CNS STORY: Muslim scholar rouses support over visa revocation

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CNS Story:

RAMADAN Sep-16-2004 (790 words) With photo. xxxn

Muslim scholar rouses support over visa revocation

By Patricia Zapor
Catholic News Service

WASHINGTON (CNS) -- A Muslim scholar whose visa to teach at the University of Notre Dame was revoked shortly before the start of the school year has roused the support of Christians and Muslims who say he would add a valuable voice to religious understanding.

Tariq Ramadan, a Swiss Islamic theologian, was to have started work at the Catholic university in Indiana in August. In February, he was issued an H-1B visa, a category reserved for professionals. In late July, after his family had already shipped their belongings to Indiana, the State Department revoked the visa and told Ramadan he could reapply.

The only explanation given was that the Department of Homeland Security had requested the action, according to Scott Appleby, director of Notre Dame's Joan B. Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies.

Ramadan's situation quickly became the subject of news stories and editorials in the United States and in Europe. A handful of detractors suggested that Ramadan had links to extremists and that he was anti-Semitic. Others rose to his defense.

Ramadan himself wrote an opinion piece published in daily newspapers that rebutted the arguments raised about his work and his connections.

"I admit that my intellectual project is inherently controversial," he wrote. "My goal is to foster communities within the Islamic world that are seeking a path between their often bitter experience with some American and European policies on the one hand and the unacceptable violence of Islamic extremists on the other."

He said he shares some Muslims' criticisms of Western governments, including "the deleterious worldwide effects of unregulated American consumerism" and finds U.S. policies in the Middle East "misguided and counterproductive."

But, he noted that he also criticizes many "so-called Islamic governments, including that of Saudi Arabia, for their human rights violations and offenses against human dignity, personal freedom and pluralism."

Ramadan said he makes "no apologies for taking a critical look at both Islam and the West; in doing so I am being true to my faith and to the ethics of my Swiss citizenship. I believe Muslims can remain faithful to their religion and be able, from within pluralistic and democratic societies, to oppose all injustices."

Holy Cross Father Edward Malloy, Notre Dame's president, told the university student newspaper, The Observer, that neither Ramadan nor the university has heard an explanation of why the visa was revoked.

Because Ramadan has not been given a chance to hear and address whatever allegations led to the State Department's action, "it seems to me the law's not being fulfilled," Father Malloy told the paper.

Among those speaking in Ramadan's favor were the 15 scholars who make up the board of directors of the Center for the Study of Islam and Democracy in Washington.

"Revoking Dr. Ramadan's visa will not only deprive Notre Dame students of a great educational opportunity, it will also deny the American people and institutions a much-needed opportunity to engage the Muslim world in a real and serious dialogue," wrote the center's directors.

Appleby said in a letter to colleagues posted on the Kroc Institute's Web site that despite assertions that Ramadan's views constitute a threat "we have seen no evidence that he poses any threat to our national security. In fact, we believe the world could be a safer place if he is allowed to continue his work of bringing together in dialogue the divided and contentious voices within Islam."

Appleby said Ramadan "is a strong but moderate voice in a world plagued by extremism."

Ramadan was named in April by Time magazine as one of the 100 most influential thinkers in the world. Among his recent publications are the books "To Be a European Muslim" and "Western Muslims and the Future of Islam."

Father Francis Tiso, an associate director of the Secretariat for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said from his reading of some of Ramadan's work the theologian would be a valuable asset to Muslim-Christian understanding in the United States.

He likened Ramadan's perspectives on the secularization of Islam in Europe to the kind of thinking among Catholic theologians that preceded the Second Vatican Council.

"He discusses Islamic reform in terms of modernizing on its own terms, using its own resources," Father Tiso told Catholic News Service.

Like Christianity, Islam in Europe struggles with the effects of a secular society, he explained. Religion in the United States faces secularism also, but in very different ways.

"I think it would have been useful to Catholic-Muslim dialogue in this country for him to teach in the United States," Father Tiso said. And Ramadan's studies could benefit from closely observing the very different role religion plays in U.S. society than it does in Europe, he added.

END

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