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The World Wants To Like America. The Guiding Values That Thomas Jefferson Articulated So Eloquently - Life, Liberty, And The Pursuit Of Happiness - Resonate Strongly Around The World, Transcending Countless Superficial And Cultural Differences, Not Because These Are American Values, But Because They Are Universal Values, Embedded In The Human Heart.

-Feisal Abdul Rauf

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The World Wants To

Feisal Abdul Rauf

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The World Wants To Like America. The Guiding Values That Thomas Jefferson Articulated So Eloquently - Life, Liberty, And The Pursuit Of Happiness - Resonate Strongly Around The World, Transcending Countless Superficial And Cultural Differences, Not Because These Are American Values, But Because They Are Universal Values, Embedded In The Human Heart.

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Religion Is Defined By The Relationship Between God And Man. And Islam Is The Submission And The Acknowledgment Of The Human Being To The Creator.

Yusuf Qaradawi Is Probably The Most Well-known Legal Authority In The Whole Muslim World Today.

The Battleground Has Been Moderates Of All Faith Traditions In All The Countries Of The World Against The Radicals Of All Faith Traditions In All Parts Of The World.

Countries Of The World

Staying Chaste Until Marriage, A Commandment Of My Faith, Was One Of The Most Difficult Challenges Of My Young Life. I Had A Powerful Sense That If I Did Not Get A Grip On My Identity, My Ethics, And My Religion, I Would Go Off The Rails.

The Sources Of Human Problems Have To Do With Egotism, ‘i.’

Koran Says Whoever Believes In God In The Last Day Shall Be Saved. It Is A Religion Whose Very Name, Islam, Comes From The Word Shalom, Which Means Peace. It's About Establishing Peace. We Greet Each Other With Peace Be Upon You, Which The Jews Do In Greeting Each Other.

I Worked As A Teacher In The Public School System In New York City For Several Years, And I Was A Victim Of The Layoffs, You Know, In The Mid-'70s. And Then I Worked As A Sales Engineer For A Company In New Jersey That Was Selling Industrial Filtration Equipment.

In Malaysia, Where Western Culture Was Extremely Influential, I'd Grown Up Listening To Elvis And The Beatles And Watching American Movies. People Wanted To Be Like Americans. In Contrast, When I Got Here, I Saw Prosperous Middle-class American College Students Wanting To Somehow Join The Third World.

The Islamic Method Of Waging War Is Not To Kill Innocent Civilians, But It Was Christians In World War Ii Who Bombed Civilians In Dresden And Hiroshima, Neither Of Which Were Military Targets.

I Condemn Everyone And Anyone Who Commits Acts Of Terrorism. And Hamas Has Committed Acts Of Terrorism.

I Have Never Made A Threat. I've Never Made A Threat, Never Expressed A Threat, Never - I've Never - I Would Never Threaten Violence Ever, Because I Am A Man Of Peace, Dedicated To Peace.

What's Brilliant About The United States System Of Government Is Separation Of Power. Not Only The Executive, Legislative, Judicial Branches, But Also The Independence Of The Military From Civilians, An Independent Media And Press, An Independent Central Bank.

Fanaticism And Terrorism Have No Place In Islam.

I Am A Supporter Of The State Of Israel.

I Am An American Citizen Born In Kuwait Of Egyptian Parents. I Grew Up In Great Britain, Malaysia, And Egypt And Have Lived In The United States Since 1965, When I Was Seventeen.

I Read, Read Enormously On All Different Fields Of Islamic Thought, From Philosophy To Islamic Literature, Poetry, Exegeses, Knowledge Of The Hadith, The Teachings Of The Prophet. That's How I Trained Myself. And Then I Was Appointed Imam By A Sufi Master From Istanbul, Turkey.

'jihad' Can Mean Holy War To Extremists, But It Means Struggle To The Average Muslim.

Bigotry Toward Any Faith Community Cannot Have Any Place In Civilized Society Anywhere In The World.

Civilized Society

In Spite Of The Polls, The Fact Is That American Muslims Are Very Happy And They Thrive In This Country.

The Fundamental Idea Which Defines A Human Being As A Muslim Is The Declaration Of Faith: That There Is A Creator, Whom We Call God - Or Allah, In Arabic - And That The Creator Is One And Single. And We Declare This Faith By The Declaration Of Faith, Where We... Bear Witness That There Is No God But God.

In The 20th Century, The Muslim World Created A Vision Of Religious Nationalism. Turkey, For Example, Had To Be Ethnically Turkish. Kurds, Armenians, Other Minorities Didn't Have A Place In Such A Vision Of A Nation-state.

I As A Muslim Want You, As A Christian, To Really Be A Perfect Christian. I Want My Jewish Friends To Be Perfect Jews, To Live According To The Highest Principles Of What It Means To Be A Jew, To Be A Christian, To Be A Muslim.

Americans Must Outgrow The Unbecoming Arrogance That Leads Us To Assert That America Somehow Owns A Monopoly On Goodness And Truth - A Belief That Leads Some To View The World As But A Stage On Which To Play Out The Great Historical Drama: The United States Of America Versus The Powers Of Evil.

I Was Completely Surrounded By Religion From A Young Time. I Was Taught By My Father. I Engaged In Discussions With Him And Many Of These Scholars Who Visited And Came Around The Dining Table, The Lunch Table, And Attended Many Lectures With My Dad. And So I Learned The Apprentice Way.

There Are Moderates In Israel. There Are Moderates In Iran, There Are Moderates In The Republican Party, Moderates In The Democratic Party. What We Need To Do Is We Need Link All Of These Moderates Together And To Figure Out A Way By Which This Particular Coalition Can Speak To Important Issues To Marginalize The Voice Of The Extremists.

Sufis Teach That We First Must Battle And Destroy The Evil Within Ourselves By Shining Upon It The Good Within, And Then We Learn To Battle The Evil In Others By Helping Their Higher Selves Gain Control Of Their Lower Selves.

A Kind Of Racism Still Exists In The United States, And Islamophobia Is A More Convenient Way To Express That Sentiment. There Has Also Been An Attempt To Paint Muslims As Enemies Of The United States.

My Life Has Been Devoted To Peacemaking.

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There Are Individuals Who Are Working Very Hard To Promote Fear And Antagonism Towards Islam And Muslims In This Country. It's Fueled, In Part, By The First African-american President That We Have. Obama's Father Was A Muslim And People Have Used This To Arouse Hostility Against Him.

Working Very Hard

Our Enemy Is Not Islam. Islam Is Not The Enemy Of America; Americans Are Not The Enemy Of Islam. Our Real Enemy Is Extremism And Radicalism.

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The Truth Is That Killing Innocent People Is Always Wrong - And No Argument Or Excuse, No Matter How Deeply Believed, Can Ever Make It Right. No Religion On Earth Condones The Killing Of Innocent People; No Faith Tradition Tolerates The Random Killing Of Our Brothers And Sisters On This Earth.

There Are Always People Who Will - Who Will Do Peculiar Things And Think That They Are Doing Things In The Name Of Their Religion.

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If Muslims Curse The Christians, Then The Christians Will Curse The Muslims. And People Will Curse Allah, And Allah Will Hold Us Responsible For That.

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When I Arrived In America, I Experienced Serious Culture Shock. For Someone With A Religious Upbringing, The 1960s Were An Extremely Difficult Time. Even Though Religion Was A Big Part Of The Civil Rights And Peace Movements, In My College Religion Was Treated As Irrelevant, Hopelessly Stodgy, And Behind The Times.

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The World Wants To Like America. The Guiding Values That Thomas Jefferson Articulated So Eloquently - Life, Liberty, And The Pursuit Of Happiness - Resonate Strongly Around The World, Transcending Countless Superficial And Cultural Differences, Not Because These Are American Values, But Because They Are Universal Values, Embedded In The Human Heart.

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We Are Americans. We - We - We Are - We Are Doctors. We Are Investment Bankers. We Are Taxi Drivers. We Are Store Keepers. We Are Lawyers. We Are - We Are Part Of The Fabric Of America. And The Way That America Today Treats Its Muslims Is Being Watched By Over A Billion Muslims Worldwide.

The American Principles Of Democracy Expresses The Deepest Values Of The Sharia Both Structurally And In The Government... Sharia Requires Us Muslims Anywhere To Abide By The Law Of The Land.

Any Organization Or Any Individual That Targets Civilians And Kills Them For Political Agenda Is A Terrorist Organization.

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