The German mosque that attracts women imams, gays and ath threats – POLITICO

Contents:

• PROFILE: CHRISTIAN AWHAN HERMANNFDG A MOSQUE FOR GERMANY’S FIRST GAY IMAM
• THE GERMAN MOSQUE THAT ATTRACTS WOMEN IMAMS, GAYS, AND DEATH THREATS
• THE GERMAN MOSQUE THAT ATTRACTS WOMEN IMAMS, GAYS AND ATH THREATS

PROFILE: CHRISTIAN AWHAN HERMANNFDG A MOSQUE FOR GERMANY’S FIRST GAY IMAM

It will host two major LGBTQ+ events across July – one is the Lbian and Gay Ftival on 16-17 July, wh the other beg Christopher Street Day, better known as the official Pri day, on 23 July. Members of the LGBT muny, which is typilly owned upon by nservative Mlims, will also have a place si the mosque was created wh the aim of unifyg men, women, Shi, Sunni, straight men, gay men and otherwise alike.

THE GERMAN MOSQUE THAT ATTRACTS WOMEN IMAMS, GAYS, AND DEATH THREATS

“Our goal is to offer a place to worship to all people that do not feel at home the existg mosqu, to women that seek equal rights [wh men], to homosexuals and primarily to all separate [Mlim] nomatns: Alaw, Sunnis, and Shias, ” At stated, acrdg to do not need to wear full-face veils or burqas, a tradn that is otherwise mon for Mlim women all across the globe when they attend prayers at the mosque. Seyran At' visn of a liberal mosque where all Mlims n pray together - women and men, Sunni and Shie, straight and gay - turned to realy Friday as dozens of people me together Berl to gurate a new hoe of, a well-known women's right activist and lawyer, preached ont of the crowd which filled the mosque. LONDON (Thomson Rters Foundatn) - Tugay Sarac was jt 15 when he first talked about travelg om Germany to Syria to fight for Islamic unlike his iends at the time, Sarac had turned to radil Islam as a way of avoidg g to terms wh his sexualy.

“I had iends who, like me, were really radil extremists and even nsired gog to Syria or to Palte to fight, ” he told the Thomson Rters Foundatn a quiet rner of the prayer room of Berl’s Ibn Rhd-Goethe 20, Sarac, who was born Berl to a Turkish fay, learned om an early age that homosexualy was wrong - and un-Islamic. “I thought beg gay is bad and that through Islam, by prayg to God, I uld cure myself and bee normal.

I was really ashamed of my gay thoughts. Yet Sarac was not lookg for a greater sense of Mlim solidary – he was nng away om the fact he was gay. “(But) Islam for me was very clear that homosexualy was bad.

THE GERMAN MOSQUE THAT ATTRACTS WOMEN IMAMS, GAYS AND ATH THREATS

”It was only when Sarac me across the Ibn Rhd-Goethe mosque - one of only a handful of gay-iendly mosqu around the world - that he found a middle ground that allowed him to accept both his sexualy and his Sarac found himself drawn to the life of the mosque, s liberal, clive form of Islam drew him away om his more fundamentalist views and helped him e to terms wh who he was. “Comg here, I started beg fortable wh myself and that’s when I told my mother and my nt (that I was gay). Followg a spate of attacks on mosqu, Interr Mister Horst Seehofer said March that Islam do not belong Germany, clashg wh Chancellor Angela Merkel’s multi-ethnic visn for Europe’s biggt ’s father, who moved to Germany at the age of six, boasted of beatg up gay people when he himself was younger and ma his views of homosexualy very clear to the young Sarac.