign for 100 Days of Peace

Modeled on the truce that was observed during the ancient Olympics, churches, mosques and schools in Citizens UK called for “100 days of peace” around the Olympic and Paralympic Games. These 100 days are being used to advance the City Safe campaign, which was set up after the murder of Jimmy Mizen in a South East London Bakery in 2008.

In this effort, shops, businesses and other buildings are being designated as “safe havens” that are open to young people fleeing violence, and whose owners commit to working with police to report 100% of all crimes they learn about.  By the end of the 100 days, Citizens UK will publish a map that shows where City Safe havens have been set up during the Olympic period.

The campaign is making wide ripples. Press coverage of the Iftar included reports on MSNBC and in the Independent Catholic News.

2 Comments on A New Covenant of Virtue Array
Angus Ritchie
Canon Dr. Angus Ritchie is an Anglican priest. For over twenty years, he has served in parishes in East London involved in community organizing, playing a leading role in campaigns for the Living Wage, affordable housing, and a cap on interest rates. He is the founding director of the Centre for Theology and Community. His latest book, Inclusive Populism: Creating Citizens in the Global Age was published by the University of Notre Dame Press in 2019, and was recently discussed by Pope Francis at a conference of Catholics involved in community organizing.
Authority, Community & Identity article

An Interfaith Encounter with America (Part 1)


“If Islam is so great and things are so wonderful back home, why did you come here?” These words are a vivid memory that I carry with me from my first year in college at an American university in 1992. As an international student from Pakistan who had grown up in a relatively privileged household, my transition to college life in America had promised to be seamless. And in many ways it was, at least outwardly.

Culture Shock

So my culture shock was rather abrupt, coming in the form of a sudden spiritual crisis. In the course of a midnight conversation on religion and politics, a fellow student had jolted me out of my comfort zone with his jarring question: “Why did you come here?” Since that time, I have been on a quest to reconcile the theoretical greatness of Islam with the actual greatness of America. In this sense, my formative interfaith encounter was with America rather than Christianity.

America presents itself to me in religious terms. It has founding (sacred) texts, requires a pledge of total allegiance, strives to shape the world in its own image, and inspires service, valor, and ultimate sacrifice. America is a “way of life.” It has its own set of preachers, warriors, fundamentalists, apologists, dissenters, and enemies. It also has what might be called a sacred historical narrative, complete with “founding fathers,” a “shining city on a hill,” and an “end of history”. My exploration of the relationship of Islam to America has challenged and shaped how I view myself, religion, history, and God.

After going through college sampling Sufi, Salafi, and Tablighi options, I settled into the arms of an Islamist movement with the aim of re-establishing the caliphate, first in one country and then eventually over the entire globe. I learned Arabic, studied the Qur’an in Lahore, attended an interfaith seminary in Hartford, resigned from my position as a career engineer, and ultimately pursued Islamic studies in a secular graduate school in the Ivy League. These various experiences, particularly in light of the anxiety in which we live our lives after September 11, 2001, have allowed me to see numerous parallels between Islam and America. This essay presents a few provocative impressions of such parallels, which are in the end more intuitive than anything else, along with a personal attempt to grapple with my “Muslim-ness” with an ever increasing sense of “American-ness.”

Muslim or American?

Initially, I was inclined to see a contradiction between being a true Muslim and a faithful American. How could one swear allegiance to a country with human-made laws, while Islam calls to submission to the will and law of God? How could one pay taxes that contribute to agendas that one disagrees with, or consider legislation that conflicts with God’s will as legitimate and binding, simply because the whims of the masses, unwittingly cajoled along their path by the power of sinister corporate interests? It is an Islamist movement that prodded me to ask these questions sharply. According to the Qur’an, “It is He [God] who has sent His Messenger with the guidance and the religion of truth, that he may uplift it above every religion, though the unbelievers be averse” (61:9).

The logic of scripture as commanding believers to engage in an all-out struggle in the path of God in pursuit of the supremacy of Islam presented itself as ever so clear. It appeared incontrovertible that the Prophet had in fact left his lifelong career as an example for believers to follow. The Prophet’s method was, in a nutshell, the communication of God’s revelation, the Qur’an, to humanity, along with engagement in an organized effort to make God’s word a lived religious, social, political, and cultural reality. One prophetic report sums it up: “The best of you is the one who learns the Qur’an and teaches it to others.” My task, then, was to learn and teach the Qur’an to the world, spread its ideas, teach its beliefs, and establish its law. This is what it would mean to “make God great.” “God is great” are not mere words to be uttered by the tongue (to say “Allahu Akbar”). The task is to demonstrate that God is great by performing, legislating, and institutionalizing His greatness in the world.

Establishing Justice

In my spiritual quest that led to political Islam, I had one all-important stroke of fortune. Despite my zeal, I did not happen to get recruited by al-Qaeda! Instead, I landed in a group called Tanzeem-e-Islami, a Pakistani-based movement which had a few unique things going for it… and which I will discuss in my next post.

1 Comment on An Interfaith Encounter with America (Part 1) Array
Mahan Mirza
Mahan Mirza was appointed teaching professor and executive director for the Keough School's Rafat and Zoreen Ansari Institute for Global Engagement with Religion on July 1, 2019.

An Islamic studies scholar and expert on religious literacy, Mirza brings extensive pedagogical and administrative experience to his roles at Notre Dame, including serving as dean of faculty at Zaytuna College in Berkeley, California, America’s first accredited Muslim liberal arts college. Prior to his appointment as Executive Director of the Ansari Institute, Mirza served as the lead faculty member for Notre Dame's  Madrasa Discourses project, which equips Islamic religious leaders in India and Pakistan with the tools to confidently engage with pluralism, modern science, and new philosophies. 

Mirza holds a B.S. in mechanical engineering from the University of Texas at Austin, an M.A. from Hartford Seminary, and a Ph.D. in religious studies from Yale University. He has taught courses and lectured on Arabic-Islamic studies, western religions, and the history of science, along with foundational subjects in the liberal arts, including logic, rhetoric, astronomy, ethics, and politics. He has edited two special issues of 
The Muslim World and served as assistant editor for the Princeton Encyclopedia of Islamic Political Thought (2018).

He is a fellow with the Liu Institute for Asia and Asian Studies at the Keough School and continues to serve as an advisor for Madrasa Discourses.
 
Authority, Community & Identity article

Faith Confronts Culture in “American Dervish”


American Dervish, by American actor and author Ayad Akhtar, is set in one of the many places in the world with vibrant Muslim communities.  In this case: Wisconsin.

Akhtar skillfully develops wonderful characters.  As I delved into this novel I kept wanting to find more and more time to read so I could find out what would happen to characters such as the main figure Hayat; Mina, a dear family friend; and Mina’s suitor, the kind Jewish doctor Nathan.  Also, Akhtar powerfully tackles the serious, generally taboo topics of Jew-hatred and domestic abuse.  (This courageous novel goes beyond abstract “anti-Semitism”; American Dervish confronts outright hatred and its real-life consequences.)

Quran “Translation” Conundrum

Along the way, American Dervish has one of the most interesting wrestling matches I’ve seen yet over whether or not to make the Quran accessible in languages other than Arabic for people who do not know Arabic.  (While I as a non-Muslim am an onlooker to these intra-Muslim “wrestling” matches, I myself have sat through more than a few Catholic Masses in Latin trying to figure out why we weren’t using a language the people present would actually understand.)

I’ve read academic paper after academic paper on language and the Quran.  I’ve listened to quarrels about whether renderings of the Quran in other languages should be called “interpretation,” “translation,” or “version.”  Yet none of these analytic discourses have captured potential spiritual implications of this question for individuals the way Akhtar does in American Dervish.  He gives the reader a view into this question through the eyes of the little boy Hayat as he emerges into the first inklings of spiritual awareness and begins to encounter the Quran.

Quran as Toxin vs. Quran as Tonic

Hayat’s father Naveed, an immigrant to the U.S. from Pakistan, where he was raised Muslim, is beyond fed up with those he views as nut-case Muslim fundamentalists.  In Naveed’s mind, “mosque” = “den of hypocrites,” and “Quran” = “fundamentalist fuel.”  Naveed doesn’t want Hayat to go near the mosque and forbids his son from reading the Quran.  At first, none of this means much of anything to Hayat, who is more interested in ice cream and riding his bicycle.

Then Mina, a friend of Hayat’s mother from Pakistan, comes to stay with their family along with her five-year-old son.  Mina is a delight.  She is smart, vivacious, and she has a deep awareness that there is more to life than material possessions and social status.  At the same time, Mina is divorced and now a single mother, a combination considered toxic in her social circles in Pakistan.  Mina and Hayat’s mother hope some time in America will offer Mina some respite, and perhaps even a new lease on life, insulated from the social prejudices of home.

Mina’s spiritual life is rich, and the Quran is foundational for her.  Mina is aware of Naveed’s “allergy” to anything with the label “Islamic.” So she keeps her conversations with Hayat, and eventually her Quran lessons for him, between the two of them.  In these informal tutorials, Hayat awakens to beauty, mystery, and wonder.  Mina emphasizes to Hayat, “[D]on’t just start with memorizing.  Read it first.  See what it means…Words don’t matter if you don’t know what they mean.”  From this, on his own initiative and telling no one, Hayat begins memorizing chapters of the Quran from the copy Mina has given him.  He uses his recesses at school to learn new chapters and practice until he has memorized them.

Hayat keeps hearing about a cousin three years older who has become a “hafiz,” i.e. one who has memorized the Quran.  Every mention of this cousin includes praise and boasting.  Hayat’s sense of relative belittlement and intimidation are only magnified when Hayat discovers that the cousin is coming to the U.S. to attend a family wedding.

Yet when Hayat meets this cousin who is treated like a saint by the family, it turns out the boy is a brat through and through, and quite a crude one at that.  The boy’s father is proud of having invested in a tutor for three years to help his son memorize the Quran, “It cost me a fortune….” says the cousin’s father. “But it’s worth it.  Heaven is worth every penny and a hundred million more.”  As if one could buy heaven, as if this excuses this father for not investing in developing his son’s character.  As for the boy, when he tells Hayat about the experience of memorizing the Quran and his views of the Quran itself, his mouth spews only disdain, disgust, and profanity: “What a f[***]ing nightmare… Memorizing that stuff.  Like drinking castor oil every day for three years.  Jeez-f[***]ing-Louise.”

The Quran for Hayat, on the other hand, is the text from which he has learned about mercy, compassion, kindness, all reinforced by the expression of these values in Mina’s character and her day-to-day life.  These first encounters with the “saintly” Quran-hating hafiz cousin bring fissures of cognitive dissonance into Hayat’s life as he watches cultural prejudice and practice eclipse what he has been learning from the Quran.  These fissures become canyons in the years that follow.

At the family wedding, Hayat and his cousin are called forward to share a Quran recitation with the audience.  The cousin stops scowling just long enough to recite some verses.  Much to Hayat’s surprise the recitation is in Arabic, a language this cousin from Pakistan does not know.  The cousin is commended with looks of pride, the imam tells him “Wonderful….Just wonderful,” and there is robust applause from the audience.  Next up is sweet little Hayat, who flawlessly shares part of the memorization he has worked so hard on.  But it is in English, Hayat’s native and only language.  The Imam, surprised to hear the Quran in English, interrupts Hayat rather than letting him continue.  So ends his recitation.  The best the imam can muster is to call it “original” while the cousin tells Hayat he’s a “moron.”

The Heart of a Marriage

The community’s praise for text without heart and condemnation of heart-based encounter with the text is a mirror of the community’s attitude to the marriage itself at this ceremony.  I can’t tell you whose wedding this is, for that would be a serious spoiler.  But this much becomes clear: a marriage that launches on such a trajectory comes to a landing that is gut-wrenching.

As for Hayat, a would-be American dervish of sorts, his head is sent spinning more into confusion than enlightenment, and Akhtar handles the complexity of this well (or, mostly well).  Hayat is not simple.  Even little Hayat struggles, and for a little while allows himself to be pulled along by cultural and social currents in spite of how counter these currents run to what Mina has taught him; Hayat learns the hard way that the results of this are terrible.   (Less deft are Akhtar’s depictions of Hayat’s emergence into adolescence which are at times just plain jarring, more jarring than seems fitting to this novel.)

Overall, however, Akhtar weaves this tale well.  And the confusion Hayat develops is the kind of confusion that can — eventually — be intensely fruitful.  It is the confusion that asks hard questions when practice conflicts with the guidance of prophecy.  It is the confusion that comes from thinking critically and from seeing the devastating human costs of failing to do so.

Raising Problems Is the Start to Solving Problems

The challenges American Dervish holds up to Muslim communities left me more hopeful than sad.  A hefty portion of the novel is a powerful challenge to those Muslim communities that are silent about internal problems of Jew-hatred and domestic violence.

The unrelenting efforts of Muslims who are asking hard questions and thinking critically about serious issues within their community are deeply moving and impressive.  In works such as The Prohibition of Domestic Violence and Islam and The Jew is Not My Enemy, Muslims themselves are the ones questioning some of these customary practices and examining what the Quran and the Hadith actually have to say on these topics.  Significantly, this challenge is coming from inside Islam, from courageous individuals such as these authors and from the author of American Dervish, who are using their talents to raise protest.

Protest Akhtar does, delivering in American Dervish a one-two punch.  I mean this almost literally.  As the plot around Mina and Nathan unfolds, I was so saddened by what happens to them that it felt like a fist to the gut.

And this is the brilliance of American Dervish.  Akhtar expresses the human consequences of Jew-hatred and domestic violence not in statistics but much more powerfully through the medium of a novel, in the lives of individual characters.  In his creations of Mina and Nathan, and Hayat too, Akhtar walks the reader into a dreamland of a budding, genuinely loving relationship, and then through a wasteland of human devastation and destruction. And his depictions of both genuine love and terrible destructiveness are beautifully crafted. Akhtar is yet another Muslim who is silent no more.

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Jennifer Bryson
Jennifer S. Bryson is a Visiting Fellow at the Hudson Institute in Washington, DC. from 2009-2014 she served as Director of the Islam and Civil Society Project at The Witherspoon Institute in Princeton, New Jersey. She studied Political Science as an undergraduate at Stanford, medieval European intellectual history for an M.A. in History at Yale, and Greco-Arabic and Islamic studies for a Ph.D. in Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, also at Yale.
Field Notes article

Faith-Inspired Community Organising and the London Olympics


It is just days before the Opening Ceremony for the 2012 Olympics.  A significant — though usually undiscussed — factor in the success of London’s Olympic bid was the diversity of cultures and faiths in the city, and particularly in east London, where the Olympic Park is located.

Community Organising and the Olympics

In December, I blogged on the work of the Contending Modernities project in east London and its research on Christian, Muslim and secular involvement in community organising. A noteworthy recent development is that Britain’s community organizing alliance — Citizens UK — has played a significant role in shaping aspects of the 2012 London Olympics.

This 2005 article gives a flavour of the way churches and mosques that are part of Citizens UK have been working together over a number of years.  This has borne fruit in a number of very tangible ways.  First of all, those working on the construction of the Olympic Park, and those working in it during the Games being paid a living wage.  In recent months, Citizens UK’s churches and mosques have hosted “Jobs Fayres” that have helped over 1200 unemployed locals find work at the Olympics.  Research by the Institute for Public Policy Research has contrasted the effectiveness of community organizing in identifying “job ready” local people with that of private contractors paid significant amounts to do much the same thing.

Earlier this month, community organizing won a third significant victory, as the Mayor of London signed Mayoral Decision 1028. This creates east London’s first Community Land Trust (CLT).  It is the fruit of almost a decade of campaigning by churches and mosques in London Citizens.  They have campaigned for CLTs in successive Mayoral elections – winning commitments from all the main Mayoral candidates at 2500-strong Citizens Assemblies (the most recent of which is described here by Ruhana Ali).   Along with celebrating this success, churches and mosques in east London are now turning their attention to the need for affordable, community-owned housing on the Olympic Park after the Games.

Forthcoming research

This summer will see a number of publications connected with the Contending Modernities project:

  • A Covenant of Virtue will tell the story of Islamic involvement in community organising, both in terms of its theological motivation, and through case studies.  This short booklet is aimed at increasing Muslim engagement in public life, and deepening the dialogue between Muslims and people of other faiths and worldviews.  As the Olympics fall within Ramadan, we hope to launch the booklet at a multifaith Citizens Iftar during the Games.
  • In the next few months, we will also be publishing two pieces of qualitative research on Christian and Muslim engagement in community organising — exploring the different motivations for this work, and its wider impact on the way diverse communities negotiate and promote a common good
  • We will also be publishing some work on the role of faith communities in the response to last summer’s riots — and their ongoing importance in “reweaving the fabric” of civil society.

I will be blogging again soon about two longer-term pieces of research, which Contending Modernities is conducting in partnership with Theos, a London think tank.  One of these will be largely empirical, involving fieldwork in east London and three other English cities, and the other will be a more conceptual piece, growing out of my forthcoming book on morality and religion.

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Angus Ritchie
Canon Dr. Angus Ritchie is an Anglican priest. For over twenty years, he has served in parishes in East London involved in community organizing, playing a leading role in campaigns for the Living Wage, affordable housing, and a cap on interest rates. He is the founding director of the Centre for Theology and Community. His latest book, Inclusive Populism: Creating Citizens in the Global Age was published by the University of Notre Dame Press in 2019, and was recently discussed by Pope Francis at a conference of Catholics involved in community organizing.
Authority, Community & Identity article

Which Language, Whose Vernacular?: Vatican II and Liturgical Politics in Bangalore (Part 3)


What Language Represents

While the first two demands of the pro-Kannada group in April 1990 were specifically about the issue of language in the liturgy, their next two demands reflected broader concerns: that (more) Kannada Christians be ordained priests, and that churches in villages be renovated. Clearly for the nationalists, the denigration of the status of their language is one of the key reasons for the perpetuation of inequalities vis-à-vis important roles — not only in the Church but also in a rapidly modernizing society. Even while the new archbishops have been chosen from within the state of Karnataka, the groups remain dissatisfied because most bishops chosen are not of Kannada origin (even though they may be fluent in the language).

The conflict therefore cannot be seen as purely a matter of language. To a great extent, it has to do with economics. With the shift of the liturgical language from Latin to the vernacular of the majority of every parish, Tamil-speaking priests began to enjoy prime (urban) postings, whereas Kannada-speaking priests were relegated to rural areas. So it was not simply a slight to nationalist pride in their language, but felt to them like salt in their wounds that they were also denied the privileges of city life and assigned to “backward” areas where roads and electricity were often lacking. Some priests I interviewed, who identified with neither language group though they spoke both languages, mentioned how their confreres who were assigned to these areas complained about lacking the basic comforts that they had even in seminary, and a sense of insult that they were denied this precisely because they were sons of the soil.

To attempt a resolution of the issue, one archbishop mandated a rotation of assignments so that nobody would be indefinitely relegated to a rural posting. But this apparently only brought up further complaints from priests, who were unable to adjust to either environment. The rapid modernization of the city meant having to deal with the growing prominence of English as a necessity for survival in the global economy.

There are further complications to the story. For instance, some told me that many of the so-called Kannada priests did not actually speak Kannada as their mother-tongue, but rather, Telugu, which is the official language of another neighboring state, Andhra Pradesh. This makes their insistence on the primacy of Kannada all the more peculiar, because their criterion for worth is neither mere fluency in the language, nor simply one’s having been born and raised in the state of Karnataka, but having Kannada as a mother-tongue. Their grievance is not simply against Tamils, but also against Konkani speakers (from regions like Mangalore, also in Karnataka), who enjoy positions of prominence in the Archdiocese — for instance, the past three archbishops are of Konkani origin.

Here a further issue emerges. In the principal Kannada Catholic Association’s recent complaints against the present Archbishop, Bernard Moras, it is noticeable that in berating him for not appointing more Kannada bishops (i.e., those whose mother-tongue is Kannada), they also accuse him of favoring his “brahminical community.” While many priests and religious I spoke to denied that the caste system had anything to do with the problems in this Archdiocese — they said it was certainly a more prominent issue in other places — the influence of caste may simply be less visible here. If, as some claim, the majority of Mangalorean Catholics have Brahmin roots, then their prominence in the church leadership might inadvertently reproduce caste inequalities. However, it is not clear that Kannada priests represent a caste minority.

Conclusion

It is difficult to offer more than a brief outline of the history of this complex problem. Most people I have interviewed about the consequences of Vatican II in Bangalore, priests and laypeople alike, considered this a lamentable episode in their history, and one that drained the Church of a lot of its energy and resources that should have been better spent addressing more serious social problems.

(Some were unwilling to speak about this openly, and were especially hesitant to go on the record. This was understandable in light of stories of nationalist groups — with the consent of priests as well — carrying out attacks on individuals and families who challenged them. Even Simo’s historical volumes, which I mentioned earlier, were forcibly confiscated from bookstores and publicly burned, because of his criticism of their behavior that he had voiced at the end of the second volume. It involved considerable effort to track them down in Bangalore, though thankfully — albeit surprisingly — there seem to be copies available in some American university libraries).

Disputes about liturgical language — and particularly discontent over the three-language formula — continue in the Archdiocese of Bangalore till today, though its principal protagonists are now older and the violence has all but disappeared. Certainly this is only one aspect of the tale of the implementation of Vatican II in this part of the world. But it is an important tale of unintended consequences, one that challenges a simple progressive vision of modernization.

Certain readings of the Council share the conceit of modernization theory of the sort developed by Talcott Parsons and others in the 1950s. As Vilho Harle notes, the pervasive assumption among these social theorists was that modernization and urbanization would produce emotionally-restrained and self-interested individuals who would simply be unaffected by racial or ethnic concerns. The various forms of ethnic and national revivals that emerged in the second half of the 20th century have proved to be one of the more formidable challenges to modernization theory. And the checkered history of Vatican II in Bangalore serves as another case illustrating the contradictions and contentions in the project of modernity.

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Brandon Vaidyanathan
Brandon Vaidyanathan Chair of the Department of Sociology at the Catholic University of America. He received his Ph.D. in sociology from the University of Notre Dame in 2014. He has researched and worked on the cultural dimensions of institutions in South Asia with his work being published in journals such as Business and Society and the Journal of American Academy and Religion.
Authority, Community & Identity article

Which Language, Whose Vernacular?: Vatican II and Liturgical Politics in Bangalore (Part 2)


Blame It on the Bishops?

In 1971, Archbishop Lourdusamy was appointed the Joint Secretary of the Sacred Congregation for the Evangelisation of Peoples, and was whisked off to Rome. His successor, installed about a year later, was Packiam Arockiaswamy.

The first strike against him was that he was Tamil. He was literally brought in from Tamil Nadu, where he had served as Bishop of Ooty. The short biography introducing him to the Archdiocese, however, mentions him as hailing “from an ancient Kannadiga family which migrated from Mysore to the neighboring Kanarese [i.e., Kannada-speaking] area of present Tamil Nadu.” Also, in his letter accepting this new position, he noted, “Though I am coming from outside the Archdiocese, I am not a complete stranger to you,” since he underwent his clerical training in Bangalore. Curiously, hardly anyone remembers or even seems to be aware of this background; it seems that he left the impression only of having been a Tamilian.

The second problem was his wavering and indecisive behavior on the language issue. One retired priest I spoke to called him “a man with no vision”; another said he had “no spine.” Arockiaswamy was unable to command the authority of his predecessor. In the judgment of Fr. Anthony Simo, a historian who compiled a two-volume history of the Archdiocese — and this is one rare occasion in which he introduces his own voice, since the volumes contain mostly primary materials such as circulars — Arockiaswamy “proved to be the man that should have never been in Bangalore as Archbishop.”

Such criticisms notwithstanding, many admit that he was a pious man who was easily able to empathize with people. Perhaps this quality prevented him from making a firm decision on the language issue. As Simo notes, “the pressure on him [made] him tilt this way and that just to accommodate [these] demands…. And once this hesitation was realised as a part of the man, the pressure became the stronger.” Under pressure from Kannada priests, Arockiaswamy decreed that Kannada would be “progressively given more prominence.” But Tamil diocesan priests were unhappy with this and pushed back, effectively creating a stalemate.

The early 1980s saw the emergence of Kannada Catholic associations for priests and laity. These associations began to voice complaints about the neglect of the Kannada-speaking community, including a lack of Kannada-speaking catechists and priests as well as a lack of representation among bishops in the Archdiocese. As historian Janaki Nair notes, less than half of parishes at the time had Kannada masses available, while Tamil and English services were available daily in most parishes. Some even claimed that Kannada-speaking seminarians and aspiring religious were discriminated against in the selection process.

Feeling that they lacked sufficient voice, the group, headed mainly by a group of twelve priests, is said to have joined hands with the broader “Hindu fundamentalist” wing of the Kannada movement that was gaining ground in the state. The concerns of these Catholic Kannada priests were then amplified in local newspapers by Hindu Kannada activist writers, who criticized the Church for its imposition of Tamil. Meanwhile, a vocal Tamil faction of priests and laity emerged, which expressed outrage at these demands and insisted instead on more Tamil Masses for parishes with a Tamil-speaking majority.

Mounting tensions eventually gave way to violence. In 1981, members of the Kannada nationalist coalition — including priests, apparently — disrupted the Chrism Mass at the St. Francis Xavier Cathedral in Bangalore, which was a Tamil-majority parish and the seat of the Archbishop, and even attacked Archbishop Arockiaswamy. They also attacked another church with a Tamil-majority congregation, demanding the liturgy be celebrated in Kannada.

The shaken archbishop appealed to Rome for help, and in the interim, issued a circular declaring that “Kannada being the regional language of the State, there shall be a Mass said in Kannada in every church.” Further, for occasions that might require Mass to be celebrated in more than one language, he proposed a three-language formula of Kannada, Tamil, and English, with Kannada given prominence in the first part of the Mass as well as the homily.  This hasty response would prove to be problematic, as would the response from Rome and the attempts to resolve the conflict by Arockiaswamy’s successor.

Failed Solutions

Rome’s response was to tackle the issue by way of an Episcopal Commission consisting of three bishops from north India. Their concluding report, published in December 1982, recognized that Kannada Catholics have felt themselves a suppressed minority in their own state. But it also emphasized that the criterion that should determine language-use was “the fuller and more active participation by all the people,” and this would require “a sense of realism and fair-play” “in such a cosmopolitan city like Bangalore.” This meant that “the Parish Priest in consultation with the Parish Council and Parishioners would be the best body to decide the language to be used” in the liturgy in the parish. However, in most churches, parish councils were not yet in place. So, the report concluded, somebody besides the Archbishop needed to make decisions about language-use in different liturgical celebrations. For this, his Vicar General, Msgr. Colaco, was appointed.

This seems to have failed to satisfy the nationalists too, since a few months later, in March 1983, Arockiaswamy seems to change his mind again, declaring in another circular, “The policy of the Archdiocese of Bangalore is to make Kannada the principal language of its liturgical worship within five years or even earlier,” even though it may not be the mother tongue of the majority. But several Tamil Catholics, dismayed by this, took the issue to court. A little over a year later, the Archbishop announced that “[i]n view of the situation prevailing in the Archdiocese and for the good of the Church,” he was going on indefinite leave. Msgr. Colaco became interim administrator, but he took seriously ill about a year later. In 1986, Alphonsus Mathias was appointed archbishop.

Archbishop Mathias, in his attempt to resolve the language problem, issued a circular declaring that in light of the history of the controversy and the failure of previous attempts, canon law gave him the prerogative to lay down “liturgical regulations which are binding to all.” Specifically, he noted that because of the diversity in the archdiocese, “uniformity in the matter of liturgical worship cannot be enforced in respect of language… without detriment to the peace, unity, and spiritual growth of the people of God.” It was in this light, he argued, that his predecessor’s 1983 circular “ha[d] to be read and interpreted.” Given the seeming promise in that circular that the archdiocese’s official liturgical language would be made Kannada, it is not surprising that the nationalists would be outraged.

Archbishop Mathias furthermore reaffirmed the “three-language formula” that Archbishop Arockiaswamy and the Liturgical Committee had proposed for all Masses celebrated by the Archbishop at the diocesan level. The exception, however, would be midnight Masses at Christmas and Easter, which would be entirely in Kannada; earlier Masses could be in other languages. Soon after this circular was issued, around 1,500 religious priests and nuns assembled in the compound of the archbishop’s house in demonstration of their support. A headline in The New Leader announced in July 1989 that the “Row over Liturgical Language comes to an end in Bangalore church.”

This announcement of a resolution turned out to be premature. The nationalists could not stand such wavering and compromise, which is what seems to have motivated the attack on the Archbishop’s house in April 1990, mentioned at the beginning of Part 1. The first two demands in their printed manifesto, copies of which were strewn about the house during their visit, were for the implementation of Arockiaswamy’s March 1983 circular, and for all Good Friday and Easter Masses to be only in Kannada.

The next two points in their manifesto, however, reveal that the conflict was about more than language.

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Brandon Vaidyanathan
Brandon Vaidyanathan Chair of the Department of Sociology at the Catholic University of America. He received his Ph.D. in sociology from the University of Notre Dame in 2014. He has researched and worked on the cultural dimensions of institutions in South Asia with his work being published in journals such as Business and Society and the Journal of American Academy and Religion.