Imam Abdallah Adhami, the 44-year-old face of the Park51 Muslim cultural center in downtown Manhattan, is stepping down from his post. Adhami, who’d been on the job only three weeks and served as Park51’s “religious adviser,” says in a statement, “It is important for me now to devote my time to the completion of my book which assists English readers in understanding and facilitating the language of the Quran. I wish the project leaders well.” He also wishes everyone would forget he said the reason anyone is gay is because they suffered through “some form of violent emotional or sexual abuse at some point in their life.”
McMike
I am so sick and tired of the media. No one is reporting the second half of his statement was him saying homosexuality was natural and it had been documented in nature.
Where is the friggin uproar when the Vatican or any Evangelical preacher call homosexuality an abomination? I have never, and will never hear, the Vatican nor ANY Evangelical preacher say homosexuality is natural and that it’s been documented in many species of animals in nature. Sure Adhami might have been off base with the ‘sexual violence’ comment but the second half is the most compassionate statement coming out of any non-gay religious elder.
astoria
The man’s full statement (I read it) contains a contradiction. He didn’t exactly say homosexuality in humans is a natural variation. Didn’t he also say anyone who leaves Islam should go to jail?
All the big religions are in need of a complete science and human rights makeover. They are never the first in any of those fields, moving forward, we always have to drag them kicking and screaming into modern times and real knowledge about pretty much everything.