No one at the multi-faith prayer service expected the backlash that would unfold. Least of all Abdisalam Adam.
Adam was one of several local prominent Somali Muslims who stood with Christians, Jews, Hindus and others at a Minneapolis event designed to show support for Muslims at a time when a Florida pastor was threatening to burn Qur’ans and hostility toward Islam was rising.
Now, he and the others find themselves branded as apostates in a firestorm within the Somali community that has stunned local church leaders.
“Right now we’re in a survival mode to straighten things out,” said Adam, who has been fielding calls from as far away as London and Ethiopia. “At first we thought we would ignore it. Then we decided to respond.”
He and fellow leaders at Minneapolis’ Dar al-Hijrah mosque issued statements this week condemning what he called a “manufactured crisis” over his role in the service and particularly imam Abdighani Ali’s “extremist” view of interfaith.
The brouhaha began almost immediately after the Sept. 28 multi-faith prayer service at Central Lutheran Church in downtown Minneapolis. About 400 people attended the “Minnesotans Standing Together” event, which was organized by the Minnesota Council of Churches and sponsored by 30-some religious organizations. Several prominent local Muslim organizations were among the sponsors.
A reporter from the Mogadishu Times, a Somali news website based in Minneapolis, covered the gathering and posted an article and some pictures showing the participants holding programs and standing with people of other faiths.
Another Somali news website, somalimidnimo.com, published the same pictures with captions reporting that Somali participants were listening to the prayers of the non-believers, according to a translation.
That set off Abdighani Ali, imam at a small Minneapolis mosque. On Oct. 1, he blasted the prayer service during his Friday khutbah, or sermon, and later on a Somali TV show.
Source:- startribune.
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