Islam in the Americas at University of Florida

Why does Islam matter in the Americas? When did it arrive here? What values, practices, traditions, & tensions exist within its histories & social dynamics in the West? How can we study Muslim communities in this hemisphere?

In Spring 2017 I will offer a course called, "Islam in the Americas" (REL 4393/LAS 4935) with the UF Religion Department and in association with the UF Center for Latin American Studies. The lecture period will be every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday from 9:35-10:25am (coffee is encouraged. Donuts are accepted as bribes...just kidding...kind of). 

This course will place Latin America, the Caribbean, & North America within a broader Islamic framework & locate Muslims of various backgrounds & experiences within the hemisphere from the 1500s to today, from Cape Columbia, Canada to Catamarca, Argentina, & many periods & places in between.

The semester will be divided into four main parts: 1) studying global Islam; 2) theoretical themes in the study of religion in the Americas; 3) the history of Islam in the Americas; and 4) country/region specific cartographies of contemporary American Muslim populations. 

n attempting to locate, and explore, Islam in the Americas students will first have to apprehend a bit of what it is to study "global Islam." In this introductory part of the course we will spend some time discussing what "Islam" is, what its main texts, traditions, and shared vocabulary are, and how studying Islam globally often means studying Muslim communities locally, but being sure to set them within macro-contexts at the regional, hemispheric, or global levels as well. 

Studying Islam in the Americas will also require a theoretical foundation. This second part of our course will cover the heritage and contact of multiple cultures in the Americas -- both across the hemisphere and the Atlantic ocean. In order to do so, we will take a look at the heritage of Europe (specifically al-Andalus), North and West Africa, and other transnational ties via politics, economics, ideologies, technology, and more. 

With these foundational aspects in place we will then dive into the study of the history of Islam in the Americas, the third section of course. Looking back to pre-colonial contact with Europe, we will navigate the "deeper roots" of Islam in the Americas that are largely ignored in historical overviews before delving into the "forbidden" and forced passages of Muslims across the Atlantic as conquistadors, slaves, and monsters in the Western imagination. Once here in the hemisphere we will see how Islam took part in, shaped, and was molded by its American context even as Muslims adapted to, resisted, and surrendered to the broader Euro-American worldview and its attendant lifeways. 

In the final part of the course we will take a closer look at specific countries and regions ranging from North America to Latin America and the Caribbean. Specifically we will consider constituencies in Brazil, Mexico, Suriname, Trinidad, Cuba, Haiti, Puerto Rico, the U.S., and Canada. 

Over the course of the semester there will be ample opportunity for students to read and respond, discuss and deliberate the topics via various assignments. However, a semester capstone project, which will be worked on, edited, and completed throughout the course of the spring, will be presented via a final paper and presentation. These projects can take up any number of thematic, chronological, demographic, or geographic topics. 

It is my hope that this course will help place Latin America, the Caribbean, and North America within a broader Islamic framework and locate Muslims of various genealogies within the hemisphere over the longue durée. urthermore, this course will aim to focus on local values, practices, traditions, and tensions placing these within larger questions about what kinds of histories, social dynamics, and meaning production make Islam significant, or how its significance is denied, in a part of the world that hasn’t recognized its history here or its contemporary configurations or impact. 

If you have any questions, comments, or want to know more about the texts, assignments, or expectations for the course, please do not hesitate to contact me. 

Raising religiously literate Americans: A Q&A with author Linda K. Wertheimer

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My first degree was in education. My current studies focus on religion. When a book called Faith Ed,: Teaching About Religion in an Age of Intolerance came out I was compelled to read it. Not only did the author — journalist Linda K. Wertheimer — provide an in-depth and thoughtful look at particular cases of controversy and success in religious studies education at primary and secondary levels across the U.S., but she rightly highlights a public education system wrestling with the practicalities of how to nurture a new generation of religiously literate U.S. citizens. 

To explore the topic and the text more I caught up with Wertheimer. Below is our Q&A. 

*Listen to Wertheimer speak at Books & Books: Miami, FL | Sunday, Jan. 17th 4pm.

Where did you draw your inspiration to write this book?

Faith Ed. grew out of two events, one in my childhood and one more recent. When I was in fourth grade, my family moved from western New York state to rural Ohio. I was the only Jew, other than my brothers, in our new school system. My school had weekly Christianity classes taught in the classroom by a woman from a local church. My parents had me excused from those classes, but peers noticed that I left and asked why. I told them I was Jewish, and as a result, I experienced some ostracism as well anti-Semitism. I always wondered, though, if my peers’ treatment was more ignorance than anti-Semitism. I wondered, too, if it would have made a difference if teachers had taught us about many religions instead of promoting only one. Those kind of questions inspired me in part to write Faith Ed.

The second event that led to writing this book was hearing about a suburban Boston middle school’s field trip to a mosque and a subsequent controversy. I was fascinated to learn that sixth-graders were spending half a year learning about the world’s religions and even more intrigued to find out that learning about religion was required as part of social studies. I wanted to know more.

What's the one takeaway you want people to get from this book? 

My hope is that readers realize the importance of teaching about religion in public schools and the difference it can make not only for religious minorities but for those in the majority. I also hope this book can renew dialogue about the best way to teach about religion and how young to begin such instruction. It’s more vital now than ever to emphasize the importance of religious literacy because education can reduce ignorance and the bigotry we’re hearing aimed at Muslims in particular these days.

Do you feel that education is a necessary precursor to respect and tolerance? Is it enough?   

The goal should be that we learn to respect other faiths rather than simply tolerate them. I do believe education is a great way to help achieve respect for different religions. Is it enough? No, because education only reaches those in the classrooms. What about the adults who never learned about other religions? We need to figure out how to reach them. Children are greatly influenced by their parents.

You focus a lot on Islam; what other religions are being marginalized without proper religious education? 

It is not just Islam that is greatly misunderstood. Students who were Sikh, Jewish and Hindu spoke of being bullied because of their faith. So did a Jehovah’s Witness. Religions in the minority as well as lesser known branches of Christianity all face some of the same issues as Islam.

People on all sides of the issue have passion and purpose in their reasoning. Do you think the passion is helpful or hurtful to the cause of education about religion? 

I don’t think passion is a problem as long as educators and parents can be objective whether they are teaching the material or their children are learning it. Some of these protests against lessons on Islam stemmed from ignorance and bigotry. There wasn’t enough reasoned discourse about the events.

Who is doing education about religion right?

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The author Linda K. Wertheimer. 

I think educators could look at a variety of places for models. For elementary schools, the Core Knowledge curriculum is worth checking out. The Core Knowledge Foundation [featured in the book] consults experts on different religions to design its materials. First graders learn basic information about different religions in a neutral, balanced way. The curriculum is based on what students should learn as part of social studies and geography.

Modesto, CA [also featured in the book] has been held up as a model repeatedly because it’s the only school system in the country to require all high school students to take a world religions course before graduation. The course lasts only nine weeks and is really a basic look at six or more faiths. While the course doesn’t delve deep, the teachers do spend time teaching about the First Amendment and the separation of church and state. They also coach students how to ask questions without offense about religion. A study by researcher Emile Lester shows promising results, including the likelihood that students will stand up more for a religious minority.

How can families augment their child's learning in school? 

If their children attend a public school, then they likely will get some education about religion. Most states require study of religion as part of social studies and geography in middle and high school. But families can learn more about different religions from a variety of sources. Start with the children’s section in your local library and ask the librarian to point out books on different religions and holidays.

Parents can educate themselves by reading books about the world’s religions and then sharing their knowledge with their children. I’d recommend Huston Smith’s The World’s Religions or Stephen Prothero’s God Is Not One. Prothero’s Religious Literacy is also a great book to read to improve your religious literacy. Also part of education is based on experience. Take your children to other houses of worship. Visit churches, temples, mandirs, shrines, and mosques on your travels if you can or in your own community.

What message do you have for fellow journalists in an age of religious intolerance and ignorance? 

Educate yourself about different religions so you don’t unintentionally boost stereotypes. Meet clergy and activists of different faiths. If you know the least about Islam, do something about it. Attend a service at a local mosque or a local interfaith event. Write stories that help improve the education of Americans on religion. Don’t just identify a person as Christian. Are they Protestant, Catholic, or Lutheran or something else? Realize that all religions have diversity and try to understand the layers.

Anything else you want to share? 

Yes, many Americans don’t know it’s even legal to teach about religion in public school. They think Supreme Court cases in the 1960s kicked all religion out of the classroom. Those court rulings merely prohibited promoting one religion through prayer and the recitation of Bible verses. Supreme Court Justice Tom Clark in the 1963 Abington v. Schempp ruling made it clear that if anything, schools needed to do more regarding religion – but in an academic way. His words still ring true today: “It might well be said that one’s education is not complete without a study of comparative religion or the history of religion and its relationship to the advancement of civilization.”

CATCH WERTHEIMER AT AN UPCOMING EVENT IN FLORIDA:

• Books & Books: Miami, FL | Sunday, Jan. 17th 4pm

What have we learned about Islam?

When I tell people that I study global Islam the reaction usually goes something like this:

“Ohhhhhhhh, that’s interesting.” 

Two or three beats pass…wait for it, then the shoe drops: “You know, I actually have a question for you. I’ve always wondered [INSERT QUESTION,  CONUNDRUM, OR NEWS SOUNDBITE HERE].” 

Islam is, unfortunately, a very hot topic of conversation. Sometimes, I wish I studied the most boring, obscure, and esoteric religious topic so that when I told people what I study they would say, “how interesting,” not really mean it, and then casually change the topic of conversation. But that’s just not the case. The questions keep coming. The headlines continue to splash across our screens. My area of study remains relevant. 

In truth, I relish the opportunity to talk to people about religion — especially global Islam. I learn much from my studies with Muslims and non-Muslims alike and enjoy sharing that with others via blogs, news pieces, and in the classroom. In that spirit, this semester I was honored to work alongside the legendary Dr. Gwendolyn Zoharah Simmons teaching the UF Religion Department’s Intro. to Islam course. 

At the end of the class I asked all of the students to reflect on three questions: 1) what is the single most insightful thing you learned this semester? 2) What is one thing you would tell someone who has yet to take this class? 3) What is one question you still have? 

What follows is a break-down of the TOP THREE things that students learned and would share with others outside the class (there was significant overlap) and the TOP THREE questions they still had. These reflections help us understand what is most relevant to the discussion of Islam that is going on in politics, social circles, and places of worship and devotional practice across the world. Furthermore, they act as a catalyst for further conversations and questions to be answered — both here and in those confabs you and I might have sometime when I tell you that yes, indeed, I study global Islam. 

“Oh, that’s interesting” you say? Let’s talk… 

Top Three Takeaways:

1) Islam is a big, diverse, unique, and complex global religion

You can say that again. Multiple students reflected on how their image of Islam coming into the class was overly simplistic. However, as they left the class students mused that they learned “about the diversity of the umma — the global Muslim community” and just how “deep, beautiful, and informative Islam is.” That student further said, “there are just too many specifics to list, this class has really opened my eyes.” Finally, striking the same chord, another student shared, “the complexity and breadth of Islam is something I had not recognized before.” 

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Check out this super-cool class of Intro. to Islam students...what a shame they had that dorky-looking TA up front. 

As Shahab Ahmed intimated in What is Islam? the main challenge in interpreting Islam is coming to terms with the considerable diversity of beliefs, practices, and postures of global Islam while simultaneously appreciating that there are shared principles which act as a cri de coeur for Muslims across the world.

The uncomfortable truth is that essentialized conceptualizations that say "Islam = violence" or "Islam = peace" are insensitive to the alterations and negotiations that characterizes lived Islam in interaction with myriad Muslim constituencies and non-Muslim actors throughout the world. 

An introductory class presents students with this complexity and invites them to capture not necessarily what Islam is or is not, but the many different ways that Muslims live, move, and believe in this world while learning to critically think about what this complexity means in the world we live in. 

2) The basics are important

Even so, students also reflected that there is a unity that runs through the story of Islam since its inception in the 7th-century. Students appreciated learning more about Muhammad — the first Muslim and the living Qur’an, its history, the basics of the Qur’an and the Sunna — the traditions of the prophet, and foundations of Muslim theology, philosophy, and practice. 

As students could readily appreciate this course could only whet their appetites to learn more. As one student shared, “I learned so much only to realize I still know so little. This can’t be the end of my exploration.” Amen. 

3) Islam is not necessarily what you see/hear in the news or on social media

Overwhelmingly, students came away surprised about how the image of Islam presented in the public and in popular discourse is a distorted and inaccurate one. One student said, “I would invite people to learn more about Islam even if they think they know all about it from the news. The truth is — they don’t.” Some students made it personal and shared, “I didn’t know anything about this religion before I started” but “if you’re non-Muslim take this class to undue the popular ideas that are out there and wrong,” and “if you’re Muslim take it see how non-Muslims view your religion.” One student was unequivocal about this point and said, “don’t believe the media. The representations of Islam on social media are not accurate. Do your own research, take a class like this, and learn about Islam for yourself.” 

As a member of “the media” and an active agent on sites such as Facebook and Twitter I take comments like these personally. While I am invariably impressed with the quality, and creative, content that religion newswriters are able to produce on complex topics, there are occasionally weak stories, missed opportunities or the need for more nuance or critical insight — especially when it comes to Islam and specifically when it comes to broadcast news. 

My students tend to agree. I think we should listen. They spend a lot of time on those new-fangled-smart-phone-thingies and the way Islam is constructed, represented, and controlled via news and social media has significant implications for them Classes can help, but they cannot undo all the injurious images of Islam shared across media platforms.

Top Three Questions Lingering: 

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Our main text for the class. While it certainly has its weaknesses, it provided a solid foundation for discussion along with other resources and primary documents. 

With everything students learned, questions still lingered. The top three were: 1) Where, and how, does ISIS/ISIL/Daesh fit in? 2) Is global Islam still growing? If so, is it trending toward “fundamentalism” or “progressivism?” 3) What can we do to end Islamophobia? 

Behind each of these questions are real concerns. While students in this class felt they understood more about the religion as a whole they were still uncomfortable with how that matches up with the actions of Muslims who are part of ISIS, whether or not this is the future of the faith, and how others are going to treat Muslims based on popular misperceptions and media-fed monstrosities.

What next?  

As I told them at the end of the class, they are now “scholars of Islam.” Although there is much more to learn and questions needing continual conversation (hey, you can’t cover everything in one semester and you need to get a basic hold of the foundations before you can tackle more complex issues), these students now know more than at least 70% of the population…if not much more. 

Thus, the conversation must continue. We need to maintain the relevant discussion between people of multiple perspectives, faiths, and practices — Muslim and non-Muslim, in our local communities and across the globe. 

I was personally awe-struck by the sheer caliber of the students who took this class this semester. Their passion for the topic, the candor of their questions, and the effort they put into learning the material and discussing difficult topics was humbling. I can only hope that they are a vanguard for these exchanges. I also sincerely hope their learning does not stop there and they become ambassadors for peacemaking and religious literacy in a world all to often torn apart by identity politics (“us” vs. “them” mentalities) and flat-out ignorance. 

Now, to grade their finals…

Understanding Islam & the death penalty for apostasy

Last week, a Saudi Arabian court sentenced Palestinian poet Ashraf Fayadh to death for apostasy — the deliberate renouncement of Islam. Human rights advocates across the world rallied to his cause and as Aaron Sankin reported, "Fayadh's fate quickly became a cause célèbre on social media, with a litany of Twitter users gathering around the hashtag #FreeAshraf to protest his death sentence.”

Under the Wahhabi interpretation — an austere, literalist, sect of Islam associated with Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab and the Saud royal family — such crimes as blasphemy and apostasy are punishable by death. 

Fayadh’s case is not an isolated one. Liberal author Raif Badawi was publicly flogged in January 2015 and remains in prison after being convicted of blasphemy. There was, at the time, an international outcry as many decried the juxtaposition of such a penalty with international conceptions of human rights, freedom of conscience and speech, and the value of religious pluralism. 

While there are grave reasons to challenge the decisions of the Saudi courts to condemn these men, there is a concomitant danger with condemning an entire religion or casting dispersion toward Muslims for such stats and scenarios. Furthermore, the numbers can be misleading. There are, I think, five points to keep in mind when considering such stories before coming to any clear conclusions: 

People of Peace Documentary

In Sterling Heights, Michigan the battle over the proposed construction of a mosque precipitated religious and cultural tension between Christians and Muslims. The UN reported that Christian militias are engaged in ethnic cleansing of Muslims in an ongoing Central African Republic civil war. At the same time, over the previous weekend (October 11, 2015) after hearing about armed protests scheduled to take place around mosques throughout the U.S., hundreds came out to rally around their Muslim neighbors in support.

In the midst of all these headlines, I had the pleasure of talking with Michal. She is doing inspiring peacemaking work with Christians and Muslims. She wrote of her calling, “I'm passionate about helping local churches effectively interact with the Muslim community around them; overcoming stereotypes/fears/misunderstandings, share faith and work together for the common good. I do this through my PhD research, the many grassroots events I organize with Muslims and Christians in California, and the documentaries I'm working on.”

While her work is primarily in Southern California, the impact is global. Michal, and her Muslim friend and partner Sondos — who together maintain the site MissUnderstanding.co — are confident that what they do is a significant part of the peacemaking process across the world. 

One of the many projects Michal and Sondos are working on is the “People of Peace Documentary.” The project is about Muslims and Christians learning what it means to become friends while staying true to their faith. 

In the clip above, twelve Christians visit a local mosque to learn more about their Muslim neighbors. They are paired with a Muslim their age and gender to talk about what their faith means to them. The goal is to talk candidly and openly about any subject.

Interacting with someone from another religion on their terms and at their place of worship or practice is one of the best avenues for better understanding and increased dialogue between people of disparate faiths. Such experiences “re-humanize” the religious “other” more than a lecture, a book, or even an in-class discussion. Beyond learning, students are then able to identify with the religious “other.” 

As Yehezkel Landau wrote, “We need to develop educational strategies to overcome the ignorance that leads to prejudice, which in turn leads to dehumanizing contempt, which in turn breeds violence.” Friendships between people of different religious persuasions are not only personally fulfilling, but educationally efficacious and potentially life-changing. Sometimes, people talk just once. Other times, they make lifelong friends and change the world together. 

Watch the video to find out more and to consider a program like it with your local masjid or church communities.

Things You Missed in Religion Class

People ask me questions all the time.

They're sending me questions every day via text, e-mails, even carrier pigeons. Rather than just responding in private messages, I'd like to start having public conversations about our most burning religion and spirituality questions. 

So, I'm starting a new video/audio cast called, "Things You Missed in Religion Class." Watch this video to learn more: 

​All you need to do is send your questions to me with the subject line: 

Or you can send it to me via Facebook or Twitter with the hashtag:

My first video will be "Is that a cult?" 

What will my next video be about? 

Good question. 

Send me your own conundrums and we'll find out together. 

Peace. 

The Spiritual Howcast: Islam 101

Matt Popovits is a pretty cool dude. He's a church planter, preacher extraordinaire, and a teacher who takes culture seriously. He's also asking, and tackling, some of the most real, difficult, and talked about questions in his podcast/videocast show "The Spiritual Howcast." 

This week Matt and I talked about "Understanding Islam." The 8-minute program takes you through some basics & introduces you to the world of Islam. More than anything else, it's a primer on how you can get to know Muslims beyond the headlines, the books, and the tracts and instead get to know the people of an "other" faith. 

Take a listen...

...or, if you're a real religion nerd like me, you can read the entire transcript of my responses below:

1. What are the origins of the Islamic faith? What does the word "Islam" mean?

First, a note about Islam. There is no single, monolithic, “Muslim world.” While we can speak of there being one “Islam” there are many “Muslim worlds” and/or “worldviews.” As Talal Asad said, “Islam is a discursive tradition” that emerges from multiple perspectives and discourses across its global 1.5 billion member population, often determined by local political, social, and cultural contexts which produce diverse communities of mystics, extremists, nominal Muslims, progressives, and more. 

So, what I’m saying here represents the vast majority of Muslims, but there may be some, or even many, who would take me to task on these statements or interpretations. 

With that said, it is generally agreed that Islam emerged out of the 7th century Middle East when Muhammad, the prophet, sought to introduce an uncompromising monotheism and belief in the one God’s revelation in the Arabian peninsula’s pluralistic and polytheistic tribal milieu.

Muhammad, influenced by Christians and Jews he met as part of the caravan trade, began to speak of his own revelatory experiences — which became the Qur’an — and began to teach of God’s long line of prophets, an ethical responsibility and accountability based on God’s revealed word, and a coming day of judgement. 

This message undercut the social, cultural, and political establishment of the day and Muhammad was run out of town, from Mecca to a town to the north called Medina. This sojourn is known as the hijra, or migration, of Muhammad and his followers. It was in Medina that the Muslim community was eventually founded and the term “Islam” initially used to describe the movement. The word “Islam” comes from the Arabic root “aslama,” which means “submission.” Particularly to God. 

2. In the Christian faith one is saved through the work of Christ on behalf of mankind. How is one "saved" in Islam? What is the "big idea" of the Islamic faith?

That’s a great question, but, really it’s a bit misguided to talk about “salvation” when it comes to studying other religions beyond Christianity. Each religion has different goals, different problems, different leaders, different texts and discussions. 

Of course, our tendency, as Christians, in studying world religions is to familiarize the “other” and the “strange” by making comparisons to our own theology and practice. It’s natural, it’s the oldest trick in the travelers trade. But, too readily familiarizing can obscure just as much as it reveals. 

What I’m trying to say is this — is “salvation” the right term for Islam? Is that the goal? I think your “big idea” terminology is a better way to go about this question. The big idea in Islam goes back to the root of the word itself — submission, or perhaps, “surrender.”

Islam, according to the Qur’an — its revealed holy text — and the Hadith — the traditions and teachings of the prophet Muhammad, is the “straight” or “right” path to surrendering themselves in all ways to Allah — the one true God. They do this through right practices such as prayer and alms, right beliefs such as in angels and the proper prophets, right living such as through the law, or Shariah, and right rituals such as fasting and the hajj, or pilgrimage, to Mecca. 

3. What, in your opinion, is one of the most common misperceptions that Americans, in particular Christians, have in regard to their Islamic neighbors?

Our viewpoint of Muslims is still largely driven by an inherited and compounded “orientalism,” or viewpoint that neatly, but errantly, divides the world up into “East” and “West” (orient and occident) as if one is civilized (the West) and the other uncivilized (the East). This is an artificial boundary we’ve created and it was laid out on the basis of the concept of creating a “them” to define an “us.” 

Part of this orientalist perspective on the world that artificially divides up God’s creation is to define the “Orient” and particularly the “Muslim world” as non-Western, premodern, and savage. 

We think of Muslims and our thoughts immediately turn to billionaires, bombers, and belly dancers. We dream up images, and consume them on TV, of horrors, harems, and turbaned horndogs. Meanwhile, we picture ourselves as middle class, peaceable, and respectable. 

The truth is that Muslims come in all shapes and sizes. They are rich and poor, peaceable and ready to anger (sometimes for good reason), male and female, liberal and conservative. 

We may think that all Muslims are “out to get us” with shariah, terror, or their lies, but in truth if you pursue relationships with Muslims you find they are some of the most hospitable people in the world, well-reasoned in their faith, and ready to enjoy your company and kindness. 

4. What benefit is there from a person of one faith taking the time learn about a different faith?

I always like to quote Max Müller, for all his faults, who said, "The person who knows only one religion, knows none.”

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Learning about another faith, and more importantly, forming friendships with people of different religions is SO important and vital in a world torn apart by misconceptions, forced divisions, and violence. 

While education and instruction are good, ending undue negative opinions and actions against Muslims — Islamophobia — will also require relationships, interaction, and experiential exchange between U.S. Christians and Muslim Americans. Not only are Christians compelled to do something by the commands of Scripture and the example of Jesus, but we are liberated to do so as well.  For followers of Christ, our identity is not wrapped up in our culture, our creed, our country, or our carefully constructed conception of the “religious other.” Instead, our identity is founded in Christ, and Christ alone. Indeed, it is an essential aspect of Christian faith that we, who were once far off — strangers, aliens, and outsiders — have now been brought near in Jesus. As the apostle Paul put it, “the dividing wall of hostility” has been broken down in Christ, “who is our peace” (Ephesians 2:11-22).

This message is immensely liberating. We, who are no longer defined by our animosity to God and our alienation from his family, likewise no longer need to identify ourselves by our opposition to the other. We are no longer enslaved to cultural constructions of antipathy such as Islamophobia. 

So we can look to the example of Jesus and pursue a course of hospitality, collaboration, and faithfulness with our Muslim neighbors and friends rather than worrying about security and/or persecution. 

Three Ways to Relate to the "Religious Other"

As I wrote in a previous post, the U.S. has witnessed a stunning religious transformation over the last 40 years and Christians are struggling to adjust.

Today, there are 1,700 federally recognized religious bodies in the U.S., 600 of which are non-Christian and just last week Pew Research Center reported how Christianity’s share of the U.S. population is steadily decreasing with more Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims, and “nones” emerging on the American religious marketplace.

Faced with questions, fears, and honest desires to adapt, learn, and be hospitable toward their neighbors of other religious perspectives most congregations opt for a world religions “Bible” study. The vast majority of these studies are amateurish at best. While most leaders of these studies start with the intention to help their parishioners learn more about the world’s religions, the way they go about it usually leads to nominally increased religious literacy. Even worse, these studies often exacerbate pre-existing prejudices or presuppositions about those religious studied.

In place of these studies I suggest the following three practical means of learning more about your neighbors of different religions.

*READ MORE at blog.LCEF.org

Sympathizing with Scientologists

The most unsavory "four-letter word" in America may be "change." Perhaps its antecedent "new" also carries some seriously suspicious impressions. Whether warranted or not, Americans are reticent to readily accept, incorporate, or appreciate relatively new religious movements.

Although we like to pick our way through the buffet of religions on offer to us in a digital and global age, we are suspicious of full-fledged nouveau religious systems. After all, we like our religion like we like our comfy pants -- worn-in, familiar, and neutral in color. Or perhaps, we prefer those religions that remind us of mom's Thanksgiving stuffing recipe -- don't transgress the recipe and we can all enjoy a scoop or two of whatever we want. 

Then there's the Church of Scientology. Founded by science fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard, Scientology (as it is popularly known) is the quintessential new religious movement for examining Americans' wariness of accepting entities, beliefs, and rituals they do not understand. 

Based on Hubbard's book Dianetics, published in 1950, and other writings and manuals Scientologists believe that the individual is first and foremost a spirit, or thetan, and that thetans can be cleared of negative energy through a process called auditing. They espouse this as "spiritual technology" as auditors use machines called "e-meters" that measure stress and other markers of spiritual and material tarnish. 

Scientology has long suffered derision in popular culture and in political maneuvers. Likewise, Scientology has been one of the most famously secretive and prone to take their complaints against their detractors to the civil courts. Their publications, while slick and well produced, appear paranoid and overcomplicated. Their public personas (Tom Cruise, John Travolta, etc.) are often edited and represented in news media as strange and nutty. 

All of these streams at work in the societal misgivings concerning Scientology and the religion's disgruntled posture recently came to a head with the release of Alex Gibney's combustible HBO documentary "Going Clear," based off of the best-selling book of the same name written by Pulitzer Prize winner Lawrence Wright (The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11). The film has drawn ire from the church, who took out a full-page ad in The New York Times to combat perceptions of Scientology solely based off the film, released a series of online videos to contest Gibney and Wright's claims, and also arranged a team of lawyers to prepare litigations.

I read Wright's book when it came out. Wright is a powerful and convincing investigative writer. His work was scrupulously researched (just look at the nearly 50 pages of endnotes!) and he leaves no Scientological stone unturned. 

Certainly, in investigating Scientology's founder, history, theology, rituals, and leadership systems (including the infamous 'Sea Org') Wright presents an impressive, engaging, and eerie story of a religion that many view as an out-of-control cult. And, in Wright's estimation, they may have every reason to believe so. 

Granted, Scientology has some strange beliefs and practices. Its cosmogony features a perplexing narrative that started some 75 million years ago. At that time, according to Hubbard and Scientologists, the Galactic Confederacy was run by an evil overlord named Xenu who exiled human souls (thetans) to Earth in space ships that look more like DC-8s than anything alien or ancient. Then there is the secretive Sea Org leadership crew and its Rehabilitation Project Force (RPF). The RPF involves punishment for Sea Org members who act, or speak, out and takes them through a process of remediation wherein they are supposedly forced to live in primitive conditions of forced asceticism, forced labor, and without contact with the outside world. 

So yeah, when it comes to Scientology things can get weird. 

Like most people, I am simultaneously enthralled and repelled by exotic entities such as Scientology. Therefore, just as I took a creepy little drive through the polygamous planned community of Colorado City after reading Jon Krakauer's Under the Banner of Heaven, I decided to drop by the Scientology center in Phoenix, AZ. 

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A picture from the backside of the Scientology Ideal Org in north Phoenix, AZ. 

Greeted by a young man we'll call "Tom" in suit and button-up shirt, looking the picture of business-casual Arizona chic, I was invited to sit down, served a glass of water on a seasonably warm day in the Valley of the Sun, and was given a run-down of the center's significant history. Tom told me the Phoenix center has some renown because it was the birthplace of Scientology, where Hubbard reportedly "made the breakthrough discoveries of the human spirit that gave rise to our religion." The Phoenix center is an "Ideal Organization" (or "Ideal Org") as it provides the full spectrum of facilities to educate Scientologists and serve as their home base for spiritual technological ritual.

I was then invited to enjoy an initial auditing session, what they called "a free stress-test," and take a brief tour of the facility. Already late for a meeting at a local church, I declined. I'll be honest, it was a convenient excuse. Bathed in Wright's analysis of Scientology I was swimming in cultic images and depictions of domination and control. I shivered as I left the air-conditioned insides of this Ideal Org and stepped into the Arizona sun. 

Fast-forward to 2015. This time, I'm not in Phoenix, but in Nashville, TN walking along broadway, the epicenter of "Nash Vegas" and its hoard of honky-tonks, neon-lit big boots, and country music kitsch. 

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Free stress-tests in Nashville, courtesy of the Sea Org. 

There, replete in matching red table cloth and seeming personnel uniforms were two Scientologists, piles of copies of Dianetics in multiple languages, and two E-meters just ready to read my stress levels and invite me into the world of Scientology. Just a week from the premier of the controversial HBO documentary I decided to dive back into the world of "spiritual technology."

I sat down across from "Betsy." After the exchange of pleasantries I had two metal cylinders in my hands, connected by black wires to a red E-meter (really, they had the color coordination thing down). Betsy proceeded to ask me questions about my family, work, travel, and life situation letting me know when the E-meter showed signs of stress and diving deeper into the contexts that may be responsible for tension in my life. 

Through the course of this conversation it came up that I am a PhD student studying religion (so I am totally stressed and totally feel guilty about it) and also work as a freelance religion newswriter and offer commentary on religion and culture. 

The gig was up. 

Our tête-a-tête turned away from my troubles and re-focused on Betsy's conversion, her experiences on the streets with naysayers, gawkers, and seekers, and yes, that book and documentary. The talk got personal quick and I could tell that Betsy's partner was slightly uncomfortable with the amount of intimate detail that she was divulging (although she would catch herself at times to keep some elements of her story closer to the chest). I promised Betsy I would not share the particulars of our dialogue, but I have to admit that as I walked away from the resplendently red table and matching everything I didn't shiver or shake from a rush of adrenaline or a sufficient sense of creepiness. 

Instead, I felt like I'd just talked to a human being. More than that, a spiritual and physical being in search of something greater than herself and finding it in the "spiritual technology" of Scientology. In my work as a religion newswriter, academic, and Christian churchworker I have interacted with lots of Betsy's. They've been Muslim, Lutheran, non-religious, Buddhist, pantheistic, and everything else betwixt and between. 

Over the years I've had many of my presuppositions flipped on their side or completely shattered. I've learned a lot in talking, and interacting, with "the religious other." Along the way, I've come to appreciate the humanity of each and every religious body and I am here to say that it is clearly time for the American public, the news media, and academia to do the same with Scientologists. At the very least, and in the worse-case scenario, I've been able to walk alongside someone who was in danger in their spiritual walk and was a resource for them as they found their way out of the religion they were a part of. Along the way, I've learned that my sympathy and friendship may be the greatest gifts I can offer to the "religious other" I encounter in my neighborhood, at the local pub, or on my city's streets.

Is Scientology a dangerous cult or an exalted form of 21st-century "spiritual technology" that holds the keys to our mythic past and our advanced future? The truth is probably on neither end of the spectrum, nor anywhere in the middle. Scientology is certainly strange (at least to me, and I am assuming, many of you) and its claims are surely suspect and deserving of skepticism. Nonetheless, the effort needs to be made to endeavor to understand even that which seems overly exotic, cultic, or bizarre  -- Scientology included. 

Could I be being swayed by propaganda, both public and personalized? Quite possibly. Is there something to be gained, and learned, through scrupulous study spurred by suspicion? Most definitely. Even so, I believe it is time to uncover another side of the Scientology story by investigating it sympathetically, exploring its human dynamics, and pursuing an emic (insider's) point-of-view.

As I oft-repeat as an advocate for religious literacy, there is a pertinent need for Americans (and indeed, people throughout the world) to cure ourselves of our irredeemable ignorance when it comes to religious beliefs, rituals, personages, and communities. Given our increased secularity and over-reliance on spiritual individualism some aspects of religion have become more controversial and more prone to explosive conflict. This is concomitant with reduced levels of religious literacy. New religious movements -- from ISKCON (International Society for Krishna Consciousness) to Scientology -- and other unconventional and perhaps uncomfortable forms of religion have become especially suspect at a time when religious institutions in general are being openly called into question. While Buddhists, Christians, Sikhs, Muslims, atheists and other religious bodies all catch plenty of flak, new and unusual religious groups encounter the most hostility. At a time when we are questioning levels of "Islamophobia" in the U.S. it is important we likewise interrogate our presuppositions about new religious movements. At the same time, some new religious movements have turned more inward and made matters worse lashing out with violence and more secrecy. This is a vicious spiral of ignorance, conflict, and occasional bloodshed. 

To turn away from this powder keg of a situation not only will Americans need to open ourselves up, so will Scientology. Just as the U.S. public should not be putting forward an image that says we are a place of religious freedom, "melting pot" multi-culturalism, and tolerance when in reality we are perniciously suspicious of anything we don't understand or can't associate with Scientology should also make the move away from propaganda and focus their previously cited proficiency with media to tell their story on personal and pellucid terms.

In that way, we can all move forward and "go clear" in our efforts toward greater religious literacy and interfaith engagement. 

*With all this said, let me add this caveat: I recommend you to read Lawrence Wright's Going Clear. I also suggest you check out Scientology's website to watch their responses. You could even go so far as to read Dianetics. As of right now, I would not encourage you to visit Scientology centers or receive "free stress tests" unless you are a researcher or journalist. There is still too much unknown about the organization, its beliefs, and practices for me to advocate a completely open stance. Likewise, I don't want to put you in a situation where you would feel threatened. This applies to the non-Scientologist as well as the Scientologist. I don't want those seeking understanding to be made unwarrantedly uncomfortable nor do I want to see people attacking the Betsys and Toms of this world for their beliefs. I would not want to be responsible for untold harm or damage to anyone, Scientologist or not. More time, and more purposeful transparency on both sides, is needed before we can be bold in our dialogue and exchange with Scientology. 

Three dead in NC. Will we pay attention?

I came on here to post my blog on the Crusades, Barack Obama, and al-Dawla al-Islamiyya (ISIS, ISIL, IS, Daesh). Then, I woke up to this:

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As reported, a man, Craig Stephen Hicks, who portrayed himself as an avowed atheist on social media turned himself in early Wednesday (February 11) after he allegedly shot, and killed, three people in Chapel Hill, NC at a condo complex near the University of North Carolina. The victims were Deah Shaddy Barakat, his newlywed wife of two-months, Yusor Abu-Salha, and her sister, Razan Abu-Salha. All three were Muslim. 

I came across this disheartening bulletin on Twitter & Facebook, with the hashtags #ChapelHillShooting and #MuslimLivesMatter. Where I did not come across this news (at the time) was on any of the three major television news networks in the U.S.: CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC. CNN posted a story 13 mins later, Fox and MSNBC followed suit within the hour. 

I took to Twitter and posted:

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While the motivations of Hicks are yet to be uncovered and made clear what is evident is this -- a breaking story wherein three Muslims were killed by a white, non-religious man, in the Southeast went uncovered by major news outlets for hours. Had it been three white victims killed by a single Muslim man I have no doubt this news would have shot to the headlines much quicker and, importantly, without the popular calls from thousands on social media who, without the aid of news outlets, got #MuslimLivesMatter and #ChapelHillShooting trending. 

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Although I understand that news outlets can't cover everything and even significant stories sometimes slip past their significant radar of journalists and staff watching local news sources and social media, I can't help but sense something more unnerving in this scenario. In a news cycle that pushes pictures of hostages in Iraq/Syria to the front page (and rightly so) and when a Muslim man (Alton Nolen) beheads a woman in Oklahoma and threatens/assaults others is the number one news item of the day and there is serious lag on the #ChapelHillShooting I feel like something is amiss. 

And my suspicion is not just a flight of fancy. Edward Said, in his work Covering Islam, made it explicit that Western media coverage of Muslims and Arabs was decidedly rife with cultural bias and political motives. Over the last thirty years, the situation has not improved. In fact, the media re-presentations may be getting worse. Other studies over the last decade have underscored the predilection that the media has for portraying Muslims in a negative light, which concomitantly goes hand-in-hand with lack of coverage of Muslim victims, multiple instances of mosque arson, or clear cases of anti-Muslim bigotry (a la the "Happy September 11th" to-go box in Houston, TX). 

Unfortunately, not only does this lack of coverage of anti-Muslim bigotry and simultaneous vilification of Muslims in the news on a regular basis (whether rightly or wrongly) cause us to devalue human lives simply because they are Muslim lives, but it also aggravates the situation that undergirds this entire confabulation. 

Frequent commenter Erik Johnson wrote to me this morning that we should not let the #ChapelHillShooting be used as a "fig leaf for much other evil" perpetrated by the likes of al-Dawla al-Islamiyya and other religio-political violent terror groups. Certainly, Johnson is right to make this caveat clear. At the same time, we must recognize the fact that anti-Muslim bias and a reticence to highlight that #MuslimLivesMatter only feeds into the propaganda promulgated by al-Dawla al-Islamiyya and their ilk. 

As I shared this morning:

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Just as Muslims make it clear that violence and terror is not to be done in the name of Islam (#NotInMyName) we who are not Muslim (or even those who are) must make it unequivocal that we do not condone, nor will we allow, religious or a-religious violence or bigotry be done in our names or in our countries. We cannot allow the false dichotomy between Islam and the West to be compounded.

Instead, we must listen and learn, dialogue and discern, dine together, do good together, and seek peace together. While there is worth in learning from our history, there is little value in quarreling ad nauseam over emphases in history while a contemporary crisis boils over in both foreign locals and our own communities. 

As Ronald A. Lindsey, president and CEO of the Center for Inquiry -- a secular educational organization for the promotion of humanist values -- said, "[w]e hope that what ultimately emerges from this tragedy is a deeper understanding between people of all faiths and no faith that each one of us has the capacity to do good, to help in our own small ways to make the world a better place....we are all responsible for each other."

Religious literacy, and its vehicles of religious education and experience, are crucial components in combatting religious cluelessness and its antecedents of bigotry, deconstruction of human identity and religious/sociological/racist/cultural violence.

As Yehezkel Landau said in an article entitled Teaching the Religious Other from the U.S. Institute for Peace, “We need to develop educational strategies to overcome the ignorance that leads to prejudice, which in turn leads to dehumanizing contempt, which in turn breeds violence.”

It is my hope that through religious education, both experiential and in-depth in the classroom, mosque, or local church, we can mature out of our religious ignorance and bias and instead step into a future where, while we may not all get along, we may at least understand a little bit more about each other’s religious convictions and customs. This won’t be accomplished by blogs alone, thoughtful articles or even secondary religious education, but instead will be forged in direct encounter with the “religious other” in a peaceful context and with an open mind prepared by previous study and discussion.

The good news is, you can start today. Pay attention. Share this news, talk about this news. Be impacted by this news today. Be disheartened for the families of the victims. Stand with atheists who are saying #NotInMyName. Stand with Muslims who feel persecuted in the U.S. and elsewhere. Stand for peace, reconciliation, and compassion. Stand for #MuslimLivesMatter. 

And then, do something about it. Pray for mercy and peace. Build bridges of hope through education, relationship, or collective interfaith action.

Just. Do. Something. 

The Quran in Conversation: Hearing Diverse Voices in American Islam (Interview)

Just over half of Americans (54%) know that the Qur'an is Islam's holy book. Based on that number, it is likely that much less have much knowledge of its contents or if they do, they only know what is given to them by popular pundits, mainstream media, and polemical parties ranging from the liberal to the strictly conservative. 

The Qur'an is not Islam's "Bible" per se. It is much more. As an illustration, the Qur'an is to Islam what Jesus is to Christianity. It is the very embodiment of the revelation of God. It is received, not inspired. In the original Arabic, it is the very word of God to the people of Earth. It is the foundation and form of Muslim belief and ritual, providing an outline of their doctrine and a playbook for their piety. It is a complex collection of revelation that, for Muslims, deserves the utmost respect, attention, repetition, and faithful interpretation. 

Increasingly, it also demands our attention, respect, and faithful engagement. Not only are the number of Muslims increasing in the U.S. (both from immigration and domestic conversion), but there are also myriad advocates of Huntington's "clash of civilizations" thesis and pundits misquoting, or at the very least misinterpreting, Quranic ayahs (verses). In order to befriend and dialogue with our Muslim neighbors, coworkers, and community members in a compassionate, and informed manner we need to approach the Qur'an with charity and a zeal for apperception from a Muslim perspective, not with our own lenses. 

Omid Safi wrote in his review of this book, Quran in Conversation, the Qur'an is quick becoming an American scripture and this book provides a rich opportunity to understand it as such. As the editor Dr. Michael Birkel wrote in his introduction,

“This book is written for readers of goodwill who are curious to learn more, who are rightly suspicious of rancorous distortions of Islam, and who would like to hear thoughtful Muslims themselves talk about their Scripture in ways that outsiders can comprehend.”

Relying on the first-hand accounts of more than twenty Muslims scholars and leaders, Birkel has assembled a collection of fresh American Muslim voices that speak to relevant issues of Islamic theology, women and Islam, global Islam, relationships with "the religious other," and others.

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Personally, I appreciated the echoes of my own faith and practice that I found in the book, not to mention the many illuminating insights I read including perspectives on how Muslims in America are comfortable with diversity, are holistic and vibrant in their religious orientation, and are competent in addressing the most contentious questions concerning Islam. More than anything I respect and am pleased with the fact that Birkel allows the subaltern Muslim voice to guide the conversation, going so far as to keep his commentary to a minimum and even change its font to a smaller size than the text of Islamic interlocutors. 

Nonetheless, I must note that this book is not without its bias. Lacking in its pages are "hardline" interpretations, strictly classical readings, and Wahhabi/Salafi discourses. What Birkel wants you to hear are progressive voices, which are no doubt founded in traditional sources, classical schools of thought, and informed by centuries of Islamic tradition, but are nonetheless forward thinking, mystical more than classical, informed by the modern era, and boundary blurring. In its pages this book contains interfaith pioneers, feminist heroes, and multicultural mavens who provide an eye-opening glimpse into the diversity of contemporary Muslim thought in the U.S. 

I am often asked by people reticent to recognize that Islam is anything other than a violent, blood-soaked, medieval religion to provide examples of enlightened reformist Islamic voices. While I have not struggled to name names and reference essays and/or books, this volume makes my response that much easier. For everyone who challenges me to provide examples of the wide spectrum of Islamic thought I will no doubt refer them to Quran in Conversation. While it may not provide every perspective in the American Muslim world, it does a phenomenal job showcasing a wide variety of dissonant and varyingly orthodox, but avant-garde voices emerging from the variegated American Muslim landscape. 

*To learn more about religion & culture, follow @kchitwood on Twitter

Below is an interview I was pleased to have with the editor Dr. Michael Birkel who is a professor of religion at Earlham College in Richmond, Indiana. 

Dr. Birkel, thank you for taking the time to talk about your new book. Why don't you start by telling me a bit about yourself and your academic background: 

I come from a Quaker background and teach widely, on topics as varied as the history of Christianity, Hebrew Scriptures.

With that background, how did you get started with a book on Islam and the Qur'an? 

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Dr. Michael Birkel, editor and commentator of Quran in Conversation. 

I started out just wanting to know more about Islam in order to teach more about Islam. My philosophy of teaching is about truth seeking and then truth telling. Teaching can also be a form of peacemaking. Truth isn’t being completely sought or told in painting a portrait of Islam. We tend to always see extremists from far away. 

So, I began by reading widely, learned Quranic Arabic to read the text, and began teaching Islam. I have some students who are Muslim and they will take my class because I teach Islam with respect. Their knowledge of Islam may be very deep, but as wide as their zipcode. It’s very local. I came to learn that their own tradition is broader then they thought. People need to know more about Islam. Religious literacy among non-Muslims in society is pretty low. 

How did this book come about? 

I was encouraged by these students to write a book from the outside of Islam. My scholarly training was not in Islam, so I am not a trained scholar but I could meet the people who are. This book project grew out of it. Non-Muslims tend to know nothing about what is in the Qur'an or about their Muslim neighbors.

What I decided to do was my Muslim neighbors (imams, educators, university professors, Islamic students) to choose one passage from the Qur'an and talk to me about it. I had 25 extraordinary conversations and included them in this book. 

What I find fascinating is that when you ask someone what is at the center of their religious experience and bring a listening and sympathetic ear to that conversation, something wonderful and enlightening can happen. That's the aim of this text. 

I teach some biblical studies and love the history of biblical interpretation over the centuries. Sacred texts give life, and come to life, in community. I knew the Qur'an gave life to the Islamic community, this book is an opportunity to come to the life of that community. 

What new, or surprising, things did you learn as you engaged in these conversations? 

One theme that emerged again and again, one not portrayed in the wider media, was that of mercy and compassion. This idea of rahma (mercy) is at the center of the Islamic experience. The fundamental nature of Allah is mercy. As one of the contributors (Mohammad Hassan Khalil) said, the "idea of rahma frames the Qur'an." 

That sense of divine mercy overcoming all else came up again and again as a quality of God, as a divine attribute that we as humans are to emulate. Within the Muslim community it lends a strong concern for social justice and externally ones’ dealings with those outside the umma. If the Quran is a vehicle, mercy is the chassis.

Another thing I learned is what I learned from speaking with Muslims from a variety of ethnic backgrounds and global locales. So, I learned that whatever you think Islam is, it’s bigger and wider than that.

Finally, I was overwhelmed by the depth of Muslim hospitality in sharing their personal perspectives with me, with us. Specifically, voices of gender justice from prominent and rising Muslim feminist voices became a real gift. It is stunning to be in the room with these individuals who share a concern for this dimension of human justice and to base it within the Qur'an. They see this text as fundamentally about human equality. Even though there are aspects of their culture and text may seem the other way they are very committed to a reading of the text that is committed to gender equality. They bring learning, creativity, and innovation to their reading of the text. A number of these folks have taken steps of individual personal courage in challenging patriarchal dimensions within the Muslim community. 

How do people of other faiths jump in to the Quranic conversation? 

The Qur'an is complicated for newcomers. It is not arranged thematically or chronologically. Still, this is the same with the Bible. Imagine picking up Jeremiah. What’s going on here? It’s a complicated text. If you throw the Bible even at Christian students without commentary or tools, it would be difficult. People reading the Gospels feel like it’s a collection of different stories. How do you reconcile it all? You need help and guidance through the text. A community. 

We who read our own texts in community may challenge one another, propose what is a faithful reading and what is not. But still, we read it in company and articulate our understanding of it in community. The same happens with Qur'an. One way to read the text is to read it with Muslims. If you don’t want to barge into your local mosque, you can begin by reading this book!

You wrote, "Islam should no longer be regarded as so foreign, as 'the other,' in the West, yet at the same time it should remain distinctive, not to be domesticated in the service of any other religion." Tell me more about that and the idea of the Qur'an as "an American Scripture."

This is an incredibly exciting time to be a Muslim in North America. On one hand, it’s difficult. Try flying, going to an airport. It’s tough, but it’s also exciting. If 100 years ago you were visiting me in Philadelphia or Chicago and you were Roman Catholic and wanted to go to church I could take you to different places based on your ethnicity because of the "center of support" nature of cathedrals for Irish, Polish, Slovak communities, etc.. Now, for the most part that doesn’t hold as much. Distinctly American expressions of Catholicism have emerged. 

A similar process is underway among the American Muslim community. There are still Muslim ethnic enclaves. You could choose your mosque based on ethnicity or language (for khutbah), but that is changing right now because the next generation (after the 1960s immigration policy change) are now young leaders in the North American Muslim community. English is their first spoken language. While they know Arabic, Urdu, or other tongues at home, they think, produce, and write in English. They find themselves in a mosque from other places. 

Even Sunni and Shi’i pray together in the U.S. They pray together, reflect together, talk together, and in this coming together in conversation they are cross-influencing each other in a new way. They could not meet in their home countries except at the hajj, now they are living in America's cities together and are expressing their Muslim identity in American culture. 

Anything else…?

I could imagine a critique of this book. Who does this guy think he is? He is not a trained scholar of Islam! 

That’s exactly why I did it. I spoke to my neighbors and had memorable, precious, and spiritually enlightening conversations. I am not a trained scholar, and so that means you can go and do the same. I would hope that this book would only be an introduction to a greater conversation, a primer that would inspire non-Muslim readers to go out and have conversations with Muslims themselves. 

*To learn more about, or purchase, the book, please visit Baylor University Press's website.

*To learn more about religion & culture, follow @kchitwood on Twitter

What the heck are Chrismons?

Vintage Christmas style is in these days. From old style Christmas cards to ugly Christmas sweater parties to the retro-chic look of a “winter” (or Advent) beard, this year’s festal season is in many ways a throw back to holidays past. If you want your tree to harken back to the nifty-fifties, then your best bet might be to add a gold and white Chrismon decoration.

Yeah, that’s right…a Chrismon.

What’s a Chrismon you ask?

The word Chrismon is derived from the words “Christ Monograms.” They are symbols representing the life, the ministry and the meaning of Jesus Christ. They are used to decorate Christmas trees and Christian homes during the holidays and along with being white and gold, they are often decorated with beads, ribbons and glitter.

*For more #FaithGoesPop follow @kchitwood

While these golden ornaments may not be in high demand for the majority of holiday revelers this Christmas, they are still found in Methodist and Lutheran churches throughout the United States.

Chrismons take many shapes and forms. From an anchor to a pomegranate, these symbols have been used by Christians for centuries to communicate theology, designate Christian meeting places in times of persecution, and identify individuals as Christian.

The modern tradition of hanging Chrismons was started by Frances K. Spencer at Lutheran Church of the Ascension in Danville, Virginia in 1957. Since then the practice has spread across the United States.

Talking to Gretchen Roberts of the Lutheran Witness, Rev. Dr. David Eberhard, pastor of the Historic Trinity church in Detroit said, “You’ve heard a picture is worth a thousand words. Nike has a swoosh; Ford’s blue oval is instantly recognizable. Our Christian symbols tell a story and reinforce the proclaimed Word. They are a visual statement of who we are as God’s people.”

However, a lot of the meaning of these symbols has been lost in contemporary Christmas culture.

At Memorial Lutheran Church in Katy, where I worked for a few years, the congregation went through a series of Advent devotionals based on the Chrismon symbols. Accompanying the sermon series there was a daily devotional highlighting a different Chrismon each day. Asked about the devotionals and learning the meaning of the Chrismons parishioner Mary Weis said she was enjoying the devotionals.

“I sat down to read one and found myself skipping ahead” she said, “I ended up finishing the devotional in one night, it was so interesting to learn the meaning of the symbols, it gives visual reference for my faith.”

Christmas, and its seasonal siblings – Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, the Winter Solstice and even Festivus – are meaningful holidays with religious and sociological importance. Icons and signs like Chrismons add special symbolic significance to these holidays. As was reported in my previous post on secular holiday symbols, Adele Nozedar said "the use of a simple symbol...says far more than any wordy explanation ever could." She continued, "Signs and symbols, our invention of them and understanding of them, transcend the barriers of written language and are the very heart of our existence as human beings." 

Symbols, like the Chrismons, help us make sense of the season, interpret our own identity, and even understand the cosmos itself.  

Perhaps this year you can take a moment to learn more about Chrismons and their meaning, or even make a few of your own as a family project. Here is just a sampling of some of the Chrismons and their significance:

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Bronze snake and tau – harkening back to an Old Testament story (Numbers 21:9) it points to the coming of Jesus Christ who would be “lifted up” for the life of his people (John 3:14).

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Pomegranate – This Mediterranean fruit is a symbol of the church, its seeds representing the people who are full of potential to bear much fruit (Matthew 7:17-18).

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Chi Rho – This is easily one of the most recognizable symbols of Christianity and is literally a “monogram of Christ.” The first two letters of the Greek word for “Messiah,” “Anointed One,” or “Christ” are chi (x) and rho(p). Put together they form this symbol of Jesus Christ. In the image above there are two additional symbols - the Alpha and Omega - signaling that Jesus Christ is the first and the last (alpha being the first letter of the Greek alphabet, omega the final), at creation and at judgment day in the Christian tradition. The "X" in X-mas is derived from the chi in chi rho. While many believe the "X" is secular, it is derived from ancient Christian symbology. 

*For more #FaithGoesPop follow @kchitwood

Faith Goes Pop?

Taylor Swift. My new blog venture begins with Taylor Swift. What could go wrong? 

I am excited to announce a new project I am (re)launching with Read the Spirit entitled "Faith Goes Pop." 

The aim of the "Faith Goes Pop" blog is a "bold foray into the unknown and untamable intersections between, and manifestations of, religion and popular culture." Like Taylor Swift, I am "going pop" and jumping head first to combine sightings of the intersections between "faith" and "pop culture" with winsome and witty commentary that will hopefully lead to a book project down the road. But, I need your help! 

So, I invite you to check out the blog this week and share it your friends. It goes "full launch" with Read the Spirit next week when I will be featured on their e-mail blast and magazine front page. Exciting times, thanks for coming along with me on this journey! 

*For more on religion & culture, follow @kchitwood.

*Read the Spirit is a publishing company, an online magazine and a network of writers connecting readers with the most important voices in religion, spirituality, interfaith and cross-cultural issues. Read the Spirit strives for accuracy, balance and fairness.

Why "world religion Bible studies" are awful

The U.S. is suffering from a case of multi-generational and multi-cultural  religious illiteracy —what Stephen Prothero calls, “religious amnesia.” The United States, in spite of its established secularism, is a thoroughly pluralistic nation with robust expressions of myriad world religions everywhere from the wheat fields of Iowa to the buckled asphalt of Los Angeles. Yet, we are simultaneously “a nation of religious illiterates” who flunk the most basic of quizzes on religion — even our own. It seems, “[m]ost Americans remain far more committed to respecting other religions than learning about them.” 

To the rescue come "world religion Bible studies" that attempt to help Christians navigate their world's stunning religious pluralism.  The problem is, most "world religion Bible studies" are terrible. 

While most of the leaders of these studies start with the intention to help their parishioners learn more about the world's religions, the way they go about it usually leads to nominally increased religious literacy. Even worse, these studies often exacerbate pre-existing prejudices or presuppositions about studied worldviews. 

Granted, not all world religion studies are horrible, but many I've been to, or heard of (and, admittedly, some of the ones I've taught), were dreadful. While I confess that I'm a culprit of creating crappy curriculums for a "world religion Bible study" or two, I humbly suggest that I have learned the error of my ways (mostly) and want to propose some strategies to remedy the oversights of well-meaning pastors and educators.

*For more on religion and culture, follow @kchitwood

So, below are THREE REASONS WHY WORLD RELIGION BIBLE STUDIES SUCK and a few accompanying action points to make them better:   

1) Unschooled teachers 

The number one issue with the vast majority of these studies is those who are teaching don't know much about the world's religions in the first place. Furthermore, they are not in the least bit trained in how to properly engage in religious studies, which is a topic altogether distinct from the task of theology.

While teaching can be a wonderful way to learn, we should not feign being an expert when we really have not spent the time to gain expertise in one religion other than ours, let alone multiple world religions. And do not, for a moment, think that because you read one book, watched a movie, or visited a temple that this makes you an expert on Buddhism, Islam, Scientology, etc.

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This is the cover of a book I wrote on "twenty major world religions" in New Zealand. It isn't the best, but what was great about it was that I submitted every chapter to a practitioner of that respective belief system. They corrected much of what I got wrong and provided deep insight into how to (re)present religion. 

Admittedly, several pastors confessed to me that they do not know much about the world's religions, but decide to teach on them anyways because, "my parishioners are asking me to." Granted, you, as a pastor or teacher, are in a tough place when people ask you to lead a study in an area you feel you know little about. I feel for you. But then there are other pastors who took one class on world religions, watched one documentary, or read one book and decide, "My people need to know this!" and like a crusader gallivanting off to slay the pagan hordes they announce a study to equip their congregants for the spiritual battle at hand. #Facepalm. Maybe you are the former, maybe you're the latter. Either way, you aren't an expert — I implore you to stop acting like one. 

Nonetheless, I feel for you. The problem is that we pastors and teachers are expected to be weekly experts on a wide variety of topics. Every Sunday a pastor is meant to churn out a sermon wherein he/she expounds on a relevant topic from a deep knowledge of the biblical text. People listen to the pastor as if he/she is an authority on the given topic (marriage, parenting, politics, etc.). While most pastors (certainly not all) are adept at interpreting Scripture, they are not mavens in every field. It's unfair to expect them to be an expert on everything — especially religions they were not trained in. Too often we pressure them to act as if they are. Likewise, teachers and educators are expected to cover a broad range of topics week-in and week-out, even if their knowledge on some of these topics is exhausted within the confines of the text they use to teach. This problem becomes paramount in teaching on world religions.

With untrained teachers and unqualified pastors diving head first into a study where they are presumed to be specialists, but are effectively faking even basic facility, what most world religion Bible studies become are cesspools of collective religious ignorance not classrooms prepped for increased religious literacy. 

Sometimes, in an effort to sidestep an educator's insufficiency for the task, an ex-member testimony is favored. Oh Lord have mercy, this is even worse. Certainly, ex-members have a voice to bring to the table and their perspective is a valuable one to appreciate in our study of religion. But it is only one voice and an extremely biased one at that. Ex-members are ex-members for a reason. While they may not "have an axe to grind" they will most definitely present a prejudiced perspective on a religion they now eschew. 

Imagine this -- an atheist meet-up group wants to learn more about Christianity. To do so, they bring in a former evangelical who no longer believes in God to talk about their former faith. Would you, as a Christian, say that the atheists in that group necessarily got a fair picture of Christianity? Would you want them to perhaps balance out their learning with some supplementary teaching or a current member's testimony? If not, you should. Relying on ex-member testimonies or teaching is a sure way to get a skewed impression of a world religion.

So, how do we fix this? Three ways:  

The fix: Get an education. Take a class, keep reading, enroll in a master's program. Become the expert you are pretending to be. Even a few classes on one religion will equip you to better teach that topic. However, do not think that taking one intro class on world religions or reading one book is enough. Dive deep into one religion before you endeavor to teach it. Enjoy that process? Keep going deeper or expand your knowledge to include other religions. Repeat as necessary.

The fix: Study in the presence, or even under, the "religious other." While I do not like the fertile terrain for prejudice that "othering" a people group creates, the reality is that most Christians feel that Muslims and Mormons, Jews, Jains, and Jedis are "the religious other." They feel uncomfortable talking about these other faiths in the presence of "the other" (cue creepy sci-fi music here). So, they round up the wagons, close the parish hall doors, and "study" them from the safety of their own sanctuaries. As an educator, your task is to bust those doors down and make the learning environment an uncomfortable one. Bring in a Muslim to team-teach on Islam, invite an atheist to present their non-religious ways, visit a local mosque, temple, or place of worship to engage in experiential education, make your study public, or at the very least ask a Buddhist to sit in on your teaching to call you out or offer further food for thought. Yeah, it will be awkward, unsettling, and a bit "weird," but that's a good thing. In that environment learning is probably going to take place on all sides. 

The fix: Bring in the experts. f all else fails, ask the experts. Bring in a local professor or your denomination's resident religious scholar, anthropologist, or sociologist. As mentioned before, bring in a Buddhist monk to share their practice, an imam to elucidate their beliefs, etc. Shameless plug: invite me to come and speak. While I can't speak to EVERY religion with expertise, I can at least point you in the right direction or start you off with the right tools/perspective. 

2) The category of "world religions" is problematic anyways

Even if a pastor/teacher is schooled in the ways of the world's religions, what is a "world religion?" Most studies pick out a few heavy hitters among the sundry spiritualities that are held and practiced around the globe. There are some usual suspects that pop up in almost every world religion study. Here's an example from the table of contents of a self-titled "world religion Bible study" curriculum: Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Judaism, Confucianism, Bahai Faith, Spirit Religions, Atheism, New Age Movement, and others. This is a generous list. Another "world religion" study I saw recently (at a Lutheran church) sought to teach the following: Catholicism, Islam, Anglicanism, Pentecostalism, Buddhism.... Yikes. 

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This was a fun study that we did at a local brewery in Houston, Texas. While I taught this one solo, I had people who were Christian, agnostic, atheist, "spiritual, but not religious," Confucian, and Buddhist come to the study. They called me out when I needed it. And then we had a beer together, so it was all cool. 

The issue here is that these lists, and most other scopes and sequences of world religions studies make three mistakes: 1) ignore religions and spiritualities on the periphery (e.g. Sikhism, Yoruba, Juche, etc.); 2) lump together multiple world views and practiced spiritualities into general categories that obfuscate more than they educate ("Spirit religions" covers a wide, diverse, range of religions/spiritualities ranging from indigenous religion to hybrid spiritualities, New Age and "others" is necessarily ambiguous, and "Islam" and "Hinduism" obscure realities that exist in the margins); 3) make divisions where they need not do so (is a "world religions" class the proper place to present the differences between Catholics and Lutherans?). 

*For more on religion and culture, follow @kchitwood

These categories, meant to help simplify the study or book (however well-meaning they are) betray a dangerous unsophistication when it comes to apperceiving and appreciating the wild diversity of religious beliefs and spiritual practice around the world. 

The fix: Teach the tools. For years, the archetypal format of religious studies tended to place different religious traditions, typically those deemed to be “the world’s ‘great’ religions,” in their respective silos and investigate them each according to some prescribed rubric based on the author’s own definition of religion. This pedagogical approach tended to dissociate individual traditions from the study of religion as a whole and, even, from the students themselves. Since, as authors George D. Chryssides and Ron Geaves noted, students “rarely come to study religion because they wish to be neutral social scientists or simply to describe religious belief and practice more accurately,” this method bequeaths a superficial knowledge of religion at best and exacerbated stereotypes of the spiritual at its worst. Hence, I suggest an initial approach that involves considering what it means, and looks like, to study religion from a disciplined, self-reflective, point of view rather than a theological one. In lieu of teaching the religions themselves, teach how to study religion in the first place. Teach how to ask questions, be a participant-observer, etc. The rules that apply to training apply here too. If you don't feel comfortable as a religious student, bring someone in who is. 

3) Straw man studies

Now, if untrained leaders and unrefined categories are bad, this problem is the Satan-of-world-religion-studies incarnate. 

I get what the leader of these studies is trying to do: help their flock better understand other religions so that they can witness to their neighbor, coworker, family member, or friend. Typically, the end game of these studies is to help the Christian better evangelize someone of another faith. 

Putting the issues of hegemony, colonialism, and arrogance involved in discussions of Christian mission and evangelism aside for a moment, such an approach in a world religion Bible study is bad for the simple reason that in the rush to get to "what's wrong with this religion" that we usually end up skipping over "what this religion is" in the first place. 

We either misapprehend, or misrepresent, world religions by presenting a "straw man" form of the faith  (a hollow, or sham, version of the worldview that is easily defeated in an artificial argument without "the other" present) or do so by seeking first to pinpoint error rather than attempting first to understand. 

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This shot is from an event called, "Interview with an atheist," in which I invited two local, prominent, non-believers to share their story in front of a Christian audience. We then had a Q&A session that was uncomfortable, challenging, and wonderful in every way. It was not a debate. It was not a "bash the atheist/Christian" fest. It was a charitable dialogue, and everyone walked away changed. 

Sabine MacCormack in her book Religion in the Andes: Vision and Imagination in Colonial Peru shared how missionaries in colonial Peru set out to comprehend Incan religion as it was practiced in both in the centers of power (i.e. Cusco) and in the rural Andes. In their accounts, they made two fatal mistakes: 1) by setting out with the primary purpose of extirpating (destroying) these beliefs and practices and 2) interpreting these religions through their own spiritual lenses. These approaches meant that the missionaries completely misinterpreted the religion as it was presented to them. They misconstrued myths, received a false impression about beliefs, and misread rituals.  All the while, the Andean beliefs and practices survived and even thrived, whether under the guise of Catholicism or out in the open, and often with greater emphasis than before. Setting out to eradicate the religion of the Andes, the missionaries misunderstood it completely. Too often, world religion Bible studies do the same. 

The fix: Study in the presence, or even with, the "religious other." Again, there is nothing better for our mutual learning and understanding than having a Muslim present when you teach on Islam. Give permission for them to correct you where they think you are wrong. Maybe you're not and they just don't like the way you put it. But, maybe you are. Have the guts to have a practitioner of the faith you are studying call you out. Assume insiders are the experts, you would expect the same from someone studying Christianity. Your study will be MUCH BETTER because of it. 

The fix: Seek understanding and relationship. The primary goal of your study should be understanding and bridge building, not apologetics or polemic. Before you call the heresy police, hear me out. While we often see our friendships with people of other faith as a means to an end, I am proposing that we see the relationships as ends unto themselves. Part of God's grand plan is a restoring of what was lost in our fall from grace. Part of Christ's redemptive work is to bring together that which was torn asunder. Understanding other religions, and building relationships with "the religious other," is part and parcel to the resurrective, restorative, and recreative kingdom of Jesus -- to bring unity and fellowship where there was disharmony and division. This does not mean forsaking witness, but it does mean not orsaking friendship for the sake of witness. Witness to the worldview, sure. Share your faith, certainly. But the friendship must endure, the understanding must be the primary goal, and the first step in evangelizing needs to be shutting our mouths, and opening our ears, to listen and learn.

*Was this post helpful? Hurtful? Have a suggestion? Want to accuse me of heresy or worse? This blog is meant to be a provocation toward deeper understanding. It's a beginning. There will certainly be revisions in my own thought -- additions, subtractions, and perhaps a crumpling of the entire project and a total re-write before we can, together, build a “strong, benevolent Christianity” (a la Brian McLaren) that can successfully engage other religions, spiritualities, and worldviews in a context defined by religious pluralism. So, please share your thoughts with me below or via e-mail. 

*For more on religion and culture, follow @kchitwood

The danger of crafting Muslim identities for our own purposes

*For more on religion & culture follow @kchitwood

The situation with ISIS/ISIL (Al-Dawla Al-Islamiya) continues to heat up. ISIS continues to post videos of atrocious beheadings of their Western prisoners (two U.S. journalists and a British aid-worker). These digital demonstrations have provoked the Western military powers into intense discussions of reprisals and concrete conversations about constructing a coalition.

*Read "Five Facts You Need to Know about Iraq, its Religious Minorities, and ISIS."

Amidst the flurry of emotion and geo-political crusading an interesting, misleading, trend has re-surfaced: the crafting of Muslim identity by non-Muslims for the latter's own purposes.

President Barack Obama's comments to this effect did not go unnoticed. He said on September 10, just a day before the 13th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks:

“...let’s make two things clear: ISIL is not “Islamic.” No religion condones the killing of innocents, and the vast majority of ISIL’s victims have been Muslim. And ISIL is certainly not a state.”

POTUS's comments echo those of George W. Bush who famously quipped in the aftermath of 9/11, that Islam "is a peaceful religion" (Nov 13, 2002) and that:

“Islam is a vibrant faith. Millions of our fellow citizens are Muslim. We respect the faith. We honor its traditions. Our enemy does not. Our enemy doesn’t follow the great traditions of Islam. They’ve hijacked a great religion.”

— October 11, 2002

Obama used this language before moving on to say, "Our objective is clear: we will degrade, and ultimately destroy, ISIL through a comprehensive and sustained counter-terrorism strategy."

British Prime Minister David Cameron joined in with the ISIS ≠ Islam prose. In the wake of the execution of British aid-worker David Haines, Cameron remarked that ISIS "are not Muslims, they are monsters." He branded the ISIS killings and subsequent videos as acts "of pure evil" and vowed that the UK, "will do everything in our power to hunt down these murderers and ensure they face justice." 

Cameron, and Obama, made comments about what Islam is, and what it is not, that allowed them to justify their actions. Realizing that the "clash of civilizations" rhetoric (the "West" versus "Islam") is not popular sentiment, nor is it conducive to building a coalition that would include Muslim-states and Muslim majority nations, the two Western leaders made sweeping statements about what Islam is, and is not, in order to vindicate their aggressive, military-based, retaliations. 

Response to Cameron and Obama's comments has been mixed. Many from progressive Muslim communities praised them for drawing a line between their peaceful faith and practice and the brutal extremism of ISIS. Many on the far-right of the political spectrum (and even some from among the ranks of the "New Atheists," including Sam Harris) in the U.S. lambasted POTUS for his "ignorance" concerning ISIS and Islam, saying that he "isn't qualified enough to say what is and what is not Muslim." 

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Photo: Shibli Zaman, Loonwatch.com

At the same time, a Twitter handle by the name of "Ahimla Jihada" (@Ahimla2), which spouted seemingly supportive superlatives for ISIS from an "American-Muslim woman" was found to be a fake. Before the account was shutdown, the tweets of @Ahimla2, which declared her devotion to ISIS and love for terror (from within the United States no less!) produced strong responses calling for her death and the killing of many more Muslims in the U.S. Shibli Zaman at Loonwatch.com lamented:

“There are dubious forces from an increasingly belligerent political Right who are out to brainwash, by hook or crook, the American public into hating their fellow citizens of the Muslim faith and to justify a foreign policy in the ‘10/40 Window’ that has tarnished America’s reputation globally and needlessly puts our men and women in uniform in harm’s way.”

While Cameron/Obama/Bush may be lauded for trying to distinguish between ISIS and global Islam and this Twitter scandal may be mourned as an attempt to justify Islamophobia in the U.S., they are both examples of the same error: Western politicians or popular pundits cannot be the ones to say what Islam is and is not. 

*Read "Does ISIS = Islam?"

At issue here is the question -- who has the right to define what Islam is and is not? 

Language has power to shape opinions and to galvanize people to action. These leaders and culture shapers understand this. That is why they use essentializing terminology to declare what Islam is and is not. By becoming arbiters of Islamic identity, Western leaders seek to make essentialist claims in order to provide powerful, and useful, rallying-points for their own agendas. In these cases, attacking and destroying ISIS on the one hand, turning on Muslims in the U.S. on the other. 

While artlessly defining Islam may prove useful for political purposes, it is not conducive to helping non-Muslims understand what Islam is. Concepts such as 'Islam' are not static. There is no fixed form of Islam that can be found or defined, especially by non-Muslims. Instead, Islam is a diverse stream of various forces, persistently in process, forever in flux, consistently contingent on changing cultural, political, ethnic, religious, and economic realities. Really, the language of Obama, Cameron, @Ahimla2 and others who want to say neatly that ISIS is Islamic, or it is not Islamic, is hegemony at work again -- colonial powers attempting to define the "other" in order to exert their own influence or power in the Islamic world. 

My concern here is not political, it is not militaristic. Instead, it is one of religious literacy. Islam is one of the most multi-cultural, multi-generational, multifaceted, and misunderstood religions in the world, especially in the West. In order to understand Islam, we cannot apperceive it according to uncluttered constructs or uncomplicated categories. Instead, the messiness and miscellany of the Muslim world must be explored. This will often mean meeting with local Muslims, observing regional dynamics, and listening, and learning, their perspectives on global Islam. Especially in the West, we need to listen to Muslims speak about their own community, from all sides, before we begin crafting Muslim identities according to our own motivations -- be they benign or malevolent.  

If Western powers or Islamophobes want to say what Islam is or is not for their own political ends, so be it. What I don't want to see is the general population getting carried away with a vision of Islam that is founded more in Western hegemony than it is global Islamic reality. 

Does ISIS = Islam?

Does ISIS = Islam? Does Islam = ISIS? 

In the wake of rising violence and thuggish rhetoric, many are re-visiting the common accusation that terror groups and rogue states such as ISIS are Islam and that any discussion about the varieties of Islamic belief and ritual throughout the world is smokescreen. The assumptive claim is that if you prick Islam it always bleeds terror, hate, and violence. 

Dr. Terje Østebø, whose perspective on global Islam helped inspire this post, is involved in the launch of the University of Florida’s Center for Global Islamic Studies. After The Gainesville Sun published an article on the center’s launch, Østebø suffered vitriol via comments, phone calls, and e-mails. Although Østebø said, “There is an urgent need for a deeper and more nuanced understanding of the rich diversity and the complex dynamics of contemporary Islam," many of his critics found the need to point out to him — the scholar in Islam — that Islam is clearly typified by ISIS and that ISIS is at the core of this world religion.

*For more on religion and culture, follow @kchitwood

Unfortunately, these verbal assaults are too often accompanied by physical attacks as well as just last week, a man chased a Muslim American woman into oncoming traffic in Brooklyn while threatening to behead her and her companion. Every time I post an article, like this one, I will undoubtedly receive comments like this from Cowboywill46:

“Once and for all, will someone with a grain of sense admit to the world that Islam is nothing more than a mind-control, anti-social cult bent on world domination. ”

— Cowboywill46

To be fair, Islam is a world religion with a unifying foundation. It may be the Qur’an, or the holy book’s common language — Arabic. The shahada, or profession of faith that “there is no god but God and Muhammad is his prophet,” is universal in form — all Muslims confess it, it is what it takes, and means, to be Muslim. Mecca, perhaps, as “the capital of Islam” serves as, in the words of Miriam Cooke and Bruce B. Lawrence, as “[t]he organizing principle of Islamic ritual and imagination.” As such, this Saudi Arabian city is “the defining node for a worldwide community of believers who are linked to the Prophet Muhammad and to Mecca and to one another through networks of faith and family, trade and travel.” Whether knit together by language, profession, text, orienting metropolis, or something else there is a unified, integrated, sense to global Islam and a shared cultural history. To be sure, there are not several, or even two, Islams, but one Islam. 

At the same time, Islam is, in the words of scholar Talal Asad, “a discursive tradition.” There is an ongoing debate, what Reza Aslan calls, “a civil war,” raging over what is orthodox Islam and where the boundary lines of Islam can be drawn. Islam, as a world system, is not static, but is always changing according to the various lines of its own “discursive traditions.” The tone of these various streams of thought about Islam are determined by local realities, Islamic networks, and by external global forces of economics, politics, religion, and culture. 

What do these localizations and various discursive traditions do to Islam’s shared cultural and textual heritage? Local Muslims, sharing in "global Islam," interpret Islam differently according to their socio-cultural, and historical, context. Sometimes accusing the other interpretation or lived religion as not “authentic” or “orthodox” Islam. This is why ISIS, along with killing Yazidis and Christians, also targets Muslims they deem kafir (unbelievers, or apostates) because of their extreme definition of takfir— those who claim Islam but are outside the strict boundaries of Islam that ISIS puts in place. 

*For more on religion and culture, follow @kchitwood

Today is the 13th anniversary of the terror attacks of 9/11. Certainly, it is a somber remembrance and one with potent emotions and visceral reverberations in our cultural psyche. 9/11’s effect on our the U.S.’s interest in Islam has been a double-edged sword. While more solid, scholarly, work has been done on Islam in the U.S. than ever before, we have also been seeking to essentialize Islam in an effort to have manufacture a clearly defined enemy to combat. We want a clash of civilizations — Islam v. the West — but it’s not that simple. Seeking a “clash of civilizations” we usually end up with what Edward Said called, “a clash of ignorance” wherein “unedifying labels” such as “Islam” and the “West,” “mislead and confuse the mind, which is trying to make sense of a disorderly reality that won't be pigeonholed or strapped down as easily as all that.”

So, is Islam to be represented by ISIS? In one sense, yes. ISIS = Islam. However, ISIS ≠ global Islam. ISIS ≠ Islam everywhere. Not every Muslim living in the U.S., in sub-Saharan Africa, Europe, or Southeast Asia is a secret jihadi with ties to ISIS, Boko Haram, or al-Qaeda. Instead, ISIS is an expression of Islam in its locality (Syria, Iraq, the Levant) forged out of a combination of contextual concerns, socio-cultural realities, and translocal forces of politics, economics, and religion. As such, it is competing to be the authoritative voice of Islam and, in many ways, wants pundits and cultural commentators to say that ISIS = Islam. 

Yet, to say ISIS = Islam is too simplistic. There are too many other Muslim communities and expressions of glocal (localized forms of the one global faith) Islam throughout the world. Islam is a diverse global faith, which takes on a different form, with varying interpretations of the Qur’an and the tradition of Muhammad where the local Muslim community deals with dissimilar concerns about local realities and contrasting views on religious violence and Westernization. This is why it is unsophisticated to simply posit that ISIS = Islam with no further discussion or clarification. 

After all, many Muslims claim that ISIS Is un-Islamic. Muslims in South Africa who fought for equality of all races after mistreatment and misrepresentation for centuries under Afrikaaner nationalism and apartheid and Muslims in Houston who advocate anti-gang initiatives and are actively engaged in inner-city education programs would not want to be lumped in with ISIS. They are engaged in a struggle, they share the same Islamic faith, but they are not ISIS. As Jaweed Kaleem reported for the Huffington Post, there is widespread disappointment among worldwide Muslims in how ISIS is often equated with Islam in popular media.

Even so, without any right or proper understanding, many will continue to try and declare what Islam is and is not. They will pipe up and declare that “ISIS is Islam” or ignore progressive understandings of Islam by countering, “but doesn’t the Qur’an actually say _______?” What the Qur’an says, not to be crass or offensive to my Muslim friends, is irrelevant. What is more relevant in this discussion is what Muslims say the Qur’an says. What ISIS says about what Islam is or what the Qur’an says is going to be different than a Muslim community in Miami or a Muslim organization in Indonesia. Muslims’ interpretation of their shared holy text is defined by their local context, their historical moment, their transnational networks, socio-cultural realities, and interaction with global forces.

If we are to understand Islam — and ever since 9/11, 7/7, and other terrible terrorist attacks, it is evident that we must in some way endeavor to do so — our shared starting point cannot be solely those groups that engage in terrorism, persecution, and barbarous bombast. Instead, we must approach Islam as a global phenomenon, with a certain sense of interconnectedness and unity. At the same time, we must come to appreciate and pay attention to its various localities as they wrestle with the shared international socio-cultural forces of Westernization, globalization, and transnationalism. 

Does ISIS = Islam? 

Yes, but it’s too superficial of us to say “yes” unequivocally. It has to be a nuanced affirmation, one that appreciates that as much as ISIS is Islam, it is also equally not Islam. In the end, we must listen to Muslims, and their various discourses about orthodoxy, Muslim boundaries, and authenticity, before we can come to any strong conclusions or make any serious political or religious decisions about Islam as a whole based on the actions of the few who take part in the violent actions of ISIS and its counterparts.  

*For more on religion and culture, follow @kchitwood

Religion in hellholes, citadels, & tourist traps

Religion is everywhere. It’s in our hearts and in our hands. We see it in coffee shops and on college campuses, on street corners and in the local mall. Religion is everywhere. 

It’s even found in deep sinkholes and picturesque beaches in Florida. 

This last weekend was Labor Day weekend and my in-laws were in town. Our plan consisted of taking them to a couple of local highlights: the Devil’s Millhopper and St. Augustine. What I did not plan for was the unexpected religious “sightings” that we would find there and have the opportunity to reflect on. These case studies in religious sightings are not only engaging, but provide direction for you to discover religion in unexpected places or on vacation! 

The shady sinkhole of The Devil's Millhopper and its waterfalls shelter eerie stories of demons, bones, and Indian princesses. 

The Devil’s Millhopper is a local legend here in Gainesville and home to one of the most famous sinkholes in the state. Designated a National Natural Landmark and Florida State Park, the Devil’s Millhopper has been a curiosity enjoyed by tourists for over 100 years. It is not a large sinkhole, though it is an old one, formed in two stages about 10,000 and 1,000 years ago. It’s a pretty cool place, literally. The Devil’s Millhopper is not only interesting, but cooler at the bottom of its 236 steps because its basin is fed by at least twelve freshwater springs.

Researchers have unearthed a great deal of Florida’s natural history here, but it is the religious folklore surrounding the Millhopper that makes it peculiarly fascinating. 

Along with shark’s teeth and fossil remains, there have been some pre-historic human remains discovered in the bottom of the sink. Thus, while the name “millhopper” comes from the comparison of the round-bottomed pit with the bowls millers use to grind grain, it was these remains that helped give rise to the Millhopper’s malevolent moniker and the rumor that the sinkhole was feeding dead bodies to the devil. Local UF students and 

The Timucua, an American Indian people, whose territory included much of Northeast Florida and Southeast Georgia made up of 35 chiefdoms, have an origin myth for the Devil’s Millhopper that explains much of the above mythos. The story goes:

“There was a beautiful Indian princess who lived in a village in present-day Gainesville. The Devil wanted to marry the princess, but she wanted nothing to do with him. So one day, he kidnapped her and ran. On hearing this, all the Indian braves were deeply saddened and began to chase the Devil and the Indian princess. As the braves began to get closer and closer, the Devil retreated to his portal — the sinkhole — and the braves fell in (in some stories, he created the sinkhole). They fought against the quicksand and the Devil, but seeing that they were going to lose the battle they fell into retreat. When they tried to climb out, the Devil turned them to stone (in some versions he ate them and spit up their bones, explaining the pre-historic remains). To this day, it is said, that the running water of the springs is the weeping tears of the Indian braves, shed for the beautiful princess who was taken below to the Devil’s abode.”

— Adapted from Florida State Parks Authority

St. Augustine is a little slice of historical paradise on Florida’s Atlantic coast. Nicknamed “the Ancient City” it is the oldest existent, and continuously occupied European colonial city in the U.S., founded by the Spanish in 1565. 

Contested by the Spanish, British, and Americans over the centuries, St. Augustine bears the religious marks of all these influences: 

Memorial Presbyterian Church, built by Henry Flagler for his northern elite religionistas.

• Nombre de Dios (Name of God) is a Spanish mission station with a distinguishing 204ft cross that was run by Jesuits and Franciscans during the Spanish area and saw some success in reaching out to Mocama and Agua Dulce peoples, both part of the aforementioned Timucua group.
• There are significant churches including the Cathedral Basilica of St. Augustine (another National Historical Landmark, finished in 1797 after a period of Spanish revival following British rule); Trinity Church of St. Augustine (the oldest Protestant church in Florida with beautiful stained glass); and the Henry Flagler-era churches Grace United Methodist Memorial Presbyterian, and Ancient City Baptist (all built ornately to cater to the northern elite Flagler, a partner of John D. Rockefeller’s, attracted to St. Augustine). 
• The most obvious landmark in St. Augustine, however, is Castillo San Marcos, a strategic fort for the Spanish, British, and Americans, which is home to the oldest chapel in the U.S. — St. Mark’s, in one of the theaters of the fortification.

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The altar of St. Mark's Chapel in Castillo San Marcos, St. Augustine, FL.

With all this religious history, it might be easy to miss the subaltern voices of St. Augustine, the religious history of social groups who are socially, politically, and geographically outside of the dominant power structure of the colony (the Spanish, British, and American powers).

The Timucua are not the only people to feature in the religious, or native, history of Florida. Nor are the infamous Seminoles. And, unfortunately, if the story of the Devil and the Indian princess is only myth, there are far more diabolical stories about American Indians in the Sunshine State. Only, in these stories the Indians were thrown into hellholes in forts by U.S. soldiers.

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An inscription of the Kiowa Sun Dance, engraved here my imprisoned Plains American Indians under U.S. forces at Castillo San Marcos, St. Augustine, FL. 

The casement immediately adjacent to St. Mark’s chapel at Castillo San Marcos is a nondescript coquina-walled room where several displays explain the American Indian history of the space. It is a disheartening room to experience, as U.S. forces imprisoned American Indians who resisted replacement and subjugation under the advance of American new-colonial forces. Imprisoned next to the citadel’s chapel, trapped in their own “Devil’s Millhopper,” these Kiowa and Southern Cheyenne men etched the dreams of their freedom into the walls even as they became a tourist trap to northerners vacationing in St. Augustine, including missionaries and teachers who tried to “help” them assimilate by teaching the prisoners English, Christianity, and other elements of “American” culture. 

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A representation of the inscription above. 

Their religious graffiti featured the Kiowa Sun Dance — outlawed by the U.S. government. The Sun Dance was the premier religious ceremony for the Kiowas, similar to other plains Indian People. Typically, it was performed annually during the summer, and provided a time for ceremonial and religious celebration and supplication. It was also a socio-cultural re-union providing an opportunity for the sharing of news, healing, and self-renewal among kin. 

Engraving this into the walls, and performing it in the courtyard of the Castillo San Marcos, acted as a form of protest against their imprisonment and subjugation — especially since the Sun Dance was an agonizing ordeal for those who performed it and it in some way mirrored the torment of the imprisoned plains Indians. 

Then there is the Huguenot Cemetery, which recalls the slaughter of Huguenots in St. John — French Calvinists who fled to Florida to escape persecution in France — just 26 miles North of St. Augustine. 

These tragic testaments can make it seem as if the subaltern stories form St. Augustine are solely sad ones, but this is not always the case. 

Tourists traipsing down St. George Street are so easily drawn to the restaurants and shops there that it is easy to walk past the National Greek Orthodox Shrine of St. Photios without noticing it. 

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The chapel, featuring Byzantine-style gold-leaf highlighted frescoes, at the Greek Orthodox National Shrine of St. Photios, St. Augustine, FL. 

The shrine is unique in the Western Hemisphere with its dozens of Byzantine frescoes, beautifully highlighted with gold leaf. Surrounded by the subdued sounds of chants used in the Greek Orthodox Church and a coolness that is a strange departure from the outside temperature, the visitor experience includes a walk down a candle-lit corridor to a beautiful grotto. 

But what is it doing in St. Augustine? According to the documentary video in the chapel, St. Augustine is Greek-Americans’ ‘Plymouth Rock.’ Forced out by poverty and land-locked farming scenarios from their Mediterranean home, the first Greeks to arrive in the New World came by ship to St. Augustine in 1768. From here, they traveled south to work as indentured servants at an indigo plantation. While they suffered there, they remember St. Augustine fondly and have enshrined it in their national psyche naming the chapel after St. Photios the Great, a 9th-century patriarch of Constantinople, the seat of power and nationalism for the Greek Orthodox. 

This beautiful shrine is open to the public, but very few enjoy its splendors or explore its history. The same goes for the Kiowa engraving or the Huguenot cemetery. Missing these subaltern sites means failing to see the whole story of a place, a time, and a people. 

What can you do to make sure you don’t miss the story? Open your eyes to the wonderful world of religious sightings, study up a little beforehand, and go spiritual site-seeing. 

You’ll be surprised what you find. 

Five Facts You Need To Know about Iraq, its Religious Minorities, & ISIS

Making sense of Iraq, ISIS, Yazidis, beheadings, crucifixions and your social media feed

The headlines are currently filled with reports and claims of widespread persecution of religious minorities at the hands of the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS, also known as ISIL) rebels in Iraq and Syria. The word ‘genocide’ has even begun to appear. 

For the shrewd observer, there is much to discern and not every news source, social media feed, or blog can be trusted to convey a factual picture. The situation is particularly sensitive, and in need of astute investigation, due to the potential reality of widespread persecution, genocide, and slaughter of innocents. 

Well corroborated reports verify there is religious persecution of minorities occurring in Iraq. ISIS rebels, motivated by a confluence of religious, political, and cultural factors, are threatening, attacking, and murdering those who do not conform to their religious ideals -- including Yazidis, Christians, and Shi'a Muslims. But, the situation is not as simple as “Muslims are embarking on a genocide of Christians” and understanding a bit of Iraq’s religious demographics, history, and the story of minority religions can help paint a clearer picture. Here are five things you need to about Iraq, ISIS, & the region’s religious minorities:

1. IRAQ IS NOT A “MUSLIM” NATION

It’s easy to assume that Iraq is a “Muslim” nation given that an estimated 97% of its population is Muslim. ‘Nuff said…right? The reality is much more convoluted. 

The country’s Muslim population is divided between the Shi’a (60-65%) and Sunni (32-37%) faithful. The Shi’a (also known as Shiite) are a minority within the global Muslim population (11-12%, compared to Sunni’s 87-89%) and only claim a majority in Iraq, Iran, Bahrain, and Azerbaijan (some recent claims also say Lebanon). Shiism developed after the death of the Prophet Muhammad, when his followers split over who would lead Islam. The Shi’a branch favored Muhammad’s cousin and son-in-law ‘Ali Ibn Abi Talib. Ali and the Shi’a were defeated by the Sunni and over time the political divide between the two groups broadened to include theological distinctions. Shi’as include Ithna Asharis (Twelvers), Ismailis, Zaydis, Alevis and Alawites.

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Photo: Healing Iraq

Tension between Sunnis and Shi’as proves a perennial source of conflict in the Middle East and formed a core part of the motivations behind the Iraq Civil War that occurred after the U.S. led invasion that toppled the secular Ba’ath regime of Saddam Hussein. ISIS rebels come from a particular school, and sub-sect, of Sunni Islam (more on this later) and are not part of the Shi’a majority of Iraq’s Muslims. 

Furthermore, there are many Muslims throughout the world who seek to distance themselves, not only from ISIS (more on this later), but from countries where Muslims seek to marry religion and politics. They instead hope that secular forces will continue to grow in the Middle East, and elsewhere, and that a progressive and modernized form of Islam will take hold (see Reza Aslan, No god but God). 

Iraq’s Constitution establishes Islam as its official religion and requires that no law contradict Islam. Yet, since Iraq is an attempt at a federal parliamentary Islamic democracy founded in the ideals of pluralism, religious freedom is also guaranteed. There are large numbers of Christians in Iraq and up to 6 million people make up the country’s religious minorities (including Yazidis, Ahl-e Haqq, Mandeans, Shabak, and Bahá’í). However, that does not mean that the Muslim majority does not wield disparate amounts of power, nor does it mean there is no persecution of religious minorities. The U.S State Department reported in 2013:

In Iraq, there were reports of societal abuses and discrimination based on religious affiliation, belief, or practice, although to a lesser extent in the Iraqi Kurdistan Region (IKR) than in other areas of the country. A combination of sectarian hiring practices, corruption, targeted attacks, and the uneven application of the law had a detrimental economic effect on minority non-Muslim communities, and contributed to the departure of non-Muslims from the country. 

While Islam is predominant, state-sanctioned, and a source of conflict in Iraq it is jejune to simply say Iraq is a “Muslim” nation and convey that there is some single, unified, Muslim bloc, or that there are not significant religious divides present in the country that play a role in the current conflict. 

2. IRAQ’S RELIGIOUS HISTORY IS DEEP AND DIVERSE

Iraq has not always been a predominately Muslim country and possesses a rich religious history. In fact, its deep and diverse religious past most certainly plays a part in the political, cultural, and geographical loyalties of its contemporary population. 

Modern Iraq is at the center of the Mesopotamian delta between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, also known as “the Fertile Crescent.” Not only was the land fertile in terms of agriculture and civilization, but religion as well. The Sumerian Epic of Gilgamesh emerged out of Mesopotamia and the Sumerian’s cyclical, agricultural, and ritualistic religious environment that featured gods and goddesses such as Ishtar, Dumuzi, and Enki. The Sumerian metaphoric language and religion influenced Mesopotamian mythology and history for centuries and Hurrian, Akkadian, Babylonian, Assyrian, and even later religious groups and cultures were shaped by the cosmology of their Sumerian forebears. 

Following these indigenous religious expressions, “the Fertile Crescent” was dominated by the Persians from 323 B.C.E. During the Persian era of Iraq, the culture in the area was shaped by Hebrew and indigenous religious forces, but Zoroastrianism became the accepted religion of the Persian culture. Zoroastrianism — one of the world’s oldest surviving monotheistic religions — was founded by the Prophet Zoroaster (or Zarathustra) in ancient Iran circa 1500 B.C.E. Zoroastrian worship Ahura Mazda (Wise Lord), respect the pure elements (water, fire, earth, wind), and introduced a formalization of the concepts of monotheism, paradise, destiny, and free will to Mesopotamian religion. 

Assyrian Christianity was introduced in the 1st and 2nd-centuries C.E. and comprises some of the most ancient forms of Christianity in the world. It has since divided into various Christian sects including Nestorians, Chaldean Catholics, Syrian Catholics, Armenian Orthodox, and other Eastern Rite Christians (more on this later). 

When Islam took hold around 634 C.E., the people of Mesopotamia were predominately Christian and paid the “non-Muslim” tax. Slowly, through intermarriage and conversion (both genuine and coerced) Islam prevailed. Over a century after the initial invasion of Islam (762 C.E.) Baghdad became the official capital of the region and served as a key commercial, cultural, and educational hub, linking Asia to the Mediterranean countries. It was a cosmopolitan city that, for a time, produced phenomenal philosophical and technical works by both Arab and Persian thinkers.

In the Middle Ages (1200-1500s C.E.), Iraq traded hands between the Mongols (which included shamanistic, Buddhist, Manichean, Nestorian, and Muslim influences) and the Muslim Ottoman Turks. Following World War I, the Ottoman Empire was defeated and the British defined the territory of Iraq paying scant attention to natural boundaries and religious and ethnic divisions. No single religious or political force has been able to effectively bring order to Iraq for more than a few decades since. 

3. THE YAZIDIS ARE A UNIQUE AND FASCINATING RELIGIOUS MINORITY

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Photo: Getty Images

From this rich religious, political, economic, and cultural history several religious minorities emerged. One of those smaller religious populations is the Yazidis. The Yazidi are Kurds, but possess their own unique religion. Though largely isolated from their neighbors, their main habitations are around Mosul. Hence they have faced displacement when ISIS rebels took hold of this northern urban center and its environs. 

Thankfully, several news sources successfully explicated the religious and cultural distinctives of the Yazidis whose “faith is a fascinating mix of ancient religions.” 

Read the Washington Post’s coverage here...

4. THE CHRISTIAN POPULATION IN IRAQ IS A MIXED BAG 

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Photo: Safin Hamed | Getty Images

What about Christians in Iraq? Several misleading headlines have zeroed in on ISIS’ attacks against Christians, not only ignoring Yazidis and other religious minorities, but not fully elucidating the Christian story in Iraq and reducing their narrative to persecution alone. 

Iraqi Christians are some of the world’s oldest existent Christian populations. While not claiming a majority of the Iraqi population since the 7th-century, they constitute a significant and culturally influential minority. Before the Iraq War, Christians represented a little more than 5% of the population, claiming 1.5 - 2 million adherents. Due to rising persecution against Christians (abductions, torture, bombings, killings, forced conversion, and imposition of Sharia measures on Christian populations) their numbers plummeted to anywhere between 200,000-450,000  as of 2013 with many fleeing to surrounding countries such as Syria and Jordan (where, in the former location, they now face difficulties due to the Syrian Civil War). Those Christians that remain are concentrated in Baghdad, Basra, Arbil, Kirkuk and — significantly for the current context — in the Assyrian towns of the Nineveh Plains in the north and in Mosul.  

The Christians are a diverse group and include Nestorians, Chaldean Catholics, Syrian Catholics, Assyrian Rite Christians, and small numbers of Armenian Orthodox. The majority of Iraqi Christians are influenced directly, or contingently, by Nestorianism, a Christian sect condemned by the councils of Ephesus (431 C.E.) and Chalcedon (451 C.E.) for their assertion of the independence of the divine and human natures of Christ. Still today, the majority of the worlds Christians would consider Nestorians and their antecedents “heretics.” 

However, in most headlines they are being ambiguously labeled “Christian,” rather than as a “Christian sect.” There is certainly much debate about their place in Christian taxonomy, but it is interesting that in other contexts Nestorians and other Eastern Rite churches would be decried as perilously close to being “non-Christian” by the same Protestant and Roman Catholic groups now rallying to their cause. Theological disputes aside, they do not deserve discrimination, displacement, or death based on religious or cultural lines and any religious group that supports their right to existence should be lauded for their efforts. 

5. ISIS’S RELIGIOUS MOTIVATIONS ARE SECTARIAN AND DO NOT REPRESENT "ISLAM"

Several wayward headlines read akin to this one from The Christian Post: “Muslims Hack Off Christian Man's Head After Forcing Him to Deny Jesus Christ and Salute Mohammed as 'Messenger of God.’” Not only is this headline charged with sectarian sentiment, but it is misleading and oversimplified.

Is ISIS Muslim? If you ask Sohaib N. Sultan who wrote for TIME magazine that “ISIS is Ignoring Islam’s Teachings on Yazidis and Christians,” that claim is nebulous at best. Sultan wrote: 

I join the chorus of Muslims worldwide, Sunnis and Shi‘ites, who oppose al-Baghdadi and ISIS as a whole. The killing and oppression of innocent people and the destruction of land and property is completely antithetical to Islam’s normative teachings. It’s as pure and as simple as that.  

Sultan’s comments echo a deep rift that continues to divide global Islam, which Reza Aslan refers to as a civil war between traditionalists and reformists. Not only this, but Islam is a diverse religion with various sects and schools of thought. Not only are there Shi’as, Sufis, and Sunnis, but the Sunni are divided into various schools and theological traditions that incorporate proponents of various lines of jurisprudence including the Hanafi, Hanbali, Maliki, and Shafi’i institutions. 

ISIS militants and their leaders are influenced by, and are an active part of, the Salafi movement in Islam. Salafis are fundamentalists who view their movement as a return to the roots of Islam (although this claim is contested by Sultan and others Muslims throughout the world). Their name is derived from the Arabic phrase, 'as-salaf as-saliheen', which refers to the first three generations of Muslims — the pious “predecessors” or “ancestors” of Islam.

The Salafi movement is a slippery one to pin down. Some scholars, and the Salafis themselves, claim they are a subset of Sunni Islam, deriving their teaching from the Hanbali school. Others lump Salafism with Wahhabism — the ultraconservative Islamic teaching of Adn al-Wahhab that was institutionalized by the Saudis before being radicalized by al-Qaeda and used against their nation and other Muslims. Wahhabis adhere to takfiri beliefs, which lead adherents to target non-Wahhabi Muslims — mainstream Muslims, Sunnis, Shi’as, Sufi, etc. Salafis assert they are a broader movement than Wahhabis, but certainly the two are parallel developments and share much in common in terms of radical doctrine and violent, extremist, practice. Salafis seek to purify Islam, which features a built-in brutality toward non-Muslims. 

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A perspectival graph of global Islam's schools and sects. 

ISIS and other Salafi movements would like to promote the narrative that their war is one between Muslims and Christians. However, as Aslan, Sultan, and others note, this is as much an inter-Muslim conflict as anything else. This does not make the atrocities committed against other religious minorities any less hideous, but it does note that this is more than a Muslim-Christian conflict. 

In the end, this current confrontation, and for that matter all Salafi inspired violence, should be framed as a juxtaposition between the world’s peace loving people — Muslim, Yazidi, Christian, Buddhist, non-religious, or otherwise — and those who seek to use religion as a means of power, oppression, and senseless violence. 

Hopefully, this blog (essay, really) helps to paint this picture and convey the historical, religious, and political nexus this present hostility is part of.