American Muslims: the new generation
I think American Muslims will start seeing themselves as leaders. They will become more active and stop looking to mosques to support the community. In addition, American Muslims will not be ashamed to take time out of work to pray or take a day off from work because it’s Eid. (Eid al-Fitr, the major Islamic holiday ending Ramadan, the month of daily fasting) They ill do these things because they want to fulfill their Islamic duties but also because they want other Americans to accept their religion. They want to show that they are Muslims in their behavior and that they are not ashamed of being Muslim in the same way that Christians are not ashamed to take off from work for Christmas or to go to church to pray. For as much as the American Muslim community has grown, we will need to grow even more to accomplish goals we have set for ourselves, particularly dispelling stereotypes about Islam and gaining acceptance of our religion (p.47)
The fourth pillar of Islam, and perhaps the most widely known, is swam. In the Islamic month of Ramadan, the month in which God began to reveal the Qur’an, obviously a very holy month for Muslims, Muslims abstain from food, drink and sex from sunrise to sunset with the exception of those who are medically unable, women during the week of their menstruation or if pregnant and those traveling. They can make up these days later in the year. This fast is required so that Muslims will learn self-control and cleanse themselves. Muslims are also supposed to learn what it is like for those who suffer from hunger. Muslims believe that prayers to God throughout this month and on particular nights within this month will be given special attention by God. At the end of the month, Muslims celebrate Eid al-Fitr, a holiday equivalent in religious importance to Hanukkah or Christmas. Muslim families usually have a banquet and make a contribution to local poor people, usually a lamb sacrificed in contribution to local poor people, usually a lamb sacrificed in God’s name. Habiba Husain, a Muslim woman in San Francisco, feels charity is particularly important during Ramadan and stays quite busy with her organization, Rahima Foundation, delivering food to one hundred needy families during Ramadan and every month. (p.60)
Eid Muslims- Muslims who only attend mosque on major holidays like Eid. Many first generation Muslim immigrant are worried about their children will grow as Eid Muslims or grow out of Islam in general. (p.140)
Muslims have made significant progress on being recognized symbolically, perhaps more so than any other group in the past few years. In the fall of 1995, Vice President Albert Gore became the highest ranking US official to visit a mosque. A few months later, Hillary Rodham Clinton spoke in LA to a group of Muslims, the first First Lady to address a gathering of Muslims outside the White House. President Clinton’s July 12, 1995 speech on religious freedom acknowledged Muslims several times. African-American Muslim leaders Siraj Wahhaj and Warith Deen Muhammad delivered invocations in the House and Senate, respectively. Friday prayers are now held regularly in the U.S. Capitol building for Muslim staffers, federal employees, and other Muslims in the area. Since 1998, a crescent and star is displayed on the White House lawn alongside a menorah and Christmas tree, thanks to the tireless efforts of the late Muhammed Mehdi of New York, who popularized the idea of USA: Muslim Day, falling on the third Friday of December. President George Bush began a tradition of wishing Muslims a happy holiday on Eid, which President Clinton has expanded upon by holding an Eid celebration in the White House, usually attended by Ms. Clinton. In fact, American Muslims are indebted to the Clintons for their embracing of Islam in the US, Islamic traditions, and visiting Islamic countries. The Clintons have done more than any other First Family to raise the public stature of Muslims, especially American Muslims, and to draw a distinction between Muslim radicals and the beauty of true Islam as practiced by 1.2 billion people. At the January 10, 2000, Eid al-Fitr reception at the White House, President Clinton became the first sitting president to meet with American Muslim leaders. He said, “Too many Americans still know too little about Islam, now practiced by one of every four people.”
Symbolic recognition is important because such actions, in America, create a distinction, politically and socially, between the majority of Muslims, who are mainstream, and the more controversial Muslims like Farrakhan of NOI and extremist groups. Hopefully this symbolic recognition will lead to more political recognition and influence. (p.153)
…But we as Muslims and Americans, should remind ourselves that, while donating is not wrong or band, voting is the cheapest and the most democratic way to have influence. Every Muslim can and should vote (p.154)
The rising influence of American Muslims:
I call this re-discovery of Islam by American and Western Muslims the second Golden Age of Islam. The first Golden Age was so characterized because Islam flourished: Islam spread throughout the globe from the seventh century onward, and Muslims were the foremost scholars and thinkers of the world. The Muslims of history contributed to civilization in a number of ways: in algebra and geometry, with the creation of the number zero, in modern navigation, and architectural design, among many other advances. I predict that the second Golden Age of Islam will be so designated for primarily two reasons: because of the inner growth and strengthening of faith of Western Muslims and the successful adaptation of those Muslims to Western life without compromising their beliefs.
This Golden Age of Islam will occur primarily in the US because Muslims in America are more comfortable than in other Western nations. Americans are not strongly anti-Islamic, as some English and French are, and in America, Muslims are assured freedom of thought and practice under the First Amendment. This freedom will lead to greater participation in, and therefore greater influence on, American society. (p.178)
Eid Muslims: who attend mosque on the two major Muslim holidays.
Islam in America:
Muslim students enrolled at other American colleges and universities are becoming increasingly vocal in their efforts to gain recognition for themselves and their community. These efforts, supported by national groups such as the Muslim Student Association (MSA), are bringing results. Syracuse University has recognized “eid al-fitr at the end of Ramadan as an official school holiday, and the entire university closes for the day. At Syracuse and Harvard Universities, Islamically permissible meat is available to students on demand. (p.133)
Increasing numbers of organizations at both the national and local levels concentrate specifically on the political arena. The American Muslim Council (AMC) in Washington D.C. is a nonprofit, sociopolitical organization established in 1990 that works to promote ethical values among Muslims and the educate voters about the electoral process.
First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton now regularly invites the AMC to hose an “eid al-fitr celebration at the White House. The AMC is campaigning for official recognition of the two Islamic ‘eids as national holidays and hopes that the US postal system will issue ‘eid stamps by the year 2000. The Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC) is a bipartisan organization that also concentrates on voter education, helping Muslims understand the issues and how to make political decisions within the context of Islam. The MPAC is present at both political party conventions.
For Sunni Muslims, authoritative word regarding the beginning and the end of Ramadan comes from Saudi Arabia, where the religious sheikhs make this determination. When the end of Ramadan is announced, the great Eid al-Fitr (Feast of the Breaking of the Fast) begins a three- or four-day celebration, one of the largest and most joyous of the Muslim holidays. New Clothes are sewn or purchased for children, streets are decorated with bright lights, and children in Egypt carry lanterns as they go about the streets wishing people “Happy ‘Id!
Adults greet each other with similar expressions of good wishes, “’Id Sa’eed (Happy Holidays)” or “Sana Jadida Sa’eeda (Happy New Year).”
Traditionally, a sheep or goat was purchased by the family and slaughtered for the holiday however, with rising inflation and the increased cost of living, the purchase of an entire animal has become prohibitively expensive for many middle-class families. They may settle for a portion of meat from the butcher or share with the extended family in the purchase of an animal for slaughter. The killing of the animal must be carried out by a skilled Muslim butcher, who cuts the animal’s throat and allows it to bleed to death in the prescribed Islamic fashion. Other portions of the meat are set-aside as gifts for family, neighbors, and the poor as a traditional form of charitable behavior.
The ‘Id al-Fitr is one of the national holidays in predominantly Muslim countries during which intense socializing and celebration take place. It is probably the closest thing socially to the Christmas holiday in the West, although its religious meaning is unrelated and the materialism we have come to associate with Christmas is lacking. But socially It (31) is a time of great coming together and marks the culmination of Islam’s great annual collective rituals.
Works Cited
Fluehr-Lobban, Carolyn. Islamic Society in Practice. Gainesville, Fla. [u.a.: Univ. Pr. of Florida, 1995. Print.
Hasan, Asma Gull. American Muslims: the New Generation. New York: Continuum, 2000. Print.
Smith, Jane I. Islam in America. New York, NY: Columbia UP, 2010. Print.
