When I moved to Downriver over 3 decades ago, my first house was in a Muslim neighborhood where they constructed a mosque across the street from our neighborhood. My next-door neighbors were a Muslim couple. They were pleasant enough.
I was soon introduced to Middle Eastern food when taken to La Shish in Dearborn, a Lebanese restaurant that served incredible rice with vermicelli, shish tawook (chicken kabob) & hot pita bread with creamy hummus for dipping. But years later, it turned out that the restaurant owners were funding Hezbollah, a terrorist organization. The owners fled the U.S. & the restaurant chain collapsed.
But fortunately, there are many similar restaurants throughout our region that I enjoy! One of the languages I’m studying casually in my spare time is Arabic (it’s super hard!). One of my sons attended college & worked in Dearborn. But other than visiting restaurants, I don’t spend much time there, so I can’t speak from firsthand experience, only from what I’m seeing in the national news & in online videos coming out of Dearborn in the past few months that have amplified concerns about Islam’s growing incursion. The pejorative nickname “Dearbornistan” is thrown around a lot.
As the first majority-Arab American city in the U.S. with the highest percentage of Muslims of any U.S. city, Dearborn’s population is about half Muslim, & hosts the largest mosque in North America. This has led to a strong political representation of Muslim officials, especially in the last few years.
Last month, the city council named street intersections after a vocal backer of the terrorist groups Hezbollah & Hamas. When a Christian minister objected at the city council meeting, Dearborn’s first Muslim mayor scolded: “You are a bigot, & you are racist, & you’re an Islamophobe… Although you live here, I want you to know as mayor, you are not welcome here.” Footage has also emerged of police enforcing rules that ban Christians from handing out Gospels of John to Muslims, while Muslims are free to hand out Islamic literature.
Some Dearborn residents are now petitioning for enforcement of noise ordinances as they’re subjected to hearing Islamic calls to prayer on loudspeakers from over 20 mosques 5 times a day, beginning at 5:00 a.m. No church bells are ringing—but even if they were, it’s just a sound. But what do the Muslim calls say? “Allah is Great! Allah is Great! Allah is Great! Allah is Great! I bear witness that there is no god except the One God (Allah). …I bear witness that Muhammad is the messenger of Allah. …Hurry to salvation.” Can you imagine if Christians set up loudspeakers to proclaim “Jesus Christ is Lord God & King!”?
Large-scale street marches & events have taken place there tied to both religion & activism. The latest one in August drew up to 40,000 people. Prayers were held outdoors for the first time, with blue mats laid out for hundreds. Issues have also been raised about public funds being used for Ramadan banners & events, but none for Easter. Police sell Ramadan shirts with official logos. City workers & others can feel pressured to participate in fasting during Ramadan as well.
This isn’t just happening in Dearborn, but in other major cities with public displays that seem to assert dominance—in New York (which is about to elect its first Muslim mayor), Minneapolis, Chicago & Houston. The Texas Governor just signed a bill to ban Sharia compounds amid controversies like the EPIC City project—an attempt to create a Muslim city.
What should we do as Christians about all this? Muslims enjoy great freedoms in America, which Christians would not get to experience in majority-Muslim nations. There, Christians can either be persecuted or at least discriminated against. Yet, here we are, content to co-exist peacefully. We do not seek to force our faith on Muslims, & neither do we want them to force their faith on us.
From its founding, America has been shaped by Christian principles. The majority have claimed to be Christian, even if they don’t have genuine biblical faith or worldviews. Even now, America is only a little over 1% Muslim. But if America were to become predominantly Muslim, its core principles would shift, as Islamic values & legal traditions, grounded in the Qur’an & Sharia, would replace Christian-derived concepts like individual rights.
Wanting to maintain the Christian ethos in our cities & nation does not make us “Islamaphobes.” We believe Islam is a false religion begun by a false prophet who advanced Islam often by force & conquest. He did many violent & terrible things, in contrast to the loving & perfect Jesus, who is the best person to have ever lived & done the most good for the world. It’s because we love all people that we want them to reject the Qur’an’s teachings, & come to faith in the true God of Scripture, & in Jesus as more than a prophet (John 14:6, Acts 4:12).
So we don’t give in to hostile feelings motivated by fear. We can pray, asking for God to bring change, & soften & open hearts (Matt. 5:44). We can live out the gospel of righteousness, peace, & joy—our lives might be the first glimpse of Christ’s grace many encounter (Rom. 14:17). We can speak truth boldly & witness humbly (1 Pet. 3:15, Acts 17:17). We seek conversations, not confrontations because we hope for conversions. We know who our real enemy is—not Muslims, but Satan (Eph. 6:12).