Post by buzzanddidj on Sep 23rd, 2014 at 12:10am
It’s a shame we must have #NotInMyName
Condemning Isil should not morph into an obligation to apologise for being Muslim
19 Sep 2014
Alan Henning, the 47-year-old taxi driver abducted by Isil in Syria
This is not a piece I envisaged I would ever write. Isil is not a subject that dominates my family dinner table or chats with friends and colleagues. As a young journalist I have privately vowed never to take up the mantle of “voice of my generation” or to act as a spokesperson for British Muslims or Islam.
In truth, I spent my evenings this week worrying about whether or not Chelsea would win their opening Champions League game rather than fretting over the strategic implications of the latest beheading video to come out of Raqqa. The actions of the self-styled Islamic State are so divorced from the banal realities of my life that news from Syria and Iraq becomes just another grim headline when I come into The Telegraph office every morning.
They are neither a “state” nor proponents of any vision of Islam that I have ever encountered. Indeed, I still most identify the word Isis, as we used to call Islamic State, with the river I first encountered during my freshers’ week at Oxford.
The terms “jihadi” and “jihadist”, meanwhile, have been appropriated to label the likes of the murderer “Jihadi John” and his fellow thugs. But my jihad is no millenarian fight for a Caliphate. My jihad, which means struggle, is to wake up on time for work, to squeeze my prayers in, and make sure I speak to my mum at least three times a week.
Every day, myself and others who wear outward manifestations of our faith face a small jihad to convince people, on first meeting, that we don’t harbour extremist tendencies and that we are not oppressed (except perhaps by a devotion to Premier League football). On the whole, I think we manage to succeed pretty well.
Continued
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/religion/11106474/Its-a-shame-we-must-have-NotInMyName.html
Condemning Isil should not morph into an obligation to apologise for being Muslim
19 Sep 2014
Alan Henning, the 47-year-old taxi driver abducted by Isil in Syria
This is not a piece I envisaged I would ever write. Isil is not a subject that dominates my family dinner table or chats with friends and colleagues. As a young journalist I have privately vowed never to take up the mantle of “voice of my generation” or to act as a spokesperson for British Muslims or Islam.
In truth, I spent my evenings this week worrying about whether or not Chelsea would win their opening Champions League game rather than fretting over the strategic implications of the latest beheading video to come out of Raqqa. The actions of the self-styled Islamic State are so divorced from the banal realities of my life that news from Syria and Iraq becomes just another grim headline when I come into The Telegraph office every morning.
They are neither a “state” nor proponents of any vision of Islam that I have ever encountered. Indeed, I still most identify the word Isis, as we used to call Islamic State, with the river I first encountered during my freshers’ week at Oxford.
The terms “jihadi” and “jihadist”, meanwhile, have been appropriated to label the likes of the murderer “Jihadi John” and his fellow thugs. But my jihad is no millenarian fight for a Caliphate. My jihad, which means struggle, is to wake up on time for work, to squeeze my prayers in, and make sure I speak to my mum at least three times a week.
Every day, myself and others who wear outward manifestations of our faith face a small jihad to convince people, on first meeting, that we don’t harbour extremist tendencies and that we are not oppressed (except perhaps by a devotion to Premier League football). On the whole, I think we manage to succeed pretty well.
Continued
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/religion/11106474/Its-a-shame-we-must-have-NotInMyName.html