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 Topic: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform

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  • Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     OP - March 30, 2012, 02:55 PM
    Quote
    Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform American Islam

    At first, the devout Muslims who gathered in a Washington, D.C., conference center seemed like they could have come from any mosque. There were women in headscarves and bearded men who quoted the Quran.

    But something was different. While mingling over hors d'oeuvres, they discussed how to change Islam's future. A woman spoke about fighting terrorism; she had married outside the Islamic faith, which is forbidden for a Muslim woman. A Pakistani man mentioned his plans to meet friends for drinks, despite the faith's ban on alcohol.

    In a corner of the room, an imam in a long gray tunic counseled a young Muslim with a vexing spiritual conflict: being gay and Muslim. The imam, also gay and in a relationship, could easily sympathize with the youth's difficulties.

    On this brisk Monday night in late October, members of Muslims for Progressive Values, a nascent American reformist organization, had gathered from around the country to celebrate a milestone: In four years, the group had grown from a few friends to a thousand members and spawned a string of small mosques and spiritual groups that stretched from Atlanta to Los Angeles.

    Today, as America's Muslim leaders debate controversial topics like political radicalism inside mosques and states' attempts to ban Shariah law, this growing network of alternative mosques and Islamic groups is quietly forging a new spiritual movement.

    They're taking bold steps, reinterpreting Islamic norms and re-examining taboos. While far from accepted by mainstream clerics, these worshippers feel that the future of the religion lies not solely with tradition but with them. Women are leading congregations in prayer, gay imams are performing Islamic marriages, and men and women are praying side by side.

    Read on
  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #1 - March 30, 2012, 02:59 PM
    So beautiful!  dance

    Might even revert to Islam just to join these people.
    قل للمليحة في الخمار الأسود
    مـاذا فـعــلت بــناسـك مـتـعـبد

    قـد كـان شـمّر لــلـصلاة ثـيابه
    حتى خـطرت له بباب المسجد

    ردي عليـه صـلاتـه وصيـامــه
    لا تـقــتـلــيه بـحـق ديــن محمد
  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #2 - March 30, 2012, 03:04 PM
    Good news for American Muslim,
    but then I don't believe in god,
    not fer me though.
  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #3 - March 30, 2012, 03:11 PM
    Great, need more initiatives like this
    "Nobody who lived through the '50s thought the '60s could've existed. So there's always hope."-Tuli Kupferberg

    What apple stores are like.....

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8QmZWv-eBI
  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #4 - March 30, 2012, 03:49 PM
    Hmm



    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tqzVsf6XixY

    I want All Muslim men in Mosques and in politics to replace with a persons like Asra Noormani..
    Do not let silence become your legacy.. Question everything   
    I renounced my faith to become a kafir, 
    the beloved betrayed me and turned in to  a Muslim     
  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #5 - March 30, 2012, 03:51 PM
    Good luck to them.




    "we can smell traitors and country haters"


    Quote from: arX on May 01, 2011, 03:33 AM
    God is Love.
    Love is Blind. Stevie Wonder is blind. Therefore, Stevie Wonder is God.

  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #6 - March 30, 2012, 04:10 PM
    Quote
    Yasir Qadhi, a popular conservative cleric and dean of academic affairs at Houston-based AlMaghrib Institute, holds the latter view. A lecture on progressives that he has given at Islamic conferences has garnered thousands of views on YouTube.

    "The very fact that the movement is so small or marginal speaks volumes about their sway and influence," says Qadhi, who lives in Memphis, Tenn., and whose institute trains 6,000 students annually. "It's pretty clear the mainstream of Muslims of North America, who are under no pressure or threat of physical violence, have clearly identified with traditional voices."

    "'Let's look at the text of the Quran and see what Allah and his messenger want us to do rather than to project our ideas onto the text," Qadhi says. "We traditionalists firmly believe the Quran is the book of Allah and the speech of Allah."

    Dalia Mogahed, director of the Gallup Center for Muslim Studies, also takes a critical view of the progressives.

    Muslims for Progressive Values "are little more than a footnote or a special interest," she writes in an email. "Their actual influence in the [Muslim American] community is virtually non-existent," adds Mogahed, who spent six years collecting 50,000 interviews for the book "Who Speaks For Islam? What a Billion Muslims Really Think."


    So, how do they overcome this ^^^

    Judaism survived as a living faith precisely because it allowed Liberal and Reform schools to formally breathe away from the Orthodox. That is, Judaism allowed that liberal space to be institutionalised, and allowed a plurality of interpretations to co-exist, even if they disagree, they are still 'Jewish'

    It seems to me that this is a kind of impulse towards a formal space for Reform Islam. The problem is that this is viewed as bidah, innovation, and deviant. And that is almost the worst thing that you can be, according to orthodoxies.
    "we can smell traitors and country haters"


    Quote from: arX on May 01, 2011, 03:33 AM
    God is Love.
    Love is Blind. Stevie Wonder is blind. Therefore, Stevie Wonder is God.

  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #7 - March 30, 2012, 04:13 PM
    While I am happy for them and wish them the best of luck, I don't think other muslims will take to this too kindly. I'm only playing devils advocate but I think that they will feel as if they are making a mockery of their deen.
    "The more powerful and original a mind, the more it will incline toward the religion of solitude."


    "i used to steal my sisters barbies so i could take their clothes off and perv on them" - prince spinoza
  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #8 - March 30, 2012, 04:35 PM
    ^That

    And this v
    Quote from: billy on March 30, 2012, 03:51 PM
    Good luck to them.

     
    Sounds like a lost cause but they might gain followers who feel threathed by their respective ummah for their sexual orientation.
    "I'm standing here like an asshole holding my Charles Dickens"

    "No theory,No ready made system,no book that has ever been written to save the world. i cleave to no system.."-Bakunin
  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #9 - March 30, 2012, 05:50 PM
    Quote from: Rendezvous on March 30, 2012, 04:13 PM
    While I am happy for them and wish them the best of luck, I don't think other muslims will take to this too kindly. I'm only playing devils advocate but I think that they will feel as if they are making a mockery of their deen.


    I don't care whether they are mocking or not .. but if I am the in charge of that place where men and women are praying together

    No more praying like this



    Sit and sing Quran or  stand and sing Quran .. OR     SIT QUITE  no noise..   finmad

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dcQT11aJGFs

     
    Do not let silence become your legacy.. Question everything   
    I renounced my faith to become a kafir, 
    the beloved betrayed me and turned in to  a Muslim     
  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #10 - March 30, 2012, 06:06 PM
    Lol I think the men and women praying together thing won't work too well, in terms of spirituality that is. I mean, I don't think any straight man will be thinking of Allah when there's a woman bending over just inches away from his face.
    "The more powerful and original a mind, the more it will incline toward the religion of solitude."


    "i used to steal my sisters barbies so i could take their clothes off and perv on them" - prince spinoza
  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #11 - March 30, 2012, 06:31 PM
    Quote from: billy on March 30, 2012, 04:10 PM
    So, how do they overcome this ^^^

    Judaism survived as a living faith precisely because it allowed Liberal and Reform schools to formally breathe away from the Orthodox. That is, Judaism allowed that liberal space to be institutionalised, and allowed a plurality of interpretations to co-exist, even if they disagree, they are still 'Jewish'

    It seems to me that this is a kind of impulse towards a formal space for Reform Islam. The problem is that this is viewed as bidah, innovation, and deviant. And that is almost the worst thing that you can be, according to orthodoxies.

    [/quo

    When i hear about reformed Judaism or reformed Islam i can only laugh. If Torah and Quran are words of God, why is there a need  to adjust them to modern times , basically admitting they were written by a bunch of semitic shepherds with their narrow-minded view of world?

    Isn't it funny how cats can understand people without ever reading a single psychology book?
  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #12 - March 30, 2012, 06:47 PM

    The point is that its a formula that exists for liberal interpretation, liberal practise and its been achieved within Judaism. What these people are trying to do strikes me as coming from a similar desire within Islam.


    "we can smell traitors and country haters"


    Quote from: arX on May 01, 2011, 03:33 AM
    God is Love.
    Love is Blind. Stevie Wonder is blind. Therefore, Stevie Wonder is God.

  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #13 - March 30, 2012, 07:00 PM
    Quote from: Rendezvous on March 30, 2012, 06:06 PM
    Lol I think the men and women praying together thing won't work too well, in terms of spirituality that is. I mean, I don't think any straight man will be thinking of Allah when there's a woman bending over just inches away from his face.


    Is this true, or is this perhaps all part and parcel of our Islamic upbringing, in which we were taught that men have no self control whatsoever?

    Just curious off topic.  On the one hand I agree with you, but then I remember the many posts from guys on this forum that argue against this idea that they have no self control and the slightest movement of a woman infront of them is supposed to distract them, that I wonder.  Thinking hard
    Inhale the good shit, exhale the bullshit.
  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #14 - March 30, 2012, 07:15 PM
     If she does have fine round behind and do ruku'uh or sujud, that will trigger a boner which can lead to a spurt of maziyyi in some men,that nullifies the wudu and sallah
    "I'm standing here like an asshole holding my Charles Dickens"

    "No theory,No ready made system,no book that has ever been written to save the world. i cleave to no system.."-Bakunin
  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #15 - March 30, 2012, 07:15 PM
    Quote from: Rendezvous on March 30, 2012, 06:06 PM
    Lol I think the men and women praying together thing won't work too well, in terms of spirituality that is. I mean, I don't think any straight man will be thinking of Allah when there's a woman bending over just inches away from his face.


    I don't think that would be a big issue at all. It's not hard to prevent those thoughts in a context like that.
    قل للمليحة في الخمار الأسود
    مـاذا فـعــلت بــناسـك مـتـعـبد

    قـد كـان شـمّر لــلـصلاة ثـيابه
    حتى خـطرت له بباب المسجد

    ردي عليـه صـلاتـه وصيـامــه
    لا تـقــتـلــيه بـحـق ديــن محمد
  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #16 - March 30, 2012, 07:26 PM
    Im sure some females wont be able to curb their arousal too, if they are praying alongside with men.
    "I'm standing here like an asshole holding my Charles Dickens"

    "No theory,No ready made system,no book that has ever been written to save the world. i cleave to no system.."-Bakunin
  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #17 - March 30, 2012, 07:55 PM
    Quote from: BerberElla on March 30, 2012, 07:00 PM
    Is this true, or is this perhaps all part and parcel of our Islamic upbringing, in which we were taught that men have no self control whatsoever?

    Just curious off topic.  On the one hand I agree with you, but then I remember the many posts from guys on this forum that argue against this idea that they have no self control and the slightest movement of a woman infront of them is supposed to distract them, that I wonder.  Thinking hard


    Good point you've bought up there, didn't think of it that way. I think while there is a part of every male (and female too!) that tries to practice self discipline in terms of their thought process, there is always that part of us which is purely based on animal desires. These thoughts can be controlled, yes, but the very process one goes through to try and control them is a distraction and deters you from thinking bout jannah or whatever.

    But yeah, ironic how in trying to de-sexualize human beings and take the focus off sex, islam manages to do the complete opposite.

    "The more powerful and original a mind, the more it will incline toward the religion of solitude."


    "i used to steal my sisters barbies so i could take their clothes off and perv on them" - prince spinoza
  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #18 - March 30, 2012, 07:58 PM
    Hmm..  you guys always think wrong on what I say..

    So how many languages do you speak Rendezvous ??
    Do not let silence become your legacy.. Question everything   
    I renounced my faith to become a kafir, 
    the beloved betrayed me and turned in to  a Muslim     
  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #19 - March 30, 2012, 08:05 PM
    Lol random question yeez ... I'm fluent in arabic and english ..
    "The more powerful and original a mind, the more it will incline toward the religion of solitude."


    "i used to steal my sisters barbies so i could take their clothes off and perv on them" - prince spinoza
  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #20 - March 31, 2012, 12:17 AM
    Here is more info on the mosque:
    http://daayieesplaceofinnerpeace.com/AM_I_DIFFERENT_1J07.html
  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #21 - April 01, 2012, 10:59 AM
    Quote from: -Tmp- on March 31, 2012, 12:17 AM
    Here is more info on the mosque:
    http://daayieesplaceofinnerpeace.com/AM_I_DIFFERENT_1J07.html

    Hmm that link has this picture



    Look at their faces and Look  at that floor.  Before prying Allah and reading all that Quran, A person like BerberElla could have made to change that floor and put some smile on their faces by working together and changing the face of the floor..
    Do not let silence become your legacy.. Question everything   
    I renounced my faith to become a kafir, 
    the beloved betrayed me and turned in to  a Muslim     
  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #22 - April 01, 2012, 11:13 AM

    Does anyone think an initiative like this could ever happen in the UK? I have my doubts that it could, the mob is too strong here.

    It says something about the relative distance some Muslims can put between themselves and the literalists in America. America is a sanctuary. At the same time, I wonder if they'd be able to do this so openly in proximity to a stronghold of someone like Yasir Qadhi in Houston, and others like him.


    "we can smell traitors and country haters"


    Quote from: arX on May 01, 2011, 03:33 AM
    God is Love.
    Love is Blind. Stevie Wonder is blind. Therefore, Stevie Wonder is God.

  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #23 - April 01, 2012, 11:19 AM
    Quote from: BerberElla on March 30, 2012, 07:00 PM
    Is this true, or is this perhaps all part and parcel of our Islamic upbringing, in which we were taught that men have no self control whatsoever?

    Just curious off topic.  On the one hand I agree with you, but then I remember the many posts from guys on this forum that argue against this idea that they have no self control and the slightest movement of a woman infront of them is supposed to distract them, that I wonder.  Thinking hard

    Men and women pray side by side in churches.

    They are not sexy places, though I'm sure much decorous flirting goes once the service is over.


    As for the whole 'men can't control themselves' angle, it would offend the fuck out of me if I could be bothered being offended. But then I have been accused of being 'impotent' by a lapdancer-cum-psychology-student because I didn't make a pass at her when we went out to supper together.
  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #24 - April 01, 2012, 11:31 AM

    Islam is anomalous in this, because no other religion disallows the sharing of the sacred worship space by women and men.

    So if every other religion can achieve their communion with their god side by side with men and women, it suggests the problem lies in the attitude of Muslims rather than anything else.

    "we can smell traitors and country haters"


    Quote from: arX on May 01, 2011, 03:33 AM
    God is Love.
    Love is Blind. Stevie Wonder is blind. Therefore, Stevie Wonder is God.

  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #25 - April 01, 2012, 11:32 AM
    Quote from: David on April 01, 2012, 11:19 AM
    But then I have been accused of being 'impotent' by a lapdancer-cum-psychology-student because I didn't make a pass at her when we went out to supper together.


    You should have said you were only interested in her for her Jungian analysis.
    "we can smell traitors and country haters"


    Quote from: arX on May 01, 2011, 03:33 AM
    God is Love.
    Love is Blind. Stevie Wonder is blind. Therefore, Stevie Wonder is God.

  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #26 - April 01, 2012, 11:37 AM
    She was always trying to get me to come and watch her at Spearmint Rhino. I'm sure she had a lovely set of Jungs, but I could never bring myself to go.
  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #27 - April 01, 2012, 11:39 AM
    Quote from: billy on April 01, 2012, 11:13 AM
    Does anyone think an initiative like this could ever happen in the UK? I have my doubts that it could, the mob is too strong here.

    It says something about the relative distance some Muslims can put between themselves and the literalists in America. America is a sanctuary. At the same time, I wonder if they'd be able to do this so openly in proximity to a stronghold of someone like Yasir Qadhi in Houston, and others like him.





    I think the nature of immigration in the two countries (and Europe as a whole) shows the difference. First of all, in the UK the Muslims are mainly South Asian, and within that, they are Pakistani/Bangladeshi, so the Muslim community is usually relatively homogenous and this allows for mobs to form. In the US, the Muslim community is far, far less homogenous and you'll see much more variety. Secondly, immigration to the UK from Muslim countries mainly came in the 60s/70s, when businesses governments decided to import low wage workers from poorer parts of the Muslim world, the same is true for France, Germany and Spain. Since the communities came together, they stayed together and formed unhealthy segregated areas (racism was also the reason for this). In the USA, immigrants have always migrated as individuals and families, and it takes a lot of effort and work to migrate to the USA as opposed to this wage-labour mass immigration we had in the UK and Western Europe. Therefore America would get the cream of the crop while Europe would be importing the poor and the uneducated, not that there's anything wrong with this, but once the migrants would reach Europe they would be put in low-wage jobs and shoddy areas and left to their own devices, and only 2/3 decades later were any real initiatives taken to try and bring them into society, but these initiatves were half-hearted at best.

    I have a lot of qualms with the American way of doing things, but I have to say their method of legal immigration, though strict and at times inhumane, has yielded better results than the European method, and I don't blame anyone for this, but I do feel that importing low-wage workers with the intention for them one day to leave was a very bad decision.
    "Nobody who lived through the '50s thought the '60s could've existed. So there's always hope."-Tuli Kupferberg

    What apple stores are like.....

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8QmZWv-eBI
  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #28 - April 01, 2012, 12:25 PM
    I'm not sure its down simply to the type of immigrants. Second and third generation British Muslims can be as zealous if not more zealous than their parents and grandparents. Look at the imam in London who was hounded by the mob for saying evolution is correct.

    Its a spatial thing as well. These guys will receive contempt, slander and maybe even threats, but as long as they are away from the hardcore they should be OK. Like I said, I'm not sure if this would slide in a part of America that has a strong neighbourhood. But there is at least some semblance of a safe space for it to occur in America.

    "we can smell traitors and country haters"


    Quote from: arX on May 01, 2011, 03:33 AM
    God is Love.
    Love is Blind. Stevie Wonder is blind. Therefore, Stevie Wonder is God.

  • Re: Progressive Muslims Launch Gay-Friendly, Women-Led Mosques In Attempt To Reform
     Reply #29 - April 01, 2012, 12:27 PM
    I know there are a lot of factors involved, but I'm just saying that one of the reasons American Muslims and European Muslims think and live differently could be the nature of immigration, integration and identity since then.

    The impact of early immigration waves can still be seen now in certain communities.
    "Nobody who lived through the '50s thought the '60s could've existed. So there's always hope."-Tuli Kupferberg

    What apple stores are like.....

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8QmZWv-eBI
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