Radio Netherlands Worldwide reports:
South African Muhsin Hendricks is an Islamic cleric and a gay man.
He runs a foundation called The Inner Circle, which helps Muslims, who are struggling to accept their sexuality. He has come to the Netherlands to spread a simple message: “It’s okay to be Muslim and gay!”
It’s a message not everyone agrees with and the reason why Mr Hendricks is no longer officially a cleric.
Muhsin Hendricks looks a little tired. He is in the Netherlands at the invitation of the Amsterdam branch of gay rights organisation COC and he’s on a punishing schedule. There is enormous public interest in the “pink imam”, as he’s been dubbed.
Sin
But every trace of fatigue vanishes as Mushin Hendricks talks about his faith and his sexuality.
“Being Muslim and being gay are both strong identities. And I think that they are both innate identities for me. So somewhere along the line I had to reconcile the two.”
This was far from easy for Muhsin Hendricks. He was born into an orthodox Muslim family in South Africa. His grandfather was a cleric in one of Cape Town’s most prominent mosques. Mushin discovered at an early age that he was different. He played with dolls rather than cars. He was seen as being feminine and was teased as a result. All this was long before he even knew there was such a thing as homosexuality.
Mushin Hendricks took comfort in his faith, in spite of the fact that many Muslims believe it offers no place to homosexual feelings. Sexual love between two men or two women is prohibited. It is seen as one of the worst possible sins, punishable in some Islamic countries by death.
Sodom and Gomorrah
But Muhsin Hendricks decided to discover for himself what the Qur’an has to say about homosexuality. He pursued his Islamic studies in Pakistan. “It didn’t seem fair for a very merciful and compassionate God to condemn me for something that I didn’t choose.”
Muhsin Hendricks drew a striking conclusion from his studies: nowhere does the Qur’an state that homosexuality is forbidden. Not even in the story of Sodom and Gomorrah. Mushin refutes the interpretation that God destroyed the cities because men had sex with one another. He argues that the cities’ residents were punished for rape, not for consensual sex between men.
Full article on Radio Netherlands Worldwide.
Muhsin Hendricks discusses homosexuality and Islam with
Maulana A K Hoosen, an Islamic Scholar, in Parvez Sharma's A Jihad for Love.
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I am not a religious person. I think if God is present and so perfect in so many people's eyes , then he should create all of us in such a way that we will live together peacefully and harmoniously.
But look at the world today ? Anyway religion is a controversial subject. Let's not even go into it. For us gays , I think we should just live our lives the way we want the mainstream to accept us. We are just like anyone else out there , just that our sexual orientation and preference are different. Cheers !
www.godisimaginary.com
Great opening comment, #1. I agree with you as well. Religion causes far more problems than it solves.
Come and live in Malaysia, and you'll see why Islam is killing a secular and multi-cultural society that was once beautiful- some 50 years ago.
Today, our land is all about marginalisation, segregation, extremism, fanaticism, racism, sexism and bigotry. It's so vulgar that even Allah can smell the stench. Where's the GOD in this?
If some of you weren't so focussed on dicks and pectorals and vanity mirrors, you might have a chance to read widely about religion, particularly the intelligent dialogues between Fr Felix Coppleston SJ a Jesuit priest, and Bertrand Russell, the aristocratic atheist and academic. These dialogues took place long before the internet ...which might be one reason of itself to have a look at them! The age of common sense and non sensationalism, do you remember it or have you heard of it?
Who will care for people less fortunate at any period in history? What will happen to you when your body sags and your money runs out? (When you are old , noone really cares if you were gay and hot in your prime, you are just another wrinkly) Where will you get help in civil disaster? Probably not from governments or atheist associations. More likely from someone with religious sentiments.
God Bless You, whoever you are and whether or not you accept His blessing.
...I fervently hope to let this film enlighten or affect people from all walks of life regardless of race, political belief, religion and personal biases...more power to people who bravely battle social storms!
Let us look at life intelligently and sensitively just what a human being should do!
All power to him!
I do not have religion but I do support anyone who thinks his/her religion helps her/him in whatever ways.
Be careful, Wihtout religion can divide people too. When you against religions, you are dividing people from logical point of view. Isn't it?
Some people eat rice, some don't. Some suck and fuck, some don't need. Be it. There are good people with and without religion. Take a close look, you will find PEACE.
"Every one of the world's "great" religions utterly trivializes the immensity and beauty of the cosmos. Books like the Bible and the Koran get almost every significant fact about us and our world wrong. Every scientific domain -- from cosmology to psychology to economics -- has superseded and surpassed the wisdom of Scripture.
Everything of value that people get from religion can be had more honestly, without presuming anything on insufficient evidence. The rest is self-deception, set to music."
"When considering the truth of a proposition, one is either engaged in an honest appraisal of the evidence and logical arguments, or one isn't. Religion is one area of our lives where people imagine that some other standard of intellectual integrity applies."
— Sam Harris
When religions started to discriminate, hate, kill, amass power, wealth and influence, religious differences and conflicts began to compound and have become entrenched and insurmountable.
The hope for peace began with religion but is sadly ending with it, unless a miracle happens.
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