Only half an hour after a work group session discussing “Change Through Communication” concluded in the hotel conference hall, the tables had been pushed back, the notes and the debates cleared away, and women were gathering on the clean white sheets spread out on the floor of the meeting hall, all facing the Kiblah.  Those who didn’t wear scarves during the meeting now draped them over their heads, set their shoes aside, and sat to listen to one woman speak, in the calm tones reserved for prayer. 

She spoke of Islam’s commitment to the improvement of the human condition, of its openness to all available knowledge: “the essence of the universality of Islam.”  The Qur’an discourages attempts to convert people of other faiths to Islam; “they have the right to choose their path,” said the speaker, and as long as they are working toward the human good, they are also on the right path.

It was a message that would come as quite a surprise to Westerners used to the post-9/11 quick-and-dirty tutorial on Islam, who have so little knowledge of – or little interest in – the faith’s similarities to other Abrahamic religions in the central emphasis on peace and love for one’s fellow men.

The power that a shared religion has to break through cultural boundaries, to silence for a moment any contention that may have occurred during the discussion earlier today, struck me.  In an ideal world, its purpose is not so dissension cannot occur, because I believe that it as vital a force as compassion or generosity for cracking foundations, for building new ones; and I expect that most of the women at this conference agree.  Instead, it is so that, standing to leave at the end of the Jumu’ah prayer, to turn to the person next to you with malice is more difficult than it had been before.