This week was much like most other weeks in our household. Like most families with young children, we raced to our jobs, barely made drop-off and pick-up timings and were exhausted by 8:30 when the kids were (finally!) asleep.
What made this week different was that my wife–who is a strong and determined survivor of a sexual assault–was triggered.
I recently decided to step back from actively searching for someone to marry. I’m serious and interested, but aspects of the Muslim matchmaking process are strange for me.
I lost my beloved wife, Joan, just over a year ago. The prospect of starting over with someone new after sixteen years of marriage is daunting. I am a forty-year-old white American male, but I am also Muslim.
<< From the AltMuslimah Archives >> When she was five, my niece was adamant that she wanted to celebrate Christmas. While her mother bemoaned the prevalence of Santa in the local mall and the carols her daughter learned in preschool, I understood the little girl’s innocent fascination with the holiday. With its sheer materialism, gaudiness, glitz and ceremony, not to mention the feel good TV specials, our Eid simply can’t compare with Christmas— maybe Eid celebrations in Middle Eastern or South East Asian countries would stand a chance, but certainly not our small Eid festivities in the American suburbs.
Read MoreI don’t celebrate Christmas. I never have and I’m fairly sure I never will. Growing up in Ottawa in the ’80s, my Christmas celebrating friends would often be shocked that December 25th was just another morning for me where I would sleep in and then go downstairs and watch cartoons with a bowl of cereal. I never felt like I was missing out though. I grew up being taught that Christmas just wasn’t a part of our Muslim traditions.
Read MoreLast week my sister called. She has been studying abroad since summer began, so naturally I was thrilled to hear from her. After hearing how she was, I asked about her new home. With her living in a Muslim country, I felt assured that everything would be fine. For that reason, what she described next was a complete shock. She began to describe a place where a girl can hardly leave her house without being verbally harassed by men walking by. She said that the catcalling was no longer the exception; it had become the rule.
Read MoreIslam is not sexist, but sometimes, Muslim men are. Islam is not misogynistic, but sometimes, Muslim men are. My words may be alarming, but they are not meant to be accusatory. Muslim men: you are privileged to live in a world that has largely been shaped by male paradigms, one that has been written in your own voices. As a Muslim woman, I challenge you to make a choice: the choice to step outside this male-dominated intellectual framework and recognize how it cripples our Ummah.
Read MoreWhen we met each other three years ago over french-fries at a classy late night McDonald’s hangout, we had no idea we would be embarking together on a humble but hopeful journey to create a safe space for survivors of sexual violence. Motivated by our own personal traumas and the similar experiences of many of our friends, we decided that shaking out heads in dismay at horrifying news articles wasn’t enough. We wanted to start a larger conversation.
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Some time ago, I complained to a friend that there were few good children’s books on Muslims or Islamic themes. I’m an American-born Muslim woman, and I was looking for books to share with my older daughter Maryam, then three. I wanted lively, upbeat bedtime books that would introduce her to our faith and identity while emphasizing universal values.
My friend, a thoughtful educator at a local Islamic school invited me to visit the school’s library. Unfortunately, that visit largely confirmed my dismal view.
In a meeting last week with a few Washington, D.C. leaders, I was asked what one issue I was most passionate about right now. Without hesitation I said, to the surprise of many, the re-authorization of the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA). I knew why people in the room were surprised by my answer; in meetings with American Muslim leaders the answer they would have received would generally be civil rights, Islamophobia, national security or foreign policy.
Read More“If God made everything, the sun, the trees, the Earth, then … who made God?” “Where was I before God made me?” Zaynab, my five-year-old daughter, has been asking questions about faith, God and her purpose in the world at an ever-increasing rate. She is at that amazing, tender age where her universe of possibilities is expanding at lightning speed. . . . As a parent, my struggle is to preserve that innocence and keep her faith experience as joyful and wondrous as it is now. I realise, though, how difficult that is going to be.
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