IN THIS ISSUE
Monday, September 25, 2006: Governor Mitch Daniels is inviting Muslim Hoosiers to 2nd Annual Iftaar at his residence.
Saturday, October 7, 2006: Muslim Alliance of Indiana will host Annual Iftaar at Islamic Center in Plainfield, inviting Muslim community, Community leaders from all across Indiana and Political leadership. This is open invitation to all.
Saturday, November 11, 2006: Muslim Alliance of Indiana will hold 1st Economic Development Taskforce Meeting for strategic planning at Holiday Inn Express in Martinsville, Indiana.
September 16, 2006 - Plainfield, Indiana:: On Saturday, September 16, 2006, over 50 Muslim Hoosiers from across Indiana came together to discuss the future of Muslims of Indiana in grassroots politics. The event organized by the Muslim Alliance of Indiana, a statewide organization that seeks to connect 280,000 Muslim Hoosiers to each other and their public leadership, brought together Muslim organizations and leaders to attend the day long retreat.
The event was inaugurated by Dr. Louay Safi, Director of ISNA Leadership Institute, who strongly supported the mission and objective of the retreat.
The day started with the formation of the Muslim Alliance of Indiana Economic Development Taskforce ("Taskforce"). The Taskforce consists of Muslim Hoosier businesspeople, who will connect with Muslim businesses across the state to create a statewide Muslim chamber of commerce. The Taskforce will also work to attract Muslim businesses to the state of Indiana to enhance the state's economic development program.
The Retreat was also attended by Eric Holcomb--Governor Mitch Daniels Director of Intergovernmental Affairs, Paul Okleston--Deputy Secretary of State for Indiana, Marquisha Bridgman--Mayor Bart Peterson Interfaith Coordinator, Patrice Abduallah--Indianapolis' first Muslim City-County Councilman and Ann DeLaney--Executive Director of the Julian Center, author of Politics for Dummies and commentator on Indiana Week in Review. Ann DeLaney was the luncheon keynote speaker and invited Muslims of Indiana to participate in grassroots politics within the political parties within the state. She encouraged Muslims to come together and organize to have a more effective voice in public policy.
Presentations from various Indiana Muslim activists helped the participants better understanding on how to negotiate with the media, communicate with the political leadership and establish stronger grassroots organizations. "All politics is local and we want to make sure that the Muslim community in Indiana is active in local grassroots politics," stated Alia Shah, MAI' Executive Director. The participants were encouraged to become a part of the various political parties within the state and to learn how they can become more engaged in civic activities.
The participants took time to brainstorm about the future directions of the Muslim Alliance of Indiana (MAI). The program ended with a keynote address by Indiana University Professor Abdul Kader Sinno. Professor Sinno presented his latest research regarding Muslim participation and representation in politics in Western countries. He noted that Muslim representation in American politics was far below their representation in European nation despite the population numbers. He articulated strategies through which Muslims in Indiana can become more involved and participate in making the state more vibrant through participation in the political process.
Three FBI agents, Dan Powers, Kyle Scheatzle and Dennis Harrington, attended with MAI retreat and interacted with Muslim community. They emphasized individual and community participation important for safety and security.
They encouraged qualified individuals to apply for career in the agency.
To apply, please visit www.fbi.org. FBI also requested to contact FBI or MAI top report any incidents of hate crimes.
The FBI responded to the Muslim Alliance of Indiana's (MAI) request that a proper investigation be conducted in an Indiana Muslim businessman who was murdered last week while working in his restaurant after Friday prayer. MAI contacted state and federal authorities regarding a possible hate crimes. At MAI's urging a joint task force between city, county and FBI has been established to investigate this murder.
"Hate crimes against Muslims are on the rise in America and we must make sure that such incidents are investigated and the criminals brought to justice," stated Alia Shah, Executive Director of Muslim Alliance of Indiana. "We would like to thank the FBI for their quick response in this matter and look forward to continuing to work with them in an effort to protect Hoosiers," stated Shah.
Muslim Alliance of Indiana calls for increased dialogue between Muslims and Catholics over the controversy sparked by remarks perceived as insulting to Islam and the Prophet Muhammad made by Pope Benedict XVI.
In an address on Tuesday, the Pope quoted a 14th century Byzantine Christian Emperor as saying: "Show me just what Muhammad brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached."
"The proper response to the Pope's inaccurate and divisive remarks is for Muslims and Catholics worldwide to increase dialogue and outreach efforts aimed at building better relations between Christianity and Islam. This unfortunate episode also offers an opportunity for Christians to learn more about Islam, the Prophet Muhammad and the Islamic concept of jihad.
"Jihad is a central and broad Islamic concept that includes struggle against evil inclinations within oneself, struggle to improve the quality of life in society, struggle in the battlefield for self-defense (e.g., - having a standing army for national defense), or fighting against tyranny or oppression. 'Jihad' should not be translated as 'holy war.'
"The Quran, Islam's revealed text, condemns forced acceptance of any faith when it states: 'Let there be no compulsion in religion.' (2:256) Islam calls for peace once oppression ends: 'Fight in the cause of God with those who fight against you, but do not exceed the limits...If they desist, let there be no hostility except against the oppressors." (2:190-193)
"Muslims are also asked to maintain good relations with people of other faiths, and to engage in constructive dialogue. 'And dispute not with the People of the Book (Christians and Jews) except with means better (than mere disputation). . .but say, 'We believe in the Revelation that has come down to us and in that which came down to you.'" (29:46)
"The Quran also states: '(Rest assured that) those who believe (in the Quran), and those who follow the Jewish (scriptures), and the Christians, and the Sabians - whoever believes in God and the last day and performs good deeds - will be rewarded by their Lord. They will have nothing to fear or to regret.' (2:62)
"In Islam, there is no contradiction between faith and reason. The first verses revealed to the Prophet Muhammad included: 'Read! In the name of your Lord. . .Read! Your Lord is the Most Gracious, Who taught by the (use of the) pen, taught man what he knew not.' Historically, whenever Islam flourished, so did knowledge and discovery.
"Let us all continue the interfaith efforts promoted by the late Pope John Paul II, who made great strides in bringing Muslims and Catholics together for the common good."
Muslims urge Americans of all faiths to learn more about Islam and about the life and legacy of the Prophet Muhammad by requesting a free Quran or a book or DVD about Muhammad at www.explorethequran.org and www.cair.com/Muhammad.
Whether or not, Pope Benedict's choice to quote Byzantine Emperor Manuel Palaiologos' venom against Islam and Prophet Muhammad was appropriate or not, timely or not, intentional or not, can be disputed, but there is no doubt that Muslim response in Islamic world is excessive and not the way Prophet Muhammad would have approved it. Islam and Muslims can't be served by burning churches and killing nuns. If the pope had said at the end of his speech that he disagreed with the opinion of the emperor, the crisis would have never happened. Now that the damage to Islamic-Christian relations has been done and the pope has regretted his remarks, Muslims should accept it and "Forgive and forget."
I have been involved in Islamic-Catholic dialogue locally and nationally for last 10 years, trying to bring people and leaders of both faiths together in mutual respect and love of each other. The current crisis challenges all of us to engage the other in the much-needed interfaith dialogue to promote mutual understanding and religious harmony in our great nation and the world at large.
Shahid Athar
Past President, Interfaith Alliance of Indianapolis
Indianapolis
Muhammad Siddeeq, a member of the Nur-Allah Islamic Center on the Northside, said Pope Benedict XVI chose an "unfortunate" reference but not an intentional slight.
"I do feel that it is good and healthy that he has come back and made -- not an apology -- but at least saying he regretted it," said Siddeeq, who met Catholic leaders in Rome during millennium events in 1999. "Wise Islamic leaders . . . instead of throwing a can of gasoline on it, should accept the remarks of the pope and move on."
Ibad Ansari, president of the Muslim Alliance of Indiana, an umbrella organization that serves mosques and Islamic centers, said the pope's reference to spreading the faith by the sword doesn't reflect Muslim history. He points to Malaysia and Indonesia as places without violent pasts where Muslims are concentrated in the greatest numbers on the globe.
Muslims reacted so strongly, he said, because the Prophet Muhammad is so "dear to their hearts." And while Muslims in America have reacted with calm rationality, cultural differences in other countries may make sharper reactions possible.
"Violence is never justified. There are no ifs and buts about it," Ansari said. "Many times it is simply ignorance."
Call Star reporter Robert King at (317) 444-6089.
In the 12th century, Peter the Venerable, Abbot of Cluny, initiated a dialogue with the Islamic world. "I approach you not with arms, but with words," he wrote to the Muslims whom he imagined reading his book, "not with force, but with reason, not with hatred, but with love." Yet his treatise was entitled Summary of the Whole Heresy of the Diabolical Sect of the Saracens and segued repeatedly into spluttering intransigence. Words failed Peter when he contemplated the "bestial cruelty" of Islam, which, he claimed, had established itself by the sword. Was Muhammad a true prophet? "I shall be worse than a donkey if I agree," he expostulated, "worse than cattle if I assent!"
Peter was writing at the time of the Crusades. Even when Christians were trying to be fair, their entrenched loathing of Islam made it impossible for them to approach it objectively. For Peter, Islam was so self-evidently evil that it did not seem to occur to him that the Muslims he approached with such "love" might be offended by his remarks. This medieval cast of mind is still alive and well.
Last week, Pope Benedict XVI quoted, without qualification and with apparent approval, the words of the 14th-century Byzantine emperor Manuel II: "Show me just what Muhammad brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." The Vatican seemed bemused by the Muslim outrage occasioned by the Pope's words, claiming that the Holy Father had simply intended "to cultivate an attitude of respect and dialogue toward the other religions and cultures, and obviously also towards Islam".
But the Pope's good intentions seem far from obvious. Hatred of Islam is so ubiquitous and so deeply rooted in western culture that it brings together people who are usually at daggers drawn. Neither the Danish cartoonists, who published the offensive caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad last February, nor the Christian fundamentalists who have called him a paedophile and a terrorist, would ordinarily make common cause with the Pope; yet on the subject of Islam they are in full agreement.
Our Islamophobia dates back to the time of the Crusades, and is entwined with our chronic anti-semitism. Some of the first Crusaders began their journey to the Holy Land by massacring the Jewish communities along the Rhine valley; the Crusaders ended their campaign in 1099 by slaughtering some 30,000 Muslims and Jews in Jerusalem. It is always difficult to forgive people we know we have wronged. Thenceforth Jews and Muslims became the shadow-self of Christendom, the mirror image of everything that we hoped we were not - or feared that we were.
The fearful fantasies created by Europeans at this time endured for centuries and reveal a buried anxiety about Christian identity and behaviour. When the popes called for a Crusade to the Holy Land, Christians often persecuted the local Jewish communities: why march 3,000 miles to Palestine to liberate the tomb of Christ, and leave unscathed the people who had - or so the Crusaders mistakenly assumed - actually killed Jesus. Jews were believed to kill little children and mix their blood with the leavened bread of Passover: this "blood libel" regularly inspired pogroms in Europe, and the image of the Jew as the child slayer laid bare an almost Oedipal terror of the parent faith.
Jesus had told his followers to love their enemies, not to exterminate them. It was when the Christians of Europe were fighting brutal holy wars against Muslims in the Middle East that Islam first became known in the west as the religion of the sword. At this time, when the popes were trying to impose celibacy on the reluctant clergy, Muhammad was portrayed by the scholar monks of Europe as a lecher, and Islam condemned - with ill-concealed envy - as a faith that encouraged Muslims to indulge their basest sexual instincts. At a time when European social order was deeply hierarchical, despite the egalitarian message of the gospel, Islam was condemned for giving too much respect to women and other menials.
In a state of unhealthy denial, Christians were projecting subterranean disquiet about their activities on to the victims of the Crusades, creating fantastic enemies in their own image and likeness. This habit has persisted. The Muslims who have objected so vociferously to the Pope's denigration of Islam have accused him of "hypocrisy", pointing out that the Catholic church is ill-placed to condemn violent jihad when it has itself been guilty of unholy violence in crusades, persecutions and inquisitions and, under Pope Pius XII, tacitly condoned the Nazi Holocaust.
Pope Benedict delivered his controversial speech in Germany the day after the fifth anniversary of September 11. It is difficult to believe that his reference to an inherently violent strain in Islam was entirely accidental. He has, most unfortunately, withdrawn from the interfaith initiatives inaugurated by his predecessor, John Paul II, at a time when they are more desperately needed than ever. Coming on the heels of the Danish cartoon crisis, his remarks were extremely dangerous. They will convince more Muslims that the west is incurably Islamophobic and engaged in a new crusade.
We simply cannot afford this type of bigotry. The trouble is that too many people in the western world unconsciously share this prejudice, convinced that Islam and the Qur'an are addicted to violence. The 9/11 terrorists, who in fact violated essential Islamic principles, have confirmed this deep-rooted western perception and are seen as typical Muslims instead of the deviants they really were.
With disturbing regularity, this medieval conviction surfaces every time there is trouble in the Middle East. Yet until the 20th century, Islam was a far more tolerant and peaceful faith than Christianity. The Qur'an strictly forbids any coercion in religion and regards all rightly guided religion as coming from God; and despite the western belief to the contrary, Muslims did not impose their faith by the sword.
The early conquests in Persia and Byzantium after the Prophet's death were inspired by political rather than religious aspirations. Until the middle of the eighth century, Jews and Christians in the Muslim empire were actively discouraged from conversion to Islam, as, according to Qur'anic teaching, they had received authentic revelations of their own. The extremism and intolerance that have surfaced in the Muslim world in our own day are a response to intractable political problems - oil, Palestine, the occupation of Muslim lands, the prevelance of authoritarian regimes in the Middle East, and the west's perceived "double standards" - and not to an ingrained religious imperative.
But the old myth of Islam as a chronically violent faith persists, and surfaces at the most inappropriate moments. As one of the received ideas of the west, it seems well-nigh impossible to eradicate. Indeed, we may even be strengthening it by falling back into our old habits of projection. As we see the violence - in Iraq, Palestine, Lebanon - for which we bear a measure of responsibility, there is a temptation, perhaps, to blame it all on "Islam". But if we are feeding our prejudice in this way, we do so at our peril.
Karen Armstrong is the author of Islam: A Short History
comment@guardian.co.uk
Rabiye Kadeer, a nominee for the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize, was imprisoned for more than 5 years in China on charges of providing state secrets to foreigners. Following her release she went into exile, where she works to further human rights for the Uyghurs who live largely in the Xinjiang region (formerly known as East Turkistan) of the PRC. She is also one of the most prominent advocates for women's rights in China. Using her own resources, Rabiye Kadeer founded and then directed a large trading company in Northwestern China that provided training and employment for Uyghurs. She also founded the "Thousand Mothers' Movement" as a vehicle for the empowerment of Uyghur women in Xinjiang. Prior to her arrest in 1999, while en route to a meeting with a visiting U.S. congressman, Rabiye Kadeer was a member of the top advisory body to China's parliament. She is the winner of the 2004 Rafto Prize, and the current director of both the Uyghur American Association and the Uyghur Human Rights Project
For further information, go to www.uyghuramerican.org
Elaine D. Wright
Administrative Secretary/Accounting Representative
Near Eastern Languages and Cultures
1011 East Third Street
Goodbody Hall #102
Bloomington, Indiana 47405-7005
Phone: (812) 855-5993
Fax: (812) 855-7841
From: Inner Asian & Uralic National Resource Center IAUNRC_ANNOUNCE@LISTSERV.INDIANA.EDU
On Behalf Of IAUNRC
One day, the father of a very wealthy family took his son on a trip to the country with the express purpose of showing him how poor people live.
They spent a couple of days and nights on the farm of what would be considered a very poor family.
On their return from their trip, the father asked his son, "How was the trip?"
"It was great, Dad."
Did you see how poor people live?" the father asked.
"Oh yeah," said the son.
"So, tell me, what did you learn from the trip?" asked the father.
The son answered:
"I saw that we have one dog and they had four.
We have a pool that reaches to the middle of our garden and they have a creek that has no end.
We have imported lanterns in our garden and they have the stars at night.
Our patio reaches to the front yard and they have the whole horizon.
We have a small piece of land to live on and they have fields that go beyond our sight.
We have servants who serve us, but they serve others.
We buy our food, but they grow theirs.
We have walls around our property to protect us, they have friends to protect them."
The boy's father was speechless.
Then his son added, "Thanks Dad for showing me how poor we are."
Isn't perspective a wonderful thing? Makes you wonder what would happen if we all gave thanks for everything we have, instead of worrying about what we don't have.
Appreciate every single thing you have, especially your friends!
"Life is too short and friends are too few."
Register to Vote today for the November 7th Election
The General Election is November 7th and the deadline to register to vote is quickly approaching.
Please take a few minutes today to make sure you and your family members are registered to vote.
- Have you recently moved?
- Have you recently changed your name?
- Did you turn 18 in the past year?
- Do you have any family or friends that need to be registered?
If you answered yes to any of these questions then you need to register to vote!
Don't pass up your chance to make an impact in your community, state and country. Register today for the November election!
MUSLIM ALLIANCE OF INDIANA is dedicated to empower Muslims through social engagement and developing awareness of public issues among Muslims and connecting 280,000 Muslim Hoosiers with the leadership.
To learn more about past activities and accomplishments, please visit at www.muslimalliancein.com
To be involved with MAI mission, please contact muslimalliancein@yahoo.com
To strengthen and disseminate the vision, please forward this message to others in Indiana or send email list to muslimalliancein@yahoo.com
This is intended for Muslim Hoosiers and friends promoting peace and harmony, mutual respect and making Indiana strong. If you want to be off this list, please advise.
Thank you.
