Word: islamics
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...current turmoil over Turkey's identity that pits political Islam against staunch secularism in the courts and on the streets, the Alevis offer a third way - a faith-based humanism big enough to incorporate both piety and modernity. Indeed, Alevi Islam is as layered as the ceremonial dress worshipers sometimes wear, originating in pre-Islamic times when the Turks were nomadic horsemen in Central Asia. Their circular prayer rooms, veneration of horses and participation in sports such as javelin throwing, all predate the quasi-Shi'ite form of Islam they later adopted (Alevi means "follower of Ali," the grandson...
...Aykan Erdemir, assistant professor of sociology at Middle East Technical University in Ankara, argues that the treatment of the Alevi is a crucial litmus test that Turkey is failing. "The [Alevi] are not only offering an alternative, more Western-ready version of Islam," he says. "They also show that Sunni conservatives in power in Turkey are in fact extremely bigoted and spreading hate language...
...Upstairs at the Karacaahmet Sultan shrine, an Alevi leader named Muharrem Ercan sits behind his desk in his smoke-filled office. He's confident, he says, that the Alevi are on the winning side. "We solved the issue of whether Islam could be tolerant 750 years ago," he says. "It's the rest of Turkey that has to catch...
...participate in prayer with the CSA members was so personally meaningful, as it demonstrates how open our religious communities are to other faith members,” Syed said.Aside from the public services and the Kickoff Festival, the week also included a panel on commonalities between Christianity and Islam, a community service project at the Salvation Army food kitchen, a film screening about women’s religious activism, and a religion-themed trivia night.“The scope of this week shows how much the Interfaith Council has matured over four years,” Syed said...
...late 1960s was emerging as a more rigorous, if not radical, reevaluation of the role of African Americans in the country's history, with the church as confessional, refuge and bully pulpit. Much of it was a reaction to the Black Power Movement and the Nation of Islam, which questioned the compatibility of blackness with Christianity. "Blacks coming out of the '60s were no longer ashamed of being black people, nor did they have to apologize for being Christian. Because many persons in the African-American community were teasing us, Christians, of being a white man's religion," Wright told...