The 46th Annual ISNA Convention is set to begin in the US capital this weekend.

The theme of this year's gathering is 'Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.'

IQRA will be blogging from this year's convention - check for regular updates at the Editor' Blog http://iqra.typepad.com/tmp/

I am pleased to announce the launch of the redesigned Web site, IQRA (http://www.iqra.ca)

IQRA is an online magazine based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It aims to be a voice for progressive change by providing relevant news, thoughtful commentaries, lifestyle features and literary reviews.

The site has a new look and feel and is the first major redesign since it was launched in 2003.

Technology Specialist, Umar Nasir, led the redesign of the site and I would like to thank him for his excellent work.

NOTE: If you were a subscriber to the IQRA headline feed, please go to the new site and enter you email address to continue receiving updates. 

Muneeb Nasir

May 30, 2009

(Toronto, ON) - Changing our attitude is the key to providing greater accessibility to the disabled, Ontario's Lieutenant Governor David Onley told a gathering hosted by the Canadian Association of Muslims with Disabilities (CAMD) on Sunday, May 24.

"It means that we must not form value judgments based on what a person looks like," he said. "I'm sure it has happened to many of you and it has happened to me. It's not pleasant and in many cases its hurtful."

Onley who is the first Lieutenant Governor in Ontario with a disability, has overcome challenges associated with polio and post-polio syndrome, including paralysis.

Rabia Khedr, CAMD’s Executive Director, said the Symposium was organized to, "bring families, community leaders and community members together to talk about planning for the future of people with disabilities and their families as they're aging."

The Planning for the Future: Disability Rights & Responsibilities Symposium was held at the ISNA Islamic Centre in Mississauga. 

The day-long planning symposium included presentations by Abdalla Idris Ali and Shahina Siddiqui, a video presentation, and workshops.

The event was an opportunity for families, service providers and community leaders to network and discuss issues around disabilities and it concluded with the launch of the CAMD Family Support Network.

The Symposium was funded by the Olive Tree Foundation as “we feel that CAMD is providing an important service to the Muslim community,” said Muneeb Nasir, the Foundation’s President.

The Lieutenant Governor told the audience of how our attitude to disabilities can lead to exclusion.

He said that an employer who rejected an applicant because he or she had one leg, may have rejected Terry Fox; if the employer rejected someone in a wheelchair, they would have rejected Rick Hansen and if the employer rejected someone who needs a computer to speak for him or her, the employer would have rejected Stephen Hawking.

By Muneeb Nasir

The Canadian Muslim community continues to agonize over their religious leaders.

In a recent study done by Karim H. Karim for the Institute for Research on Public Policy, he found that Muslims in Canada and other Western countries “seek religious leadership that can guide them as they navigate spiritual and worldly matters in a knowledgeable and insightful manner. They expect their imam to have not only an intellectually sophisticated understanding of Islamic sources but also a keen appreciation of the Western contexts in which they are living.”

Very recently, the congregation of the main mosque in Ottawa, the Ottawa Muslim Association, has been caught up in a debate around such issues as a result of the choice of a new Imam.
 
The Imam, who was brought in from Al Azhar University in Egypt, is being criticized by segments of the community for his communication skills, his lack of experience and familiarity with Canadian social conditions.
 
The debate has become very public with the articles being written in the local press and even eliciting an editorial in the Ottawa Citizen.

The Ottawa Citizen editorial identifies the crux of the community’s wrangling as due to the lack of religious leaders in Muslim institutions who possess both Islamic knowledge and knowledge of the Canadian context.

“While the discussion is ongoing, it has already accomplished some larger good in revealing the absence of western-trained imams. There is, it seems, too few imams who can bridge the gap between scholarly Islam and western society, at least to the satisfaction of ordinary Muslims living in countries like Canada. Non-Muslims, too, ought to be concerned about the inability of Islamic leaders to connect with -- or understand -- westerners.”

The expectations being placed on Imams are tremendous and put an unreasonable burden on them as they were not trained to handle a complex society and a diverse community.

Karim Karim’s study found that ‘the expectations that adherents have of their leaders have been transformed by not only the circumstances produced by modernity and migration, but also educational and technological advances and globalization.’

Some of the study’s participants even went as far as criticizing their ‘imams’ lack of intellectual capacity to engage with contemporary issues’ and many were ‘frustrated at the lack of “an intellectual Islam” and the overbearing presence of an uninformed emotionalism spouted from the mimbar (pulpit).‘

These complaints have led to proposals and initiatives for training ‘home grown’ Imams, through colleges and universities, or by establishing Muslim seminaries.
 
While this type of education and training within Canada is needed, I would propose that, given the urgency of the needs and the complexity of life today, a system of religious leadership be developed for including a wider diversity of people to meet the needs of the mosque, whether in delivering the Friday sermons or in providing religious council to members of the community.

A mosque’s religious leadership should be widened to include ‘lay’ Imams (khateebs) who would complement the traditionally trained Imams in delivering sermons, thereby addressing the current weakness of Imams of being able to bridge the gap between Islamic knowledge and Canadian society.
 
These volunteer khateebs would be professionals and community activists who should have some fundamental knowledge of the religion. 

They would possess some of the 'arts of the Imam' such as leading prayers and fulfilling the religious requirements of the sermon, but would also have an understanding of the universal objectives of Islam and its moral principles and ethical values. 

These khateebs would be expected to have an appreciation of the Canadian context, be intellectually and culturally competent, practically engaged, and skilled in preparing and delivering sermons on contemporary issues and provide moral and ethical perspectives in fluent and topical English.

To a very limited extent, this arrangement exists in some Centres (by default) where there is a system of rotating khateebs, a number of whom possess the abilities and skills outlined above and which they have acquired through their professions and public service activism.

These steps are not meant to undermine the Imam’s knowledge of textual sources or his role in providing guidance with regards to the immutable aspects of Islam (such as the pillars of faith and acts of worship), but to recognize the needs of the community in a world of growing complexity and to include expertise in social and contemporary issues to meet them.  

In order to improve the quality of sermons in a mosque, the input of women and men who are experts in their professions should also be sought in elaborating the topics and even in assisting the Imams and khateebs in researching an issue.

In addition, the expertise within a mosque needs to be tapped into and put to use in providing religious guidance to members.

Imams are used to a ‘fatwa driven’ approach in addressing all issues in a community.

Some participants in Karim Karim’s study were disturbed by this approach where ‘simple, even simplistic, answers are presented to resolve complex questions. Issues are often boiled down to the permitted (halal) and the prohibited (haram) in a binary fashion.’

Many of the issues being presented to Imams require the input and expertise of professionals in other fields, such as social workers, therapists, lawyers, educators etc.

These proposals would require some boldness on the part of the mosque leadership and membership as it requires a cooperative approach to the religious guidance and stewardship of a congregation.

However, failure to act decisively on the Imam issue is leading to the further erosion of the authority of religious leaders and the relevance of Islamic knowledge to deal with contemporary issues that Muslims are facing. 

References
Karim, Karim H. 2009. “Changing Perceptions of Islamic Authority among Muslims in Canada, the United States and the United Kingdom.” IRPP Choices 15 (2).

The Ottawa Citizen. April 30, 2009. Editorial: “In search of an imam.” Retrieved May 12, 2009.
http://www.ottawacitizen.com/Life/search+imam/1547486/story.html

Acknowledgement
I would like to express my gratitude to the Muslim Presence Reading Circle for their input and assistance in elaborating the ideas in this article.

By Maryam Yasmin Hussain

I recently happened to attend a wedding in a small village outside the capital of Pakistan, Islamabad. Almost everyone present at the wedding was from England, and came here merely for the wedding so all the relatives would be present at this great event. The setup was fabulous, the surrounding fields amazing and the garden was huge with lots of greenery everywhere. It felt as if everything was taken out of an ‘over the top’ Bollywood movie, the only difference was that this was real and not a fantasy. (READ MORE)

On Saturday, April 25, the world lost a pioneer in American Muslim movement, a medical ethicist, a poet and a powerful voice for reform. Throughout his life, Dr. Hassan Hathout (1924-2009) was always known for carrying a message of love.

“The passing of Dr. Hassan Hathout is a profound loss to our community,” said MPAC Executive Director Salam Al-Marayati. “He promoted love as a key element of faith—loving everyone, friend and foe, while working for justice. We are committed to expressing our gratitude for his lifetime of work in the cause of Islam by continuing to work for the Islamic values of mercy, justice, dignity and equality for all.”

Dr. Hathout was a multi-cultural physician, ethicist, and poet. He grew up in surroundings where love of God and country, and call of duty, were pivotal. With much talent, learning, discipline, and meditation, he was able to combine a highly successful career in academic medicine, ethics, and theology. (READ MORE)

  By Muneeb Nasir

Tariq Ramadan in his book, Radical Reform: Islamic Ethic and Liberation, addresses Muslim societies and communities everywhere with a bold call for radical reform.

The publisher, Oxford University Press, writes in its description of the book that ‘it is bound to provoke controversy and spark debate among Muslims and non-Muslims alike’.

Ramadan argues that radical reform demands not only the equal contributions of scholars of both the text and the context, but the critical engagement and creative imagination of the Muslim masses.

In response to this call for critical engagement, a group of interested and courageous readers in Toronto have been meeting to discuss and reflect on the author’s bold proposals for reforming Muslim minds - see Reading Circle schedule here

Reflections on 4th  week reading,  Elaborating An Applied Islamic Ethics: Pages  113 - 155

The playing field will need to be leveled for transformational reform to take place.

The two revelations (the text and the Universe) and the two sets of scholars (of the text and context) are to be on equal footing and the textual scholars are to have a double specialization.

This will change the authority relationship in elaborating norms and ethics which is currently weighted in favor of the textual scholars.

Going further, to produce applied Islamic ethics requires reclaiming what it means to be truly ‘Islamic’ and reconsidering the higher objectives.

Labeling this and that ‘Islamic’ may comfort and connect but may not reflect that it is based on ethical principles, the norms and goals that are to orient the knowledge acquired.

The classical list of higher objectives was produced with sanctions in mind and indicates what needed to be protected.

This restricts and reduces these objectives to a religious enterprise.

A grander scheme is being proposed, on two axes, vertical and horizontal, which opens up and expands the objectives.   

The vertical axis pulls the objectives up to a give it a global dimension and the horizontal axis allows for elaboration of each item on the vertical scale, to deal with the growing complexity of the world.

At the top is Din and Maslaha – ‘protecting the Islamic conception of Life and Death’ and ‘the common good and interest of Humankind and Creation.’

These two objectives on this first level gives a Tawhidi framework and determines its meaning thereby providing orientation to the Way.

This level gives the perspectives for ethical elaboration and restores a universal approach to the project.

Level two objectives are the founding pillars – protecting and promoting Life, Nature and Peace.

Level three objectives (thirteen) are about promoting and protecting an individual’s and community’s being and action and these are based on the values stipulated in the text – Dignity, Welfare, Knowledge, Creativity, Autonomy, Development, Equality, Freedom, Justice, Fraternity, Love, Solidarity and Diversity.

Level 4 of the objectives has three categories – promoting and protecting firstly, the Inner Being, secondly, The Being and Individual and thirdly, Societies and Groups.

Category One is all about the inner dimension – promoting/protecting sincerity, contemplation, humility…

Intriguingly, most of the classical list of objectives is to be found Category Two – promoting/protecting intelligence, progeny, health…..  

Category Three is recognizes contemporary needs – promoting/protecting rules of law, pluralism, culture, religions….

An interesting and exciting proposal that transform Maqasid ash-Shariah and gives it breath and depth.

By Shelina Merani

The Power of Courage was one of the topics of discussion at a two-day intensive workshop in Paris recently where the European Muslim Presence network met to study the latest book by Tariq Ramadan, Radical Reform, Islamic Ethics and Liberation.

Fortunate to have the author himself there, Tariq Ramadan started the discussions by explaining that the process of reform starts by engaging with the world. In doing so, we are finding meaning and ultimately  answering the call of our creator. The concept of “reform” therefore should not be a foreign concept to Muslims.

Radical Reform highlights two major problems in the Muslim world which are hindering reform.

The first problem is that of leadership. Muslim scholars rarely come together to debate and drive reforms. Instead, they are more satisfied in talking among themselves in isolated circles.  Not serving the community, but instead being served by it.

The second challenge is that the Muslim community have forfeited their responsibilities. Instead of reforming themselves and their societies with a clear, forward looking vision, they are adapting and reacting to circumstances as they unfold.  As passive receptors of information, they admire scholars often exclusively because of their charisma or the emotions they invoke in the masses.

In addressing these problems, a bold call has been put forth to Muslim communities: hold the scholars to account and challenge them to act on the power of courage. That is, let them understand that they need to be better equipped to evolve their thinking, to respond to contemporary issues, to listen to their communities, to be creative in finding solutions.

“Are we ready for this?” is often heard from some quarters of the Muslim community. It is a potentially dangerous question because it attempts to erase the process of critical thinking urgently required for reform. The environment in some of our communities has become so bizarre that even the notion of questioning is akin to heresy.

Radical Reform goes further by stating that this “lack of calm critical debate is one of the evils undermining contemporary Islamic thought.” For example when Tariq Ramadan put out a Call for a moratorium on corporal punishment, stoning and the death penalty in the Islamic world, many scholars were in agreement privately but only one had the courage to affirm his position publicly – the majority were afraid that the community was not ready.

Since participating in this weekend seminar, I have understood that critical thinking is crucial for self reform and reflecting on one’s own  values and decisions. Critical thinkers ask questions; pose new answers that challenge the status quo, question traditional beliefs and challenge received doctrines.

According to Joel Westheimer, the Canada research chair in democracy and education at the University of Ottawa, critical thinking is about “finding the source of a problem in society and thinking of ways to solve it.” Research is showing however that that this faculty of critical thinking is not only deficient in Muslim communities; it is a societal problem.

Most universities are ineffective in fostering critical thinking. For example, in a three year study of 68 public and private colleges in California, though the overwhelming majority (89%) claimed critical thinking to be a primary objective of their instruction, only a small minority (19%) could give a clear explanation of what critical thinking is.

If we go back to the origins of critical thinking, our creator and educator is advising towards this path. The Qur’an infinitely extols humans to think, observe, ponder, reflect and question the signs of the universe and the wonders within ourselves.

“ …and in this way, God makes clear unto you his messages to that you might [learn] to use your reason.” (2:242).

 ” Verily, in all this there are messages indeed for people who think!” (13:3),

I have recently seen one example of Muslims using their critical thinking skills to solve a problem and offering the power of courage to those in positions of power.

When the process of finding a new Imam for the main Ottawa mosque was put in place, some youth wanted to ensure that chosen candidate would be homegrown and able to understand not only the texts, but also the context.

Frustrated, the youth said, “we have tried numerous times to engage in dialogue with the mosque administration.”

Having not been able to engage with the leadership, they launched an online petition and received hundreds of signatories.

Despite this, the mosque ignored the youth’s suggestion and, instead, invited a 37 year old Imam from Egypt to fill the position.

The youths were so frustrated by the choice that they eventually sent an email to the Ottawa Citizen with the subject heading, “A Call of Distress from an Unheard Voice: The Muslim Youth of Ottawa.”

It is unfortunate that that this struggle had to play out in the media in order for mosque officials to pay some attention; it has put the current imam in a very difficult position.

This is just one example among many demonstrating that the path towards reform is going to be a long, arduous process requiring personal commitment and the power of courage from both the scholars and communities that they serve.