What they don’t teach you at Sunday school

By Haroon Moghul

There’s a fair chance you, like me, are the first generation of your family born here, that you were a guinea pig, too. I don’t begrudge the sincerity and dedication my parents and their peers showed in shaping us. Coming halfway around the world, to an alien culture, disconnected from everyone they knew and loved, raising their children not only as minorities but often extremely isolated minorities, and nevertheless instilling in them a lifelong (well, so far) commitment to religion is no mean feat. I’m pretty sure many of us, if the circumstances were reversed, would fall flat on our faces.

So let’s not hastily and summarily dismiss the achievements of those who came before us, or go out of our way to mock and deride their contributions. But, of course, they taught us what they knew, or wished they’d known, and we have an obligation to teach those who come after us what we know or, as in this case, what we’d wished we’d known. Maybe what I am going to say here might seem suspect to you, problematic, upsetting or, worse of all, nonsensical. Maybe it’s too soon. Or maybe it’ll nudge you just enough to avoid making mistakes myself and others of my generation made. Fast-forwarding you to better, more meaningful mistakes.

I want to share with you life experiences that contradict, or at least greatly complicate, what I learned in Sunday school. I learned many things through Sunday school, though it nevertheless left me utterly unprepared for many other things.

Here’s five things I’d wished I’d been taught.

1. Islam is really hard

Let me be the first to break it to you: Whether or not you grow up to see Islam as an unmitigated blessing is kind of irrelevant. Because, of course, part of the point to religion is its hardness. Added to this the malevolence many people feel towards Islam, the idiots doing vile things in its (our) name, and the nastiness and bitter infighting we experience in some of our institutions, and you’ll soon have a more confusing picture.

In some respects, yes, Islam makes life much easier. Rather I should say bearable. There is a purpose to life, a promise of balance, a hope for redemption, which might not otherwise be present. But beyond the above concerns religiosity presents, Islam’s very message provokes certain fears, among which is: What if I’m not a good Muslim? What happens to me after I die? Be prepared for religion to make life harder. If you aren’t expecting this, you’ll be devastated.

You might even be chased out altogether.

2. We don’t have two holidays

People who repeat this mean the two Eids, after Ramadan and Hajj. But what I am concerned by is what they intend by it: Do they mean we must have these two holidays at minimum? That we have these two holidays in common? Or that we can only have these two holidays? No matter how you answer these questions, the next one matters more: How do you celebrate? In many of our communities, our festivities are soporific, our attitudes can be strident, our sermons can be dull (or far, far too aggressive), and our conferences are usually parades of bearded men hectoring us unoriginally. And I say this as a bearded man.

There’s very little variety, still insufficient diversity, and not nearly enough energy. We’re the Jeb Bush of American religious life. But American Muslim culture doesn’t have to be boring. And some institutions do a fantastic job. (They’re usually exclusive.) We seem to have been overwhelmed by a desire to perceive religion as purposefully numbing; any deviation from the path is met with threats of hellfire and brimstone, or the Islamic equivalent. You should know that just because what you find immediately present around you to be unfulfilling doesn’t mean that’s the religion’s fault. Don’t let the religion chase you away.

Don’t let the religious, either.

3. Islam is not simple

A leader is someone who serves her community. A religion’s fortunes can be judged by the quality of people who serve it. Are they sharp, dedicated, and optimistic? Are they best and brightest their community has to offer? And—most importantly—are they well-suited for the task?

For some reason, we’ve handed our religion over to people who are technologists, whereas historically the people who taught our religion were humanists, aesthetes, Renaissance men (and women), who rightly preferred rich literature to Spartan equations. Who were prepared to see human life as variegated and complex.

I fear the people who tell you Islam is simple are merely covering up for their own insecurities; religion is ‘simple’ is the preference for people who see things simply. Islam is accessible, yes. If that’s what you mean by simple, fine. But when did simple come to mean immature, stunted, undeveloped, or unthinking?

4. That was 1,400 years ago

Some Muslims always present the best of Islam (usually, incidentally, a theoretical standard that exists nowhere in the world) against the worst of the West, and do this repeatedly, whenever their ego is challenged. This is arguing in bad faith, and it’s not only perverse, but it’ll guarantee you’ll get nowhere in life. Also, given that we are Westerners, what gives? If you’re being set up for seeing yourself in opposition to your own country, you’re being sabotaged. Don’t see Islam and the world as necessarily at odds. Don’t be convinced Islam is marginal, and Muslims defeated. And don’t listen to statements which are not really arguments, but periods, not the beginnings of conversations, but the ends of sentences. “Islam liberated women” is one of these; usually, a panel of men will insist Islam has advanced women so far, and so long ago, that women don’t even need to tell us, what they think, because they’re somewhere in the back enjoying being liberated.

And, of course, if that was done 1,400 years ago, it means there’s nothing left to do. Not only that we don’t have problems, but that we can’t have solutions. It’s a recipe for—well, nothing, because recipes result in something. It’s a command to sit still to no effect. Make sure that when you receive religious arguments, you think about how they would sound from someone else’s perspective, about what they are intended to do, and that you can distinguish a slogan from a point. Arguments are made up of points; slogans, together, are for rallies, and rallies are of extremely limited utility. Don’t let us get away with the feel-good language that prevents us from confronting real injustices, and challenging them, which is good for bumper stickers and no other parts of your life.

5. Islam isn’t everything

When I got to college, I did two things decisively: I joined the Islamic Center, and chose to study Arabic. I only hesitantly and very slowly stepped outside of a Middle Eastern Studies (soap)box. Let me give you some professional advice: Define yourself before others have defined you. Why is it the first place many of us go is the Muslim Students Association? Why not other clubs, other organizations, other affiliations? Have you noticed how many MSAs are very cliquish, very small and very unable to reach the majority of Muslim students?

It’s because many of the folks who come to run MSAs come straight from Sunday school. They have no experience with different kinds of people. They’ve grown up in a Muslim bubble. That’s why they can’t build out or grow out organizations.

There’s a significant difference between saying Islam is your anchor, your orientation, your guide to the world, and claiming there should be nothing but Islam in your life. Let yourself grow. Let yourself learn. Focus on things that might not make immediate sense. Figure out who you are, not what you were told to be. It’ll pay off in the long run, because it’ll give you a much broader perspective on the world. It’ll make you capable of seeing more honestly, respectfully and generously. You’ll get a sense of a world beyond a Muslim community, a reality past Sunday school, all of which you should bring back with you into your community.

You’ll be better for it, and so will our communities. You’ll also be more employable.

Which should make all our parents happy.

Editor’s Note: Haroon Moghul is the author of “The Order of Light” and “My First Police State.” His memoir, “How to be Muslim”, is due in 2016. He’s a doctoral candidate at Columbia University, formerly a Fellow at the New America Foundation and the Center on National Security at Fordham Law School, and a member of the Multicultural Audience Development Initiative at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art. Connect with Haroon on twitter @hsmoghul. The views expressed here are his own.