As current campaigns and headlines reveal, Islam is a hot-button topic today. What comes with being a popular topic are endless misconceptions and preconceived notions. These misconceptions can transform into hate and dangerous stereotyping. To battle the misunderstandings, College of DuPage’s Muslim Student Association (MSA) hosted a week of Islam awareness last week.

“Islam rhetoric is on the rise,” said Hamad Javed, President of MSA. “Considering nowadays, it’s good to have this going on.”

The goal of Islam awareness week was all in the name. Various campuses around the country have their own Islam awareness week, such as Loyola’s, “Where is the justice?” But for COD’s student association, they found the true root of stereotyping against Muslims came from ignorance. As a result, they advertised their awareness week as – “Peace: A lack of understanding.”

“We wanted to give an insight into our religion and show people it is peaceful and we are peaceful,” explained Javed.

Scholars, Mufti Kamani and Ustadh Faizaan Mumtaz, who are trained on the religion specifically to help others understand it, came in to talk to students and answer any questions they may have about Islam. These scholars are focused in Chicago but travel the world sharing their knowledge.

Students who practice the hijab, or headscarf, shared their experience on how it has helped them to feel empowered. An interfaith panel was even held with two Christian students and a Muslim student.

“We had a discussion of love and peace and how each religion promotes that and how God in their scriptures talks about peace in the bible and in the Qu’ran and how we’re taught in both to achieve peace and certain verses which lead on towards the subject of peace,” said Javed. “The two students openly expressed how they feel about Muslims, and it was a very positive discussion, and a lot of people took a lot of positivity away from that.”

“We learned about the bible, and they learned about the Qu’ran,” Javed continued. “When we intermingled, we felt like one whole body and took a group picture to show we don’t have boundaries. We accept each other differences and unite as one body because we’re all human.”

Along with other events, a “Drop your bars” open-mic invited Ibrahim Jaaber, a former NBA player for the Houston Rockets. “We wanted diversity among speakers and to appeal to the black Muslim community at COD,” said Javed. “He performed Islamic spoken word, he caught the attention of a lot of the people there.”

During their awareness week, MSA focused on their idea of “no boundaries” between Muslims and every other type of student. To represent this, they quoted Albert Einstein on their poster. “Peace cannot be kept by force; it can only be achieved by understanding.”

“Obviously Albert Einstein isn’t Muslim, the whole idea was that we wanted to let people know we admire and commend anyone who speaks good and the truth,” said Javed. “It’s not that we only listen to our scholars, we’re open to everyone. Obviously Muslim awareness week you think it’s for Islamic followers, but we are not narrow minded. Anyone who speaks good, the truth [and] sincerity, we are going to implement that in our lives.”

“Peace can be achieved but it’s being achieved with a lack of understanding,” he continued. “If we all understand that peace can do this, we can achieve it. We wanted to promote Islam as peaceful and understanding.”

Although the events promoted the truth about Islam as a peaceful and loving religion, misconceptions are still prominent on campus.

“We had a table all week, and a table near us were talking very loud making derogatory comments about Muslims,” said Javed. “ They knew we were there and made derogatory comments about Muslims. It compelled me to talk to security and ask them to tone it down so nobody felt intimidated by their speech.”

Turning this lack of understanding, proving prominent in our student body, into true acceptance will only get us closer to peace, as shared to us through MSA.

“If [students] have any questions about the faith in general, they can always approach a member,” said Javed. “Our members are very open about answering questions and instead of having preconceived notions about Muslims and Islam, I would recommend you go to a Muslim and politely ask them about whatever you have to ask.”
MSA can be found at Facebook.com/codmsa, twitter.com/cod_msa or Instagram @cod.msa.