ORONO, Maine — Islamic Awareness Week was scheduled long before recent terrorist attacks in Brussels and Pakistan, but the confluence of events provides an opportunity for meaningful discussion, according to one of the organizers of the local outreach effort.
The Muslim Students’ Association at the University of Maine and the Islamic Center of Maine, an Orono mosque, are sponsoring the annual event, which culminates with guest speakers Friday, April 1, and Saturday, April 2.
“ We aim to open our doors to our neighbors who do not share our faith, who may be skeptical of their Muslim neighbors and colleagues to have the opportunity to ask and express their concerns directly to the Muslims of this community in an open and safe environment,” Omar Conteh, outreach coordinator for the Orono mosque said in announcing the collaboration for the seventh year.
Conteh said in a recent telephone interview that the speakers and the topics for the programs were chosen “long before what happened in Brussels.”
“Each time there is an act of terrorism [for which a group claims credit in the name of Islam], fear of religion can be at the forefront of some people’s minds,” he said. “ Terrorism is happening in many places — Turkey, the Sudan and other parts of Africa. This is a wide-ranging issue that does not get as much media attention as it does when it happens in the West, but it is important that we talk about it.”
The 100-member mosque offers financial support and hosts the open house in association with the student association that has 28 members and four officers. The center does not choose the speakers, he said.
Jonathan Brown, director of the Prince Alwaleed bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., will speak at 5 p.m. Friday, April 1, in the Bangor Room in the Memorial Union on campus. His topic is “The Message of Peace: Spread by the Sword?”
Brown, author of “Misquoting Muhammad,” received his bachelor’s degree in history from Georgetown University in 2000 and his doctorate in Near Eastern languages and civilizations from the University of Chicago in 2006, according to his biography. He has studied and conducted research in countries such as Egypt, Syria, Turkey, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, South Africa, India, Indonesia and Iran.
Efforts to reach Brown were unsuccessful, but in the introduction to “Misquoting Muhammad,” published in 2014, Brown touched on what he most likely will cover at the university.
“The most pressing questions befuddling both Muslim and non-Muslim audiences were how we should understand such-and-such a controversial Quranic verse,” he wrote in the preface to the book. “During questions and answer times at talks I give I saw again and again the disillusioning clash between scripture and modernity acted out before me by individuals wondering how they should understand Islam today and what their relationship to the classical heritage of Islam should be.”
Nouman Ali Khan, founder of of the Bayyinah Institute in Irving, Texas, will speak at 5 p.m. Saturday, April 2, at the Islamic Center of Maine at 151 Park St. in Orono. His topic is “Cooperate in Matters of Goodness.”
Using television, podcasts and traditional classroom lectures, Bayyinah offers resources for Arabic and Quranic studies. Many of Khan’s lectures to students are available on the institute’s website. In a recent talk, he urged college students to take on leadership roles.
“Allah has given you certain talents, and it is your responsibility to use them,” Khan said.
Other activities will include henna tattoos, Arabic name writing and hijab wrapping between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. Monday through Friday at the Muslim Students’ Association’s table in the Memorial Union.