Community News (V14-I6)

Musa Syeed’s film wins audience award at Sundance

American director and screenwriter Musa Syeed’s film the Valley of Saints won the World Cinema Audience Award at the Sundance Festival.

The film was shot on location in Kashmir during the military curfew of Fall 2010, with Nicholas Bruckman as producer. 

The film centers on Gulzar, a young tourist boatman with plans to run away from Kashmir with his best friend. But a military crackdown derails their escape, and they become trapped in Gulzar’s lake village. They discover a mysterious woman, braving the curfew to research the dying lake. As Gulzar falls for her, rivalry and jealousy threaten his boyhood friendship and their plans of escape. The first film set in the endangered lake communities of Kashmir, Valley of Saints blends fiction and documentary to bring audiences inside this unique world.

Controversial ad offends Muslim students

COLUMBUS,OH–Muslim students at the Ohio State University have expressed their concerns over the publication of a controversial ad in the student newspaper.
The advertisement, paid for by the California-based David Horowitz Freedom Center, linked nine former Muslim Student Association members on campuses across the country to terrorism.
“It was just shocking to me at first to read it,” Muslim Student Association member Hafsa Khan in an interview to TV10.

The Muslim Student Association said that The Lantern “has a legal right to print such an advertisement, but has an ethical responsibility to reject hate speech,” Poland reported. 
Muslims in Milwaukee to host Neighbor’s Day

Muslims in Milwaukee will be hosting a “Meet Your Muslim Neighbors Day” in two  area libraries in  February 2012. The events which are free and open to the publicaim at highlighting the contributions of Muslims to the Milwaukee Community. The events will feature tables set up by various Muslim organizations in the area, a keynote speech as well as free food and gifts. The events will hold from 11am to 3pm in the following libraries:

* Oak Creek Public Library, 8620 Howell Ave. on Saturday 11 February 2012

* Franklin Public Library, 9151 W Loomis Rd. on Saturday 25 February 2012

There will be a keynote speech at 1.00pm at each event. Attendees will have the opportunity to ask questions and interact with Muslim leaders in the area.

Book club to discuss shared traits of Islam and Christianity

PORT LUDLOW,WA– The Port Ludlow Book Club delves into the seemingly divergent worlds of Islam and Christianity in its next book discussion on Tuesday, Feb. 13.

Members discuss A Deadly Misunderstanding: A Congressman’s Quest to Bridge the Muslim-Christian Divide by Mark Siljander, at 6:30 p.m. at the Bay Club.

Siljander is a former congressman from Michigan (1981-1987) and a former deputy ambassador to the United Nations. Club spokeswoman Martha Dawson said the book is a compelling and approachable account of Siljander’s discoveries of the similarities between the Bible and the Quran while traveling to some of the most contentious places on this earth – the Sahara, Libya, Sudan, Pakistan, Nepal and India – and meeting with world leaders of varying faiths. His revelations also come from studying Aramaic, the original language of Jesus Christ and the Bible, and attempting to allay misunderstanding of words and concepts that have been misinterpreted through erroneous translations. His discoveries have led him to believe that the religious texts of the Muslim and Christian faiths are surprisingly compatible when studied in their original language, Dawson said.

“This is fascinating reading for all who are interested in the seemingly divergent worlds of Islam and Christianity, the exploration of ancient texts, and how a bridge between people of differing faiths is a possibility and something that will benefit our lives and the welfare of future generations,” Dawson said.

Michigan Seerah conference at Flint Islamic Center

FLINT, MI–The Annual Seerah Conference will be held at the Flint Islamic Center on Feb.4, 2012.

Speakers will include Nuri Friedlander, a Ph.D. candidate at Harvard University, Green-Muslims.org representative Sarina Bajwa and national Muslim scholar Shaykh Yahya Rhodus. 

The conference will also feature a forum on green living. It is being sponsored by the Muslim Students Association of University of Michigan.

Muslim scholar to speak on God and religious diversity at St. John’s University

Amir Hussain will present the lecture “God and Religious Diversity: A Contemporary Muslim Perspective” at 8 p.m. Monday, Feb. 13, in the Quadrangle Building’s Alumni Lounge at Saint John’s University. The lecture is sponsored by the Jay Phillips Center for Interfaith Learning and is free and open to the public.

Hussain will discuss how Muslims understand their relationship to God given the fact of religious diversity and how they might think of religious diversity in relation to God’s will.

“As the last of the Abrahamic religions, Islam comes into a world that knows Christianity and Judaism,” Hussain said. “This means that Muslims have to have a theological understanding of both Jews and Christians in their relationship to God. As Islam expands out of Arabia and into Asia, it also has to make sense of Buddhism and Hinduism.”

A prominent scholar of Islam and interfaith relations, Hussain is professor of theological studies at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles. He earned a doctorate in religion from the University of Toronto and is the editor of the Journal of the American Academy of Religion, the premier scholarly journal for the study of religion.

Hussain is the author of “Oil and Water: Two Faiths, One God,” an introduction to Islam and Muslim-Christian dialogue, and more than two dozen book chapters and scholarly articles about Islam and Muslims. An appointed fellow of the Los Angeles Institute for the Humanities, he has appeared on the History Channel and has given interviews to numerous newspapers and magazines, including The Los Angeles Times, The New York Times and The Washington Post.

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