My belief is that in the United States of America our Constitution and the succession of constitutional law that has survived testing against it trump all other laws put upon America’s residents. In my belief there
is an irony that a person, community or sect is permitted to, by choice live under someone Else's law. A Jew may wear a skull cap where he wishes or circumcise his son under someone other than a doctor. Certain Christian and non-Christians may refuse medical care for a fatal illness which would be curable with medication and or transfusions. The holy days observed by minorities must be honored even if this presents an economic hardship to their employer and religious laws regarding marriage, divorce, birth and death are honored.
There are limits to this tolerance. These are considered individual choices and under our Constitution observance of religious law is considered voluntary. The constitution is supposed to protect any adult who chooses to opt-out of religious law and in the case of minors "The People" defend the life and well being of the minors, in court, to the greatest extent. The life of a child with Cancer and a good possibility of being saved by medicine treatment will be defended against their religion (family) in court. The family that opposes treatment on religious grounds is given the opportunity to defend their belief. Sometimes the treatment is ordered for the child and sometimes the religious argument prevails. In these cases it is not a single judge who prevails but a jury of the family's peers with those who already have prejudice favoring either side disqualified. Under some branches of Christian religion, more recently in the news we have heard about LDS in sects where girls as young as 8 are forced to marry much older men. When the practice has been discovered the man has been charged and tried. In most cases the sisters of the abused girls end up returned to their parents.
I am not singling out Mormons because we have seen this occur under the Branch Dravidian sect of the Seventh Day Adventists and other belief systems. It may be in the least that a person whose personal (civil) rights have been are vilated is protected under American secular law and are represented by our civil society in a court, if the individual is able to seek outside help.
Some of us who are Catholics know that until recently the Catholic Church did not recognize divorce for its adherents. Many adherents were not willing to opt out of their faith. In many fundamentalist churches the belief that a woman must submit to her husband has caused many women, fearful of hell, or with a brutal husband supported by his religious community, to accept brutality and terrorization for their entire life. Shelter and legal defense is available but they must first break their bond of faith and often successfully escape from the religious community that enslaves them. We hear innuendos about refugees from Scientology and other belief systems being maimed or murdered.
Forgive me; I forgot that the subject is Shari'a.
Is Shari’a any different than these other examples?
Under our Constitution Shari’a cannot be imposed upon anyone unless they subscribe to the faith in which it is practiced. This can be as bad for a Muslim woman as it is for a Christian woman who lives under a Christian Church like those described above. American law assumes that a Muslim woman living under has "elected" Shari’a and retains her right to opt-out if she abused or even if she finds that it just does not serve her personal interest. In typical moderate western Islamic sects, especially the one proposing to build the controversial lower Manhattan Community Center, the worthiness of a woman's soul is the same as a man's soul and her body and mind are accorded the same respect.
I have worship with at least one Denver Jewish community and have attended churches in our local community where that is not the case. It is as it was over 150 years ago when the United States Supreme Court held that a wife; children and slaves are the chattel (property) of the male head of household.
We are fools if we believe hat there is anything more to fear from Shari'a than there is from Scientology, Lubavitch Jewish Congregations in Denver or; read the information provided in the following report.
Sexual Abuse of Women in the Church - Published 2010
Locally, one place where there is the constant testimony about woman abused under Christian "law" is at many 12 step group meetings. The individual accounts given at those meetings are not supposed to leave the room yet anyone who participates in these effective ways of managing the lingering symptoms of religious abuse is able to credibly say that the fear of Shari'a is nothing compared to the wounding of woman that has and continues to take place in the name of majority American religions.
