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View Full Version : Post-9/11, faiths rallied to protect Muslims



Uthman
08-16-2008, 01:46 PM
After the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, leaders in New Brunswick, N.J., had an immediate concern: protecting their Muslim neighbors.

The city, a university and healthcare industry hub of 50,000, is on the commuter rail run into New York City, 30 miles away, and Middlesex County, its home, mourned 70 dead residents following 9/11.

Yet when an Episcopal priest warned the local police chief that hotheads might retaliate by attacking an Islamic society property, the chief replied that he had already sent officers to protect against any violence. Up against an environment of fear and grief, when some sought vigilante vengeance, New Brunswick instead rallied to protect its Muslim neighbors.

This surprised Gustav Niebuhr, then a New York Times religion reporter. He and his colleagues had expected a widespread backlash of anti-Muslim hostility after the attacks; he remembered such anger during the first Gulf war. More commonly, he discovered, communities came together to support local Muslims.

With the seventh anniversary of the terrorist attack approaching, Niebuhr, now a religion and journalism professor at Syracuse University, came to Newton Free Library this week to talk about the New Brunswick story and others from his new book, "Beyond Tolerance." (Viking).

Researching it, he roamed the country to find numerous unsung examples of dialogue and cooperation between religious believers of different faiths. Far from being a nation locked in religious civil war, we are, he told his audience, in the midst of "a great and growing countertrend to religious intolerance," in which Americans share their disparate religious beliefs "without ignoring differences, without trying to sand down all those things that make us interesting and diverse."

He recited familiar, sad news stories, such as the Sikh murdered in Arizona by a man who mistook him for a Muslim. But the book includes the case of the Islamic School of Seattle, whose non-Muslim neighbors patrolled the sidewalks in case vandals attacked the school, and similar examples in other cities.

Elsewhere, when word spread on the Internet that Muslim women in traditional head scarves feared for their safety when they went shopping, neighbors offered to shop for them, according to Niehbuhr. In another example, employers encouraged Islamic employees to report harassment, promising to clamp down on it.

Indeed, interfaith cooperation preceded 9/11. By one estimate, 1,000 interfaith groups have formed since the mid-90s, spurred by growing religious diversity wrought in the country by immigrants from Africa, Asia, and Latin America, said Niebuhr.

He used his talk to criticize what he characterized as the overly belligerent, war-on-terror response of the Bush administration, though in an interview afterward, he said he supported the war against Afghanistan for its shielding of Osama bin Laden. "It was absolutely necessary to go after Al Qaeda, and the fact that the Taliban, which to me was a barbaric regime, was harboring bin Laden, [made it] a war of necessity."

At the same time, bin Laden and the Taliban, he said, "represent a narrow, and I would say aberrant, stream in world Islam."

He stressed that conviction in response to several questions from the audience after his talk. "In this country, does the benevolent Muslim have a voice, as opposed to the Taliban?" asked Melvin Klayman of Newton. "They have no interest in ideas" such as pluralism.

"Oh, yeah," exclaimed Niebuhr, citing statements from leaders of groups like the Islamic Society of North America who condemned the 9/11 attacks. Muslim clerics in Egypt and Jordan posted similar denunciations on the Internet, he added. When several people asked about Muslim criticism as covered by The New York Times, he said, "The sad thing is violence gets the headlines, for crying out loud."

Writing about religion is in the family's blood. Niebuhr's grandfather was Reinhold Niebuhr, a famed Protestant theologian of the mid-20th century, and his great-uncle, Helmut Reinhold Niebuhr, was a noted ethicist.

Both were concerned that religion be "personal yet not pietistic," he said in the interview. "I've seen myself in that tradition, perhaps more in an analytical sense, as someone who's taken a more journalistic approach. But I do count myself within the family tradition. At least I hope so. I want to say that with a certain humility."

Comments, questions and story ideas may be sent to spiritual@globe.com.

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north_malaysian
08-18-2008, 09:33 AM
thanks for the story
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Eric H
08-18-2008, 04:55 PM
Greetings and peace be with you Osman my friend,

Wonderful story, and an example of how life can be, very encouraging.

In the spirit of rpaying for greater interfaith friendship

Eric
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