Albert Mohler: Ever Hear of the First Amendment? An Argument to Watch

Tuesday, July 12, 2011

There it was, plain as day. Monday’s edition of USA Today included an opinion column by a Muslim woman that argued–quite straightforwardly–that the United States government should force a nondiscrimination policy on gender in all places of worship.

Asra Q. Nomani, a former reporter for The Wall Street Journal, argues that the Internal Revenue Service should move to deny tax-exempt status to any place of worship that holds to different roles for men and women. In “End Gender Apartheid in U.S. Mosques,” Nomani writes, “I’ve come to the difficult decision that women must use the legal system to restore rights in places of worship…”

Nomani writes out of her own experience as a Muslim woman in the United States. As she relates in her article, she has joined with a movement that has launched “Pray Ins” at several mosques in the Washington, D.C. area, protesting the practice of separating Muslim men and women for prayers. the rest

I am a Christian, not a Muslim, and it is not my purpose or responsibility to explain the theological basis for the gender practices and policies of Muslim mosques. But Nomani’s argument is a direct threat to religious liberty itself, not just to the teachings and practices of American Muslims.