Articles tagged as "Muslim"

On the New Year’s Day Church Bombing in Egypt

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Terrorism cannot be the outcome of any proper understanding of religion. It is rather a manifestation of the immorality of people with cruel hearts, arrogant souls, and warped logic. It is thus with great sadness and outrage that we witness the emergence of this disease in our nation with the recent bombing outside a church in Alexandria that killed tens of Egyptian citizens. There is no doubt that such barbarism needs to be denounced in the strongest of terms, and opposed at every turn. We demand that the perpetrators be brought to justice and stand trial.

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American Identity and the Challenge of Islam


A review of Akbar Ahmed, “Journey into America: the challenge of Islam” (Brookings Institution Press, 2010).

“The challenge of Islam,” as Akbar Ahmed calls it, is ushering in a new chapter in the history of American identity. But in the ideals of America’s Founding Fathers Ahmed finds hope for a vibrant, inclusive American future—if, that is, Americans remain faithful to these ideals and preserve America’s true identity.

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Challenging Marriage Laws in Contemporary Shi’i Iran

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The contradictions of growing up the unveiled granddaughter of an Iranian ayatollah had not occurred to me until I was confronted in 1988 by Dr. Christian Troll, a scholar of Islam and a Jesuit priest living in India at the time. “How is it possible,” he asked, “that your grandfather did not ask you to veil?” Indeed! “Why hadn’t he?,” I wondered. What was specific to him or to Iran at that time in history that made it seem perfectly normal for him to let his daughters and granddaughters go unveiled?

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Orsi Contra Ecclesiam


In Citizens, Simon Schama’s narration of the French Revolution, he describes the revolutionary government’s suppression of the popular rebellion in the Vendée. Far more than a military maneuver, he recounts, the operation sought “the wholesale destruction of an entire region of France.” In a “sinister anticipation of the technological killings of the twentieth century,” the revolution’s armies exterminated women, children, entire villages, and ultimately some one third of the inhabitants of the region. Among the massacres’ chief targets was the Catholic Church….

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Contending Complexities

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Last spring, when Scott Appleby phoned me about the launch of Contending Modernities, I was immediately intrigued. I have worked for many years in various forums of Muslim-Christian relations so I knew that Scott was proposing a project of significant scope and consequence. I am grateful to the University of Notre Dame for undertaking this initiative and hope that I can offer a few words that may prove helpful as the project progresses.

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Islam and Modernity


As the world becomes increasingly interconnected through technological advances, we are now beginning to appreciate the differing experiences of the world’s many cultures in their encounters with the complex of institutions and ideas that we identify as modernity. In particular, we have the new concept of “alternative modernities,” a term which goes a long way in representing the diversity of the world in encountering new realities.

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“McFootball” in New York?: a Muslim Reaction to the CM Launch

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Before departing for the launch of “Contending Modernities: Catholic, Muslim, Secular,” I got another one of those random emails: “Tony Blair’s Sister-in-Law Converts to Islam,” apparently after having a spiritual experience in Iran. A few years ago, Tony Blair announced his own conversion to Catholicism. This prompted me to reflect that one never seems to hear announcements of anyone’s “conversion” to “secularism.”

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Does Islam Need to Be “Modernized”?


I don’t know how many times I have heard Christians—Catholics included, strangely—say, “What Islam needs is a Reformation.” The normally sensible Cardinal Danneels of Brussels even went so far as to say that what Islam needs is to go through its French Revolution—which makes one want to ask when the Catholic Church was ever in favor of the Reformation or the French Revolution?

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Islamic Feminism in Spain and Beyond


Two days last month I got up at 4 a.m. to attend the Fourth International Feminist Conference in Spain. Why so early? Because I participated via my computer in Washington, six hours behind Madrid time, thanks to live-streaming on Webislam. One can only imagine in how many time zones others were also coming on board. Interacting in cyber and real space has been the hallmark of Islamic feminism since it first burst on the global scene some two decades ago.

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