ACTS OF FAITH:  THE STORY OF AN AMERICAN MUSLIM, THE STRUGGLE FOR THE SOUL OF A GENERATION
By Eboo Patel
Boston:  Beacon Press, 2007.  PP. 189

Reviewed by Dr. Susan K. Hedahl            

            A parish pastor in Chicago who works with youth told me, "This book offers some options in dealing with inter-religious issues."   In fact, this book is 'must' reading for those working with youth and young adults.  Its contents are "a book about how some young people become champions of religious pluralism while others become the foot soldiers of religious totalitarianism." (xvi) The book's author, Eboo Patel, is a young Muslim who founded the Chicago-based Interfaith Youth Core and this work is about how that happened.

             Patel grew up in the Chicago suburb of Glen Ellyn, Illinois.  He is of Islamic/Indian descent, in particular raised as an Ismaili Muslim, a form of Shii'ism.  His academic and personal life, which included a stint as a Rhodes Scholar, is a fascinating quest - perhaps a glorious obsession? - towards finding ways youth of different faith perspectives can interact with one over.

            The work is a faith journey of many dimensions. Patel seeks out religious leaders of all different types to talk about spirituality and community interaction.  He meets Brother Wayne Teasdale, a Catholic monk, who encouraged him to express a prophetic voice towards the creation of establishing a global interfaith movement.  For awhile he joins the Catholic Workers movement.  Patel and a friend talk to the Dalai Lama.  At one point Patel returns to India to re-establish contact with family and to further hone what it means to be socially active and conscious, especially as he sees the owner/servant relationships in relatives' homes. One day at a conference in Chicago, he buttonholes Martin Marty and they talk of issues related to the free practice of faith and the counter-weights prompted by forms of fundamentalism.

            Patel's work is rich in examples of different people who are either caught up in radicalism or experience their faith in ways that create life and enrich themselves and others.  He uses anecdotes from both sides of the Atlantic, whether it is American Eric Rudolph and his history of bombings or the stories of the young men who bombed the subways in London, to depict how youth can be taught to choose.  The Interfaith Youth Core portrays the impact of young people on their communities who have chosen lively dialogue rather than isolation.

            One of the many insights in this book and the rationale for the IYC is summed up in a conversation that Patel has with a Roman Catholic, a senior official in the Archdiocese of Chicago.  The official expressed his hope that Catholic kids would become better Catholics. While Patel agreed, he also said:  "The problem is that today's youths - Catholic, Muslim, Jewish or whatever - no longer live in the so-called 'banquet hall' of their faith communities.... They are coming into contact with kids from different backgrounds all the time.  If they don't have a way of understanding how their faith relates to the Jews, Buddhists, Muslims, Hindus, Evangelicals, and other that they spend most of their lives around, then there's a good chance that their religious identities will atrophy." (165)

            This work starts with the reality of inter-faith/inter-religious dialogue where it should start: with the youth.  If you are involved with youth in a religious community, read Patel's vivid autobiography and reflections and ask how they match with what the youth in your own community know of their friends of different faiths.