Acts of Faith: The Story of an American Muslim in the Struggle for the Soul of a Generation

“In my head, I loved ideas. In my gut, I knew they counted only when they were connected to reality.” 

Even as a young student, Patel understands that theory can be useless if it is not attached to practical action. He encounters this frustration again as he tries to get support for the IFYC. Many religious leaders support youth interfaith practices in theory but do little to provide young people opportunities to experience other faiths. Patel even feels that some inaction on the part of religious leaders is why young people are able to be radicalized. Religious zealots find and influence young people searching for community and identity. They act where other religious leaders do not.

“The heart of even the most ardent religious believer will provide more accurate clues to his or her behavior than the theology of his or her faith.” 

Mormon doctrine requires Lisa to believe that a non-Mormon who dies will not go to Heaven, but when Patel asks her this question about his grandmother—“Will she not go to Heaven?”—Lisa says that “[s]he will go somewhere good.” Her heart will not allow her to say something that she knows will hurt Patel, even if the theological point is at odds with what she says. 

“My father couldn’t make it all the way through Fugitive Days. ‘It reminds me too much of you,’ he said. ‘It scares the shit out of me, what you could have become.’” 

Patel’s father, although they had not talked about it before, is aware of Patel’s rage, his sense of helplessness, and how close his son had come to the tipping point of radicalism. But his remark is also encouraging because he no longer believes that radicalism can reach Patel. 

“I just have some things that I’m interested in and a bunch of groups I come in and out of. But I could leave them at any time and they wouldn’t know I was gone.” 

Membership in a group is not the same as an identity, even when the group is formed on behalf of identity politics. Though he is a part of a number of organizations, Patel still does not feel a connection to anything that gives him identity. He often sees how those around him gain their identity through their religious communities. For example, Sarah’s commitment to her Jewish faith and history, and her visceral ties to her heritage, show Patel that he has no community. 

“I loved my work as a teacher, and I loved the people I was living with, but however I combined community, justice, and creativity, it did not add up to identity.” 

For much of the book, Patel struggles to define identity as a series of actions he takes and people he spends time with. His early ideas about identity have more to do with what he does than with what he is. It is not until he can proudly say “I am a Muslim” that he has found the core of his identity (114). 

“The tradition you were born into was your home, Brother Wayne told me, but as Gandhi once wrote, it should be a home with the windows open so that the winds of other traditions can blow through and bring their unique oxygen. ‘It’s good to have wings,’ he would say, ‘but you have to have roots, too.’” 

Religious pluralism requires the mobility and adaptability of flight, but the stability of roots. Brother Wayne quotes Gandhi and reinforces that it is not a threat when one tradition influences another. 

“I realized that it was precisely because of America’s glaring imperfections that I should seek to participate in its progress, carve a place in its promise, and play a role in its possibility. And at its heart and at its best, America was about pluralism.” 

Patel’s role in America’s future would not be possible without America’s flaws. His life of service would not have the same effect in a place that was either lacking the possibility of change or that was already a perfect state. 

“Religions must dialogue, but even more, they must come together to serve others. Service is the most important. And common values, finding common values between different religions.” 

The Dalai Lama, at the head of the Buddhist religion, believes it is important that religions communicate with and study one another, but always in a spirit of service. He explains to Patel and Kevin that the ultimate goal of interfaith work is to allow everyone to be of greater service to mankind. 

“‘I am a Muslim. This is what Muslim’s do.’” 

Patel’s grandmother explains that her faith means she will help Anisa, even if it puts her or anyone in her household in danger from the men looking for her. It is an act of love and service, not of practicality. Islam is a part of Mama’s identity in a way that Patel cannot yet experience.  

“As I had come to terms with my brown skin, with my Indian heritage, with my American citizenship, I realized that I was now facing and understanding the part of myself that was both first and final: I was a Muslim.” 

Until this point, Patel has tried to make his identity fit into categories that do not adequately describe who and what he feels he is. His identity as a Muslim is not a category but a true identity, one that is “first and final” and that encompasses all of his other attributes. 

“That night, in prayer, I had a moment of stark clarity: I was part of the story of Islam. I was part of the story of pluralism. I was part of the story of ubuntu.” 

Ubuntu means “people are people through other people” (115).Another part of Patel’s identity is the realization that he—and all others who worship within a religion or who perform interfaith work on behalf of pluralism—is an integral piece of the human story, a story in which everyone has a part to play. 

“That’s more than a career. That’s a calling. And when you have a calling, you have to follow it.” 

Professor Nanji convinces Patel that he needs to commit his life to interfaith work, not to simply treat it as a career. Accepting a calling requires a level of commitment and responsibility that goes beyond the requirements of doing a job. Nanji believes that it would be a mistake for Patel to pursue a path other than the IFYC, and Patel agrees. 

“You realize that what you’re doing is more important than ever.” 

After the 9/11 attacks, Patel’s Jewish friend, Roy, urges Patel to continue the work of the IFYC and not to get distracted by anger or despair. The anger that led to the attacks could not be met effectively with more anger. In the aftermath of 9/11, Patel finds greater opportunities to demonstrate the need for pluralism and the service ethic. 

“There is an oft-overlooked dimension to bin Laden’s personality, a talent that is absolutely central to his macabre success: he is a brilliant youth organizer.” 

Osama bin Laden could not have masterminded the 9/11 attacks without followers. From his youth, his ability to get young people to listen to him was an invaluable recruitment tool for terrorism. Bin Laden is not the only one who has used this strategy to win people over to his cause. Many religious zealots have looked to young people who, like Patel, feel angry at a lack of identity. The IFYC and Patel’s work there strives to thwart these efforts by reaching young people who could be radicalized and showing them a different path, one of peace and acceptance.

“We humans know violence well. It is a part of each of us. It is precisely the reason I was drawn to religion in the first place.” 

Patel initially becomes interested in the study of religion because he is confused. Some religious people use their religion as a reason to commit violence. Others used it to override what Patel sees as the human impulse to find satisfaction in violence. 

“Violence committed in the name of religion is really violence emanating from the head of a particular interpreter.”

Patel admits that there are scriptures in most religions that advocate for violence. But he argues that there are several layers of meaning with which each holy book can be interpreted, including the contextual and the symbolic. Metaphor can be twisted by someone with an interest in interpreting a text in order to use it as propaganda. 

“Every time we read about a young person who kills in the name of God, we should recognize that an institution painstakingly recruited and trained that young person. And that institution is doing the same for thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands, of others like him. In other words, those religious extremists have invested in their youth programs.” 

Patel warns of the dangers of too little investment in youth programs. Funding for youth programs is typically based on short-term grants. When churches experience budget cuts, the pastors of youth programs are most likely to be fired. For Patel, it is dangerous to invest less energy and resources into young people than the radical recruiters do. 

“When it’s your people being discriminated against because of their religion, you realize how important the Constitution is for everybody.” 

Shehnaz argues that if one religious group can be legally discriminated against, it makes it easier for any religious group to be legally discriminated against. She finds it equally necessary to protect the rights of institutions whose ideas she might disagree with as to protect the rights of her own religion. 

“‘Everybody has rights in this country,’ Shehnaz said flatly. ‘That’s what makes it great. If we let the rights of one group erode, we endanger the very existence of those rights for everybody.’” 

For Shehnaz, pluralism does not stop at religion, but extends to civic and social duty. When one group loses its rights, it makes it possible for another group to lose rights as well. She believes in protecting everyone’s rights, even though they may reflect ideologies that she disagrees with. 

“Home. The place where your barber doesn’t have to ask what to do with your hair. Where the music you love came of age. Where the leading citizens fill you with pride. Where your best friend’s dreams are coming true. Where your former students recognize you on the street. The piece of earth that your hands have helped shape.” 

Patel has found his identity and his heritage in a way that brings him home. It is no longer merely a concept for him, but something he recognizes when he sees it and feels it.

“Even when we feel like we have found theological common ground—like Abraham as the patriarch of Jews, Christians, and Muslims—we quickly discover that even those paradigms have their limits. There are a million Hindus in this country, and over three million Buddhists, and neither of those communities would be called Abrahamic. But they live in America, too, and we have to have a paradigm that includes them.” 

Patel speaks with a Catholic diocese that is supportive of the IFYC’s mission but skeptical about its practicality. Patel overcomes his doubts by making it clear that there is no point in pretending that they do not have significant religious differences and that each member of the conversation believes to have the real truth. Once they admit the limits of their ability to converge on theology, they are free to focus on their shared values. 

“On more than one occasion, I watched them intervene when adult interfaith groups began drifting into useless theological and political disagreement, bringing them back to constructive discussions based on shared values.” 

Young people at IFYC gatherings are often better able to steer and focus the conversations that Patel wishes for everyone to have than the adults are. They are less likely than their elders to quibble over issues of less importance. 

“‘If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am only for myself, what am I?’” 

Jen quotes a rabbi while discussing the values Judaism and Islam have in common. She and Patel decide that understanding the other person’s point of view is a critical element of both religions.