Leaders of American mosques need to buy into American culture more and perform the full-time roles more common to Christian pastors, said the new head of the Plainfield-based Islamic Society of North America.
Muneer Fareed, 50, a professor and former mosque prayer leader, says one of his challenges as the Islamic Society’s new secretary-general will be to help imams, or prayer leaders, better embrace American culture.
“There is a greater alienation on the part of mosque leadership from Western culture than there is on the part of the flock,” said Fareed, a former imam himself.
Imams should perform marriage counseling and pastoral care, Fareed said, even if it requires them to serve full time. Most mosques now have volunteer or part-time clergy, a model that worked well in the Arab homelands of many imams.
In those places, Muslims live among large extended families who could help with counseling. But, Fareed said, American Muslims live far from extended family and need someone to help.
Fareed’s appointment Wednesday as secretary-general of the continent’s largest Muslim organization follows the election this summer of convert Ingrid Mattson as ISNA’s president. Together, they represent the organization’s changing face.
“There is nothing wrong with the old generation,” Mattson said. “But it is a good sign for ISNA that this organization is able to attract people younger in their careers.”
Fareed, who has moved to Plainfield, will give up his position as an associate professor of Near Eastern studies at Wayne State University in Michigan. He replaces Sayyid Syeed, who moved to Washington, D.C., to focus on ISNA’s interfaith and intercultural relations.
