Diversity event helps dispel myths about Muslim worshippers

BANGOR – Contrary to popular media portrayals, not all Muslims are terrorists, and women who live in Islamic countries are not oppressed because they cover their heads with scarves, two adherents to the Middle Eastern religion said Saturday during a diversity conference.

Recently, the Islamic religion has been in the news because adherents to the Taliban, hard-line Muslims who have ruled Afghanistan since 1996, have destroyed two giant stone Buddhas thought to be at least 1,300 years old.

“For me, the statues are just stones like any other stone I see,” said Sofian Kanan, a native of Jordan who has been in the state for five years completing a Ph.D. and doing post doctoral work in chemistry at the University of Maine. Kanan was one of two Muslim speakers during a diversity conference at University College of Bangor. About a dozen people attended the workshop intended to dispel myths about Islam.

Kanan said Muslims respect other monotheistic religions, where only one god is worshipped, but do not respect religions, like Hinduism or Buddhism, that pay homage to idols.

He said people who are outraged by the destruction of the statues should be more upset about the almost daily killing of Palestinians, many of them children, by the Israelis.

In an interview, Kanan said it is frustrating to see his 2 billion fellow Muslims labeled as terrorists. For example, immediately after the bombing of the federal building in Oklahoma City, news reports said authorities were seeking Muslim terrorists who were believed responsible for the blast. When it turned out that several Americans were responsible, they were not described as Christian terrorists, Kanan said.

By and large, however, he said, people in Maine have been very understanding of his religion. For example, one Friday he was very busy and unable to join other Islamic men for a required prayer session. He put his lab coat on the floor and prayed there. His adviser called to him several times, but Kanan, deep in prayer, did not respond. Afterward, he explained to his adviser about his prayers. The professor apologized that he didn’t know about Kanan’s Islamic beliefs and requirement to pray five times daily.

There are quite a few Muslim families in the Bangor area, Kanan said, and a mosque soon will open in Orono.

Nichole Belanger, who grew up in Levant, recently converted to the Islamic faith. She said she chose the religion because it made sense to her after reading many books about it. She said women who cover their heads with a hijab, or scarf, are not oppressed as many Americans believe. Wearing a black scarf herself, Belanger said many Islamic women choose to cover themselves out of modesty and respect for Allah, the Muslim god.

Muslim women are free to go to college and work, although they are encouraged to stay home with their children, she said.

Other sessions during the two-day diversity conference included discussions of Native American cultures, living with AIDS and understanding and respecting differences. A variety of musicians also performed.