May—June, 2012 (Vol. 27, No. 7-8)

The prohibition and punishment of homosexuality in Muslim societies have been given a new twist in Iran, with “sex-reassignment” surgery becoming a sanctioned means of dealing with the tendency.

Foreign Policy magazine (May/June) reports that since 2008 Iran has carried out the second-highest number of sex-change operations of any country after Thailand. These operations have been legal in Iran for more than two decades, ever since Ayatollah Khomeini issued a fatwah authorizing them for “diagnosed transsexuals.” But many of the procedures are now undergone by young gay men who fear imprisonment or death if they persist in seeking same-sex relationships.

The official in charge of sex reassignments recently told the BBC that when it comes to homosexuality, “Islam has a cure for people suffering from this problem.” While homosexuality goes against nature, a sex change is no more sinful than “changing wheat to flour to bread,” he said.

For more than a decade since 9/11, Saudi Arabia has remained resistant to educational reform, judging by the persistent extremist Islamic themes in Saudi textbooks, reports the magazine Foreign Policy (May/June).

Despite periodic reforms, textbooks in the nation’s schools “remain stubbornly impervious to change. Even in the past two years, they have instructed first graders not to greet infidels and warned 10th graders of the West’s threat to Islam,” writes Eman Al Nafjan. When 15 of the 19 hijackers from 9/11 were revealed to be Saudis, the nation’s educational system came under harsh scrutiny.

The issue became especially pressing when the human rights watchdog group Freedom House undertook a study in which 12 Islamic-studies textbooks were analyzed and concluded that the Saudi public school curriculum “continues to propagate an ideology of hate toward the ‘unbeliever,’ most egregiously in a 12th grade text that instructed students to wage violent jihad against infidels to ‘spread the faith.’” The Education Ministry responded to the report by relegating 2,000 teachers it deemed extremist to administrative roles far from the classroom.

Yet textbooks remained untouched, with only the most explicitly extremist views removed. Just last year, new interpretations were introduced in the boys’ 10th grade hadith, the book of the Prophet Mohammed’s sayings and traditions, where such new subjects as globalization and human rights were included. But the fine print under the text’s headings often express an anti-Western themes, such as the subjection of Muslims by Western nations, and warn students about the risk of losing one’s faith by studying in the West.

A new curriculum development project will be implemented in the coming year, but the Education Ministry’s mission statement for the project has already drawn fire for calling for loyalty to Islam and the renunciation of anything that goes against the faith, and warning against “deviant sects and creeds.”

(Foreign Policy, 1899 L Street NW, Suite 550, Washington, DC 20036)

While many Salafi Muslims in the Gaza Strip remain opposed to politics, some have recently been discussing the foundation of a political party, following developments in Egypt, writes Andreas Hackl in the Jerusalem Report (May 21).

With their purist Islamic practice, aspiring to follow the pattern of the original Muslim community, Palestinian Salafis—like their fellow believers everywhere—have mostly been limiting themselves to Islamic preaching and education. Recently, however, some of them have become impressed by developments among Salafis in Egypt and the rise of the al-Nour party, which now holds 111 seats out of 498 in the Egyptian parliament.

Since many Salafis from Gaza travel to Egypt for their studies, Palestinian and Egyptian Salafis are familiar with each other. In discussions about the possibility of launching a political party and fielding possible candidates, a local Salafi leader estimates that they might get 15 percent of the votes in such a scenario. However, they are aware that it is unlikely that both Israel and the Palestinian Authority would allow free rein to such a political movement. In the Gaza Strip, Hamas would most likely oppose Salafi political efforts. Still, a small number of Salafis have come to the conclusion that nothing in their faith prevents them from establishing a political party.

But a real challenge for them would be to convince the majority of Salafis to renounce their non-political stand, remarks Nathan Thrall (International Crisis Group). Hackl’s article also mentions the militant fringe of the Salafi movement. While jihadist Salafis are estimated to range from a few hundred to a few thousand activists in the Gaza Strip, there have been several instances of clashes between Hamas and such groups. The most recent one, in August 2009, was the crushing of the followers of Jund Ansar Allah, whose leader had attempted to declare Gaza an Islamic state.

(The Jerusalem Report, P.O. Box 1805, Jerusalem 91017, Israel)

Extremist trends have often defined the perception of Islam by outsiders and even by Muslims, states the Islamic German monthly Islamische Zeitung (May) in introducing an interview with researcher Muhammad Sameer Murtaza, himself a practicing Muslim, who works with the Global Ethic Foundation.

Murtaza traces the roots of these problems to the influence of (Saudi-funded) Wahhabi doctrines and derived currents. Murtaza disagrees with the common view that radical Muslims engaging in terrorism or other extremist activities are not “true Muslims.” Such people are not eager to make Islam instrumental for other purposes, but come from a Muslim background and really believe that what they are doing should be done in the name of Islam. Rather than challenging their Islamic identity, Murtaza states that it is more fruitful to research from which kind of Islamic ideological background radicals have derived their views, i.e. Wahhabi influences.

Such groups tend to see themselves as the only real Muslims, going back to the purity of pristine Islam. This does not necessarily lead to violence: some follow the way of missionary work, spreading their version of Islam (including distributing huge numbers of copies of the Quran in the streets of German cities, a recent activity that has given rise to polemical debates). Murtaza feels that local Muslim leaders in Germany have not always managed to react appropriately to extremist calls, because they were not highly qualified and moreover felt overwhelmed with a variety of challenges; however, there are now signs of an increasing professionalism.

Radical trends have managed to remain relatively unopposed for years in Germany in particular due to the poor quality of available Islamic literature and teachings, and consequently an ignorance that led many Muslims to misread any kind of criticism of specific currents of Islam as an attack against Islam itself. Moreover, Saudi-funded Wahhabi organizations widely spread literature claiming to present “just Islam,” but actually promoting their own views, a phenomenon that has continued with the Internet.

Murtaza states that such teachings have become popular, but the way to counteract their influence would be to develop Islamic religious teaching for young people and adequate training for converts to Islam, who are often left to their own ways after being welcomed into the community. Intellectual openness is required, but Murtaza warns that, even if it will bring some people from the fringe to mainstream Islam, the presence of such groups will remain a lasting phenomenon.

(Islamische Zeitung, Beilsteiner Str. 121, 12681 Berlin, Germany – www.islamischezeitung.de)

In various places across the Muslim world over the past ten years, Sunni circles have expressed misgivings about the preaching of Shiite beliefs and the conversion of Sunni Muslims to Shiite Islam.

Among recent reports, in Indonesia, Muslim leaders from West Java have issued a declaration alerting the faithful about Shiite teachings and their spread (Jakarta Post, May 2). In Nigeria, the Shiite movement that appeared after the Iranian Revolution of 1979 has been rapidly increasing its membership and is actively translating material into the Hausa language and distributing it, with hopes of reaching beyond Nigeria—but it is seen as a threat by some other Muslims in the country (BBC News, May 8).

Often, however, it is quite difficult to sort out facts from rumors on such an issue. Religioscope Institute has just published a report in French on conversions to Shiite Islam in the North African country of Algeria. The report is based on field research conducted by Algerian scholar Abdelhafidh Ghersallah (University of Oran), who interviewed some 40 Algerian converts. According to Ghersallah’s estimates, there might currently be between 25,000 and 30,000 converts to Shiite Islam in Algeria.

Such conversions should be put in a context that has seen trends toward growing religious diversity, including the rise of Salafism and a significant current of conversions to Christianity, especially in ethnic Berber (Kabyle) areas. Conversions to Shiite Islam have been taking place over the past 30 years, following the Islamic Revolution in Iran. There are a number of reasons behind such conversions. Fascination with the Iranian religious and political model originally played a significant role. Moreover, faced with the rise of Salafism and its literalist understanding of normative Islam, converts find in Shiite doctrines philosophical depth and mystical religiosity. Among Algerians belonging to Kabyle and Amazigh minorities, Shiite affiliation allows them to reinforce a separate identity, linked to the (Shiite) Fatimid legacy of North Africa in the 10th century.

According to Ghersallah’s observations, the appeal of a political model and of a religious faith tend to be intertwined in the motivations of converts, who usually express a loyalty toward Iran, seen as the country of the only successful Islamic revolution: the Iranian Embassy plays an important role, providing books, information and invitations to Iran (e.g. for studies). There tends also to be a clear intellectual dimension, involving a comparison between Sunni and Shiite beliefs and dogmas. Originally, Shiites in Algeria tended to be a group of intellectuals fascinated with the Islamic Revolution.

Today, this has evolved into a religious community with some nascent institutions (associations, libraries, training centers, etc.).

(The report in French by Abdelhafidh Ghersallah can be downloaded from Religioscope website (PDF, 455 Ko): http://www.religion.info/pdf/2012_05_Ghersallah.pdf)

The fate of the Arab Spring and its implications for Islamic democracy are far from certain, but Tunisia and its revolution have made substantial progress in ensuring religious freedom and tolerance in the country’s political structure, writes political scientist Alfred Stepan in the Journal of Democracy (April).

In comparison to Egypt, the revolution in Tunisia, where the Arab Spring began, has taken greater strides toward establishing an autonomous and democratic political society. This is because Tunisia, through a process of negotiation between religious and secular actors, was able to incorporate what Stepan calls the “twin tolerations”—non-interference by the government in religion and religious parties, while religious groups and parties refrain from asserting special claims based on access to the divine—much earlier than Egypt.

Embracing these twin tolerations is a “move that is friendly toward liberal democracy because the embrace involves a rejection not only of theocracy, but also the illiberalism that is inseparable from aggressive, ‘top-down,’ religion-controlling versions of secularism such as Turkish Kemalism or the religion-unfriendly laicite associated with the Third French Republic”, Stepan adds. Tunisia is also different from Egypt in that it has drawn on a “useable past,” including early constitutions that made religion distinct from political power and a more recent declaration (2005) stating that “there is no compulsion in religion.

This includes the right to adopt a religion or doctrine of not.” Stepan concludes that since Tunisia is the only Arab country to enact the requirements of a democratic transition, “analysts and activists alike should pay it more attention, especially for its example of how secular and religious actors can negotiate new rules and form coalitions.”

(Journal of Democracy, 1025 F Street, Suite 800 Washington, DC 20004)

Even though marriage and dating practices are in flux among Indian-Americans, “Hindu tradition still holds sway through mixers, matrimony websites and matchmakers,” reports the Huffington Post (April 23).

While matchmaking and arranged marriages endure in many Indian villages, such arrangements tend to be informal, making use of “extensive kinship networks,” said Connecticut College religion professor Lindsey Harlan. But increasingly, matrimony websites, such as Bharatmatrimony.com, are being used by parents in both India and the U.S. to match up their children. It is estimated that 10 percent of the clients are immigrants to the U.S. or American-born Indians. Applicants specify religion and caste to the site, which has more than 20 million profiles.

Using matchmakers is another popular method, but today such services stress consultation with the singles as much as their parents and stress the role of choice in religion. One matchmaker asks clients what being a Hindu means for them—“going to the temple each week? Simply being spiritual?” Other American innovations, such as mixers, are more risky, leaving more room for choice and going against arranged marriage traditions. Yet 90 percent of Hindus in America do end up marrying within the faith, according to a recent Pew survey.

The Family International (TFI), formerly the Children of God, continues to transform itself from a countercultural, quasi-evangelical movement to one much closer to the evangelical mainstream, judging by a new report in Christianity Today magazine (April).

TFI started out as a movement on the radical edge of the Jesus movement of the late 1960s and early ‘70s, living communally and practicing free love, and using sexual favors for proselytism (called “flirty fishing”) under the leadership of David “Moses” Berg. By the 1980s, however, these controversial practices had ceased (particularly under charges of sexual abuse), although open marriage and communal living were maintained. But since 2010, when TFI leaders Peter and Maria issued a manifesto calling for more individuality in the movement, the changes have come hard and fast.

A spokesperson said TFI’s recent “reboot” has meant dismantling the group’s worldwide structure and communal living. Changes in doctrine and practice include a stronger emphasis on biblical authority, thus minimizing Peter and Maria as sources of revelation, and a more conservative sexuality. This drastic shift has met resistance from some members, who view it as a response to dwindling membership and the desire of Peter and Maria to retire with the group’s money.

(Christianity Today, 465 Gundersen, Carol Stream, IL 60188)

Scandals and divisions plaguing the Orthodox Church in America (OCA) have been almost ignored by the media, yet the turmoil surrounding this small denomination has highlighted changes in identity affecting Eastern Orthodoxy, suggests Andrew Walsh writing in the magazine Religion in the News (Spring).

The OCA was once hailed as the leader in creating a non-ethnic and unified Orthodox Church in the U.S., but the ethnic membership of the denomination (based mostly in Pennsylvania and the Great Lakes region) has been dissolving rapidly, while its “vision of ethno-Orthodox union hasn’t gained traction,” writes Walsh. At the same time, the denomination (along with other Orthodox bodies) has attracted a large and growing number of converts seeking its liturgical, moral and theological traditionalism.

But other OCA clergy and lay activists have a different vision of the church, working for a more modern, “conciliar” and democratic structure. All these developments add up to a divided and smaller, yet more far-flung religious body, “now consisting mostly of convert clergy and convert congregations … and arguably … thriving more in the Sunbelt (due to church plants) than in the Rust Belt,” Walsh adds. Modernists and traditionalists are battling over the direction of the church, particularly since financial and leadership scandals have recently hit the denomination. The most recent battle is over the leadership of head bishop Metropolitan Jonah (who is a convert himself), who was accused of acting unilaterally in making church decisions, such as forming new ties to other conservative groups, such as conservative Anglicans, and distancing the church from mainline and ecumenical partners, such as the Episcopal Church and the National Council of Churches.

The resulting battle pitted culture warriors, such as Rod Dreher, a recent convert and prominent conservative writer, and a conservative group, OCATruth.com, against a more liberal camp (also largely made up of converts) represented by another new online group, ocanews.org. Eventually, Metropolitan Jonah went on temporary leave and the new pressure groups dissolved, although the divisions remain. Walsh concludes that the culture wars are “now a pervasive presence inside even insular groups like the OCA.

Indeed, the dominance of converts in America’s smaller Orthodox churches has made this tradition particularly susceptible to culture war conflict, and perhaps a window on the American religious future …. The case of the OCA shows what happens when the inheritors of a tradition have become inconsequential, leaving the ‘choosers’ to fight to the bitter end for their competing visions of what the church should be.”

(Religion in the News, http://www.trincoll.edu/depts/csrpl)

Mainline denominations and seminaries are borrowing from evangelicals and streamlining their structures to allow for more church-planting efforts led by experienced laypeople in the field, writes Jesse James DeConto in the Christian Century (April 4).

Mainline denominations have tended to restrict new church start-ups to trained and ordained clergy, but growing concern over church decline, especially among young adults, has forced them to take a new approach. The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America has recently lifted its requirement that church planters serve three years in an established congregation, allowing new seminary graduates to launch into church planting. “Some denominations have even dropped the requirement that missioners be ordained before they serve and are supporting entrepreneurs who are building congregations among immigrants or young urban adults,” DeConto writes.

Most of the start-ups profiled in the article appear to be “post-modern” or “emerging” plants, using ancient traditions and rites accompanied by “progressive” or liberal perspectives—such as a group holding an “agape” feast in Brooklyn and a ministry opened in a tattoo parlor in Pittsburgh, while others are based in intentional communities associated with the New Monasticism movement. Many seminaries have updated their curricula to focus on church planting, although church-planting specialists find that a seminary education is rarely one of the characteristics of those who are effective in the field.

For instance, in the United Methodist Church, “more and more laypeople are starting Methodist churches and bypassing the usual ordination track.” These moves stem from institutional fear of terminal decline, sparking a renewed interest in evangelism. As one Presbyterian official said, “We‘re not doing anything prophetic. We’re doing what the Pentecostals [and] the Baptists … have been doing for the last 20 or 100 years. I’m afraid that most of the seminaries are not catching up.”

(The Christian Century, 407 S. Dearborn St., Chicago, IL 60605)

Just as Hispanic charismatics and Pentecostals are being hailed as the future of American evangelicalism, they are also seen as having the political potential that may have a significant impact on the 2012 presidential elections.

But does the growing evangelical clout of Latinos translate into political activism in the way it has for white evangelicals? An article in Charisma magazine (May) by influential Latino evangelical leader Samuel Rodriguez forecasts that “Hispanic Spirit-empowered believers … stand poised to become the narrators of this century’s American faith experience …. The measureable impact of this already exists in three of the most prominent historic Pentecostal denominations—the Church of God, the Assemblies of God and The Four Square Church—where Hispanics represent not just a growing constituency but, in many respects, the only measureable growth metric.” Rodriguez adds that “one could argue that the future of American evangelicalism as a whole lies with the Hispanic Spirit-empowered church.”

Hispanic evangelicals are not only predominantly Pentecostal and charismatic, but are increasingly “bicultural, independent, megachurch-influenced and multifaceted in the spiritual tangibles they deliver,” Rodriguez writes. The number of Hispanic megachurches has grown from a handful of ministries to dozens. He writes that Hispanic churches have always had strong social ministries, but predicts that “Next-generation Hispanic Spirit-leaders will emerge out of both pulpits and pews to lead in the ecclesiastical and public spheres.”

Rodriguez does not specify how Latino evangelicals will express their faith in the public sphere; there is a widely held view that minority groups work from a different political context than their counterparts in the mainstream and majority (white evangelicals).

But there is also evidence that evangelicalism, in compared to secularism and Catholicism, “is the most potent worldview force in conservatizing Latino political attitudes,” write Troy Gibson and Christopher Hare in the journal Politics and Religion (Issue 5).

In analyzing data from a 2007 Pew survey of Hispanic adults, the authors found that on issues of abortion, gay marriage and other ideology, Catholics and seculars “placed themselves in the orthodox and progressive camps of the so-called culture war, although this  rightward effect is far more substantial for evangelical than committed Catholic Latinos.” Gibson and Hare conclude that the “Latino vote” is far from cohesive, with fractures likely existing “along religious lines.”

(Charisma, 600 Rhinehart Rd., Lake Mary, FL 32746; Politics and Religion, http://journals.cambridge.org)