Source: Huffington Post

By: Dr. Faheem Younus Adjunct Faculty for Religion, CCBC.

People do crazy things for religion.

Take for example hundreds of families belonging to the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community in Chantilly, VA, trying to self-fund a mosque for the past decade. In an extremely friendly lending environment, the women from these families sold $500 dresses, their husbands made $5 kabob rolls, and their children cooked $.50 brownies to raise funds. And the Community’s executives, instead of lobbying governments for petrodollars, dug into their checkbooks to donate — urging others to reciprocate.

Well, on the eve of Jan. 29th, someone went crazy at this under-construction mosque in Chantilly VA: it was vandalized. All the custom glass windows on the first floor were shattered, leaving behind rocks, beer cans and a financial damage of $60,000.

There is a bright line distinction, though, between both crazy acts: one is driven by knowledge and love, while the other by ignorance at best, and hatred at worse.

This is not the first time such ignorance (or hatred) was directed at a mosque. Google the term “mosque vandalized” and you find 244,000 results. Just within 10 days of bin Laden’s death, three mosques were vandalized in New York, Maine, and Portland; so one more in Virginia is hardly ground breaking news.

What is news is the fact that we still know so little about these Muslims. Who are they? Why do they want to come to “my” community?

As an Ahmadi Muslim, allow me to tell you who we are.

Since 1924, members of the oldest Muslim organization in America have advocated loyalty to one’s country of residence. Instead of religious extremism, they are focused on education — hailing the first Muslim Nobel Laureate (in Physics) in 1979. Instead of male chauvinism, Ahmadi Muslim fathers empower their daughters, helping them to win Rhodes scholarships. And instead of confused pessimism, this community commemorated the 10th anniversary of 9/11 by raising more than 10,000 units of blood in collaboration with the American Red Cross. Pretty crazy, right? Or call it “Psychicemotus,” if you want to use a fancy word from the Grammy award winning musician Yusuf Latif ‘s album, also a respected member of Ahmadiyya Muslim Community USA.

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