Abstract
This is the first in a series of three discussion sessions featuring selected episodes of Canada’s popular television sitcom Little Mosque on the Prairie. This fun, light-hearted, and comedic show raises several practical everyday issues facing North American Muslims and people of other religions. Can a mosque be in a church? How diverse is Islam? What role does Western culture play in the formation of an Islamic community? These questions and others will be discussed at these gatherings.
Facilitators: Odeh Muhawesh, a special constultant for the Jay Phillips Center, earned his doctorate at Qum Seminary-Global Institute for Islamic Studies in Iran where he focused on comparative theology and Islamic jurisprudence. As an adjunct professor at the University of St. Thomas, he teaches courses in Islamic theology and the modern history of the Middle East. Noreen Nazir, a Catholic from Pakistan, holds an MA degree in Islamic Studies from Luther Seminary and has worked with the Christian Study Centre in Rawalpindi and the National Commission for Interfaith Dialogue and Ecumenism in Pakistan. Rabbi David Wirtschafter regularly serves as rabbi-in-residence with the Jay Phillips Center and is the rabbi of the Ames Jewish Congregation in Iowa.
Sponsored by the Jay Phillips Center in collaboration with St. Pascal Baylon Catholic Church