c. 2006 Religion News Service

Muslim Group Says Miami Terror Suspects are Not Muslims

(RNS) Days after federal authorities charged seven men with plotting terrorist attacks on U.S. soil, a Muslim advocacy group is insisting the men were not Muslims and shouldn’t be described as such in news reports.

The Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) bases its claim on a June 22 CNN interview. In it, a Miami man claims to belong to the same Seas of David group that apparently counts the suspects as members, and he tells of their religious practice.

“We study and we train through the bible,” Brother Corey says in a CNN transcript. He also refers to the group’s habit of worshiping in a “temple,” not a mosque.

“Given that the reported beliefs of this bizarre group have nothing to do with Islam, we ask members of the media to refrain from calling them `Muslims,”’ said CAIR spokesperson Ahmed Bedier.

The federal indictment against the suspects describes an intention to carry out “a violent jihad” against the United States. “Jihad” implies a Muslim orientation to take up holy war.

The Florida-based Seas of David may have drawn their belief system from multiple faith traditions. Elsewhere in the CNN interview, Corey says, “we studied Allah and also the worship of the regular Bible.”

Conservative Christian news outlets, such as Pat Robertson’s Christian Broadcasting Network and The Conservative Voice online content service, have described the suspects as Muslims.

CAIR’s request for clarification has received international attention through such vehicles as Voice of America and Arab broadcaster Al-Jazeera. Both outlets ran news stories about CAIR’s effort to distance the alleged conspirators from the Muslim faith.

_ G. Jeffrey MacDonald

Suvey Finds Deep Divide in Western-Muslim Perceptions

WASHINGTON (RNS) Westerners associate fanatacism with Muslims, Muslims associate selfishness with Westerners, and both groups associate violence and arrogance with the other, according to the latest report of The Pew Global Attitudes Project.

The report, entitled “The Great Divide: How Westerners and Muslims view each other,” surveyed 14,000 people in 13 Western and Muslim countries face-to-face and over the phone.

“This was a bad year for Muslim and Western relations,” said project director Andrew Kohut, referring to riots over cartoon portrayals of Muhammad, a major terrorist attack in London, and the continuing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The report said the rift between the West and Muslims peaked earlier this year when a cartoon depicting Muhammad was published in a Danish newspaper and then across Europe. More than 60 percent of the Americans, French and Germans surveyed said Muslim intolerance is to blame for the controversy of cartoons, while more than 80 percent of the Jordanians, Egyptians, Indonesians and Turks surveyed said Western disrespect is to blame.

There is also a chasm between how both view the other’s treatment of women. More than 59 percent of non-Muslims surveyed in Great Britain, France, the United States, Germany and Spain said Muslims are not respectful of women. More than half of Muslims surveyed in Egypt, Indonesia, Jordan and Pakistan said the same thing about Westerners. Muslims surveyed in Western countries generally held that Westerners are respectful of women.

The study drew criticism from Rabbi Brad Hirschfield, vice president of CLAL, a Jewish think tank in New York and a veteran of Muslim-Jewish relations.

“This kind of study may actually perpetuate the problem by focusing the attentions of each community on the other, and reinforcing their already growing sense of us vs. them,” he said. “It perpetuates the capacity to examine others in the absence of any self-reflection.”

_ J. Edward Mendez

Study Finds Volunteers Primarily Work Through Religious Organizations

(RNS) A survey conducted by the Corporation for National and Community Service shows that Americans primarily volunteer their time through religious organizations.

Based on data obtained from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and a “volunteering” supplement in the Current Population Survey (CPS), the report found that 34.8 percent of U.S. volunteers serve at religious organizations _ outpacing educational and community organizations.

Using Independent Sector’s estimate of the value of a volunteer’s time, religious volunteerism in America was worth about $51.4 billion, the report said. Overall, 65.4 million (28.8 percent) of American adults volunteered a total of 8.2 billion hours in 2005, equating to a value of $147.6 billion.

The CPS was administered to approximately 60,000 households nationwide, participants aged 16 or older.

The number of volunteers has increased by nearly 6 million since 2002.

Overall, the influence of religion had a positive influence on volunteer rates. However, Bible Belt states had a lower volunteer rate than most Midwest and Western states.

Educational or youth service (26.2 percent) and social or community service (13.4 percent) are other leading areas where Americans volunteer.

“Volunteers are the lifeblood of our nation,” said David Eisner, the CEO of the Corporation for National and Community Service. “From schools and shelters to hospitals and hotlines, volunteers are vital to America’s social and economic well-being.”

The Bush administration has made a commitment to increase volunteering by 10 million Americans by 2010.

“The study … will help every state create stronger volunteer networks by showing what’s working, what’s not, and highlight the best opportunities to engage citizens in the future,” Eisner said.

The Corporation for National and Community Service was founded in 1993 and is perhaps best known as the sponsor of the Americorps program.

_ Preetom Bhattacharya

Quote of the Day: FBI Director Robert S. Mueller

(RNS) “I think, in terms of a religion, it’s not the religion that is the terrorist.”

_ FBI Director Robert S. Mueller, speaking in Cleveland on June 23, a day after the arrest of an alleged terrorist cell in Miami. According to news reports, the individuals are Muslims, although some Muslim groups dispute that claim. Mueller was quoted by Congressional Quarterly.

KRE/LF END RNS