Pope Francis is my Imam, that is my spiritual Master

Pope Francis is my Imam | TheGhouseDiary.com

Pope Francis is also an Imam (religious guide) of this Muslim.  He is a true servant of God and a true follower of Jesus, and equally represents the ideals Prophet Muhammad stood for; Justice, equality and Kindness to fellow beings.

I have been looking for an individual who has genuinely understood the essence of religion and not hung up with rituals, though rituals are a part of everything we do. Mahatma Gandhi and Mother Teresa are the other two beings around my life time, although I was born four years after Gandhi's death, he has appeared twice in my dreams and has said that I have work to do. That keeps me motivated.

This man is one of the most inclusive humans God has created in this century; he respects God by respecting and including every human in his embrace. He has demonstrated respecting the otherness of others and accepting God given uniqueness to each one of his creation.

I have connected with him spiritually since March 2013, the day he was appointed to be the Pope. The more I read about him, the more I bond with him, and amazingly, what I had believe and articulated about him, he has done it all and more. It includes repairing the  Muslim-Christian, Jewish-Christian, and Hindu-Abrahimic relations, respecting those who do not believe in God, Gays and Lesbians, ordination of women into clergy... no human has to be treated anything less, all are equal in the eyes of God, and his eyes.  

In the picture below, I am in tune with Rivkah, though she is an Orthodox Jew and I am a Moderate Muslim, we have the same attitude. We are all humans and are on par with each other.  I love this man Pope Francis for his humility, a symbol of true religious person. When Rivkah could not bow towards him for her own reasons, he turned around and bowed instead, to let Rivkah, me and the world to learn that the human being is more important than the religious symbols or the protocol of the Pope. Thank you for doing this Pope Francis.  

He is a symbol of humility, what a great man he is and that is why I accept him as my religious leader.   Showing respect does not have to be communicated through bowing, it is expressed by merely admiring the man as Rikvah did without bowing. I am sure some of you may feel the same while others may opt for the other expressions. All paths are valid.
 

His teachings are Christian, because he is, but in reality he teaches the essence of religion that is embedded in "all" religions.  I hear him out as if a great Muslim Imam is speaking to me in a different wrapper.  He embodies what a true Muslim, may be a Jew or a Hindu, Sikh, or a Baha’i ought to be.

I will listen to him and will follow him. Yet, he is a Christian and I am a Muslim. The essence of all religions is to make you a human who has no barrier between him and the other human. I am willing to say, if the religion does not remove hate, prejudice, ill-will and walls between you and the other, then you really did not get your own religion. You may go back to your religion until you find yourselves to be boundless.

Genuine spirituality is feeling like a cog in the wheel of the universe and an element in the millions of other elements.  I am merely a strand in the World Wide Web, as Chief Seattle would have said it.

Pope Francis will be here in the US in two weeks, I have seriously debated about seeing him in person, as it is my sincere heartfelt desire to meet him and feel blessed with his holy presence. I have never felt like this with any one in my life.  The other side of me resists seeing him, why does it have to be symbolic?

I feel buoyed to write about him, and have written over 20 articles, some of them are at: http://mikeghouse.net/PopeFrancis.asp

Mike is a speaker, thinker, writer, pluralist, human rights activist and a media commentator committed to building cohesive societies and offers pluralistic solutions on issues of the day. His info is in 63 links at MikeGhouse.net and TheGhouseDiary.com  chronicles his writings.

Dr. Amina Wadud banned to speak in Madras University in India

Dr. Amina Wadud is Muslim scholar well respected around the world,  and has earned the distinction of being the first woman to lead the mixed congregation prayers on a Friday in 2003 or 2004. On that day and from that day forward, the whole Muslim orthodoxy has gone to work against her. Some of the placards held outside the prayer hall were disgustingly shameful. Muslims in general value free speech and subscribe to it but not the conservatives among them. Oddly the conservatives want to scream, stop and prevent others from free speech, but themselves? They want to have it all. They almost sound like my fellow Republicans.The only way to change is to speak up - enough of us to speak up to make sense to them.

URL - http://worldmuslimcongress.blogspot.com/2013/07/dr-amina-wadud-banned-to-speak-in.html

On a Friday in 2003/04, just before the prayers Dr. Wadud, Asra Nomani and Saleema were on my radio show to talk about what it means to lead the mixed congregational prayers. 

I was fortunate to be a co-speaker with her at DePaul University in Chicago a couple of years ago and I was also thrilled when she used some of my symbols from my facebook. I wrote a piece on Sharia in July 2010, and she wrote an identical piece in November of the same year - both were novel write ups and followed the same logic to the point of being duplicate. Sharia was never looked in that fashion before.

Enough of us have not taken the time to nurture the values of respecting different opinions... and even expanding on Prophet's Hadith - combat evil (their perception) with good.

Muslim men, like all other men seem to deal with women from an insecurities of losing to her or acknolwedging her knowledge. "what does she know" or "she is a woman". It is a fashion among a few prominent Muslims to criticize women scholarship and discount their knowledge off the bat. Its the old generation, the new ones in America are growing up to believe in equality of men and women. However there are some out there who are trained by their parents to be bigots, again, it is not only Muslims, you find them among Christians, Hindus, Jews and even Buddhists and Bahai's.

The men need to learn to debate her and not be afraid to learn and share the knowledge exchange.  Even a non-scholar like Taslima Nasreen, deserves to be engaged in a debate, a fair debate; instead of physically pushing here out of the stage. A disgusting act by an elected official in Hyderabad, India.

Is bigotry shown towards Dr. Wadud because she is a woman? A lot of Muslims shamelessly discount women - what does she know? 

We all have to learn to grow up. Prophet Muhammad, the mercy to mankind liberated women from the ugly clutches of men giving her all the liberties that were God given – free to practice her faith even against her husband’s wishes, free to choose her partner, divorce, own property and business, and she was no more a man’s property. She is on her own and responsible for her karma on the Day of Judgment, not her husband. What you see how women are treated has nothing to do with any religion, it is the men! And we we need to work on changing by assuring them that by debating with a woman and losing should be no different than debating with a man.


At worldmuslimcongress@yahoogroups.com, we bring tough issues to the fore, and with hesitation present the orthodox, liberal and moderate views on a given topic. However it is moderated to keep off tangent comments, and personal attacks.

The group has 1800 members including 50+ imams, scholar/academics, activist, extremists (intolerant of others) and ordinary folks.

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We also share the information regularly on our mailing list of over 36000 people across the globe – the message of pluralism and pluralism in Islam.

Mike Ghouse is a speaker, thinker and a writer on Islam, pluralism, interfaith and other topics and offers pluralistic solutions on issues of the day - all about him at www.MikeGhouse.net

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Courtesy of Wall Street Journal