A Muslim Response to America's Failure to Change

More times than I can remember, I've had to ascend the minbar and address a Friday congregation reeling. Many Imams will do the same painful work this week. But for many American Muslims, Buffalo and Uvalde strike in other ways. Beyond the infuriating inability of America to act is the rigid commitment of far too many Americans to their purported rights, even at the cost of thousands of lives. Of course, faiths are not countries. But both rise and fall based on how we think they work. In recent years, many Muslim communities were devastated by fringe groups that hijacked public discourse -- they didn't understand what Islam actually was, or how it historically worked and, as such, they inflicted chaos and bloodshed wherever they took root. And this, I fear, is what's happening in America: Instead of seeing their society as a living, dynamic moral project, which adjusts and adapts to the changing circumstances of the world, too many Americans see our nation as a rigid project whose changelessness is a mark of glory.