Mosques and Muslim Settlement in

Bouma, Gary D. and Muslim of people from Islamic backgrounds have Settlement in Australia, Canberra, Bureau of settled. These communities have grown up Immigration and Population around different , different national Research/Australian Government Publishing backgrounds and different communities of Service, 1994, pp 87 and 90-97. origin. This is not something unique to ; similar patterns can be seen among Chapter 9 - The future of other immigrant groups. Thus there is great in Australia diversity within Islam, including many of the national and theological variations of worldwide Islam is going to play a significant role in Islam. This provides a rich ground for the Australia's future. It has been a factor in the growth of an indigenous Australian expression settlement of Muslim immigrants to Australia. of Islam. While being part of worldwide Islam, The size of the Muslim population certainly Australian Muslims are cooperating to construct guarantees that a Muslim presence is here to an expression of Islam which is grounded in stay and its youth implies that it will grow. Australia. According to Ali Roude, many mosques include both Sunni and Shi'ite Mosques and Islamic societies are emerging as Muslims who work together to shape programs important social mechanisms in the adaptation and policies for the local situation. of many new Muslim immigrants to Australia and for the expression of Islamic interests in this In order to interpret what has been discovered society. For example, a study of the Preston about the role of Islam in settlement it is in depicts a growing appropriate to discuss the larger social context community offering an increasing array of within which this process is taking place and services to those who participate (Ayan 1990). which is being influenced by the new presence Mosques are providing important links between of . While Australia is Muslim individuals and families and other described as a pluralistic, multicultural society, structures of Australian society. Mosques and the processes of negotiation involved in Islamic societies have helped to interpret accommodating Islam within Australia's Australian events and policies to Australian religious mosaic provide an opportunity to see Muslims and to interpret Islamic events and how well is working in policies occurring both here and overseas to Australia... departments and agencies of Australian governments. The role of the mosques in Conflict between the claims and needs of interpreting the events surrounding the Gulf various religious groups has been a feature of War to both Australian Muslims and to history from the start (Hogan 1987; Australian Government is a case in point. Breward 1993). Under an umbrella of common law and British Protestant tradition, Australia Several implications arise from the fact that has developed notions of fair play, equal worth Islam in Australia is represented by relatively of human dignity and live and let live. Within recently arrived immigrant communities. While this framework many different cultural, most of the Muslims now in Australia are of the national, religious and lifestyle groups have and Sunni branch of Islam, there is no one Muslim are negotiating their way in this society. This is community. Communities have emerged in not done with a complete lack of conflict even those places where large enough concentrations where there is the best will. In the process of

Making Multicultural Australia Mosques and Muslim Settlement in Australia 1 negotiating a proper place and role within Australian multiculturalism Australian society, both the larger society and and Islam the particular religious, cultural or lifestyle group will grow and change. This fluid process When discussing the future of Islam in of inter-group negotiation within a particular multicultural Australia some key facts need to national structure is the prevalent mode of be kept in mind. First, Australia is a Christian multicultural pluralism in western industrial country. This claim surprises many, especially societies. those public servants and academics who prefer to think of Australia as secular. Australia is not Australia has made major strides toward this secular. Each census reveals that the vast multicultural ideal. Not only are State majority of Australians identify with some governments and the Federal Government Christian group (Bouma 1993a). Moreover, the committed to this ideal, but most religious and majority of those who say they have no religion other groups, including Islamic organisations, come from Christian backgrounds (Bouma work towards it. There are laws against 1993a; Bouma & Mason 1994). In terms of harassment and discrimination on various bases, numbers, general cultural ethos and history although no constitutionally enshrined 'bill of since European settlement, Australia is a rights'. There is some anti-vilification legislation Christian country. This essential starting point and many organisations, institutions and is avoided only at the cost of a quite unrealistic government departments have issued directives image of the context dominated by already against prejudice, discrimination and established religious groups within which harassment. That there is more to be learned newcomers compete to gain acceptance and and more progress to be made is unquestioned, recognition. Australia is not a secular country; it but equally unquestioned is the fact that much is not a level playing field for religious groups. progress has already been made. More recently arrived groups are disadvantaged. There is nothing new about this situation in Learning to be multicultural has many Australia (Breward 1993, chs 3, 4 & 9). Second, advantages for Australia. No longer is it in this Christian context non-Christian religious adequate to be competently British or groups are very small in contrast to the American. Australia is in Asia. Australia's nearest dominant Christian groups. They can hardly be neighbour, , is the largest Muslim seen to pose a threat to so highly entrenched country in the world. Overseas trade requires and well represented a dominant cultural intercultural sensitivity, including religious majority, although these groups sometimes react awareness and sensitivity. Secularity, that is the as though they are threatened. denial that religion is important, is not an adequate response in an environment both local Not only is Australia a Christian country, it is and international in which religion is important. an Anglican and Catholic country. Taken This approach has for too long characterised the together Catholics and Anglicans have responses of Federal Government bureaucrats, composed over half the population of Australia legislators and policy-makers. Mere even- from the middle of last century. The fact that handedness, while better than uneven- Anglicans and Catholics share in dominating handedness, lacks the particular sensitivity and Australian society has only been the case since understanding required to work successfully the Second Word War, as Catholic percentages with the different societies with which Australia have gradually increased and Anglican decreased is trying to develop mutually beneficial and to the point where there are now more profitable relations. A knowledge of and respect Catholics than Anglicans. Whether hegemony for a variety of religious orientations, beliefs and will pass from Anglicans to Catholics or be practices is essential, not simply an aesthetic shared by them both is yet to be seen. Some of nicety. the republicanism debate is about this issue. The

Making Multicultural Australia Mosques and Muslim Settlement in Australia 2 rest of the Christian groups are much smaller by from which most minority religious groups are comparison. In the 1991 Census 27 per cent of equally left out. the population responded that they were Catholic and 24 per cent that they were Second, this Anglican and Catholic dominance Anglican. The next largest Christian group was sets the context in which policies of the Uniting Church (8 per cent) followed by the multiculturalism are affirmed and applied in Presbyterian and Reformed (4.3 per cent), the Australia. It sets the context within which each Orthodox (2.8 per cent), the Baptists (1.7 per minority religious, cultural or lifestyle cent) and Lutherans (1.5 per cent). No other community, including Islam, negotiates its place Christian group attracted more than 1 per cent. and role in Australian society. While some The dominance of Anglicans and Catholics is immigrant groups or minority cultural or very clear. Moreover, Australian institutions, lifestyle groups may have preferred a different policies, law and education were formed in a context, perhaps one in which their views were framework of mainstream Protestantism which more dominant, the fact remains that in still informs their basic ethos. Australia they must negotiate their way in a social context dominated by particular forms of After the Anglicans and Catholics all other Christianity. However, some aspects of this religious groups are very small indeed, none dominant can be and have been attracting more than a third as many as these appealed to support pluralistic multiculturalism groups. In this sense Australian multiculturalism and can be used by minority groups in the takes place in the context of, or under the negotiating process. cultural hegemony of, Anglicans and Catholics. Historically, Anglicans have been stronger in Third, as a result of this clear dominance by two numbers and cultural legitimacy, but that is no groups, issues of multiculturalism faced by more longer the case. The dominant form of recently arrived groups will centre on how each Catholicism in Australia is Irish, hence is to relate to the core of Australian culture. strengthening the dominance of Anglo-Celtic How is each to maintain essential differences in religious culture in Australia. belief and practice while maintaining some relevance to the core? While each minority Australian multiculturalism occurs in the group in the process of negotiating a place context of a very strong, historically prominent brings some distinctive element into the larger Anglo-Celtic Christian religious community, society, just trying to relate to the central issues and several implications arise from this in that society will result in some fundamental fact. First, the dominant groups accommodation to the agendas of the dominant can afford to be welcoming to other groups. groups. The threat to the minority groups is to Religious plurality in the form of be swallowed up or crushed by the dominant multiculturalism offers no significant threat to groups. It also appears that there is little their entrenched position. Adding another small transference of victories from one makes no real difference in an already group to the next. Each group has to battle its culturally plural situation. It merely increases way into the arena and each usually shows the variety found among a very small percentage relatively little concern for the difficulties of the population, increasing the rich diversity experienced by other groups in similar positions. of Australia's religious mosaic. The addition of another small group only means that another Fourth, it is important to remember the group joins those small groups who divide up religious composition of Australia when making what little is left of various resources, from time comparisons with other countries or when on the ABC to rights to provide chaplains to examining policies or programs developed in prisons, hospitals or the military. These are other countries. In the United Kingdom one among the resources which are firmly in the group, the Church of England, attracts the vast control of established Christian groups and majority of religious identification while

Making Multicultural Australia Mosques and Muslim Settlement in Australia 3 Muslims are estimated to be 1.5 million or it, including Muslims, have shown a great about 3 per cent (Anwar 1993). The United willingness to learn and find creative ways to go Kingdom does not include a 'religion' question forward. in its census and so no accurate assessment of the relative size of various religious groups is Multiculturalism is not new to Islam. There possible. In Canada, over seven groups have to have been a variety of places, such as Spain, be added together to get 50 per cent of the Palestine and , in which Islam has been in population and Muslims are less than I per cent a multicultural, pluralistic position for long (Bibby 1987). In the United States over twenty periods of time. Cultural pluralism was the basic groups need to be combined to include 50 per social condition of the . cent of the population and Anglicans However, in most places in the world much of (Episcopalians) are wealthy, but very small (less Islam has for most of its history enjoyed the than 2 per cent) and Muslims smaller yet (less dominant cultural and social position. Islam is than 1 per cent). Each of the above has a much now in the process of developing ways of smaller Muslim population than France, which operating as a significant minority within a is estimated to have 4 million or close to 10 per number of western pluralistic societies in several cent. Before accepting what is said about nations, including Germany, France, England, minority religions and especially about Muslims Canada and Australia, where it now finds itself in any given context, it is critical to know what as a result of the patterns of post-Second World the religious mosaic of the society looks like. War immigration.

The first fact about multiculturalism in However, multiculturalism in the sense of an Australia is that it is not about relationships assumed equality among various is between 'equals'. Not all the pieces in this relatively new to Islam, just as it is to most other mosaic are of equal size or weight. In this religious groups (Bouma 1992b). Forty-three pluralistic context they may be officially of equal per cent of Muslim immigrants to Australia worth and that is important, but they do not have come from countries in which Islam is the have equal clout. This inequality in a major religion. Those who have come from multicultural society is one of size, position and countries in which they were minorities have power but not one of moral superiority. often been seeking refuge from religious and Historically, Anglicans rejoiced in a position of political persecution. (I am indebted to Riaz self-proclaimed moral superiority, British Hassan for directing my attention to these superiority. That is dead, although not all proportions.) This does not mean that Muslims Anglicans are aware of it. will not be able to develop a relationship of one among a plurality of equal religious groups. Islam in multicultural Australia Indeed, it may be more of a challenge to some Christian groups. This does mean that such a Multicultural Australia will be challenged, relationship with the larger society will be a new strengthened and extended by the inclusion of thing to many Muslim immigrants to Australia. Muslim communities. It has been and will be Indeed some of the problems voiced by greatly enriched as the particular skills, interviewees about their reactions to Australian orientations, knowledge and art of this culture centre on precisely this issue. ...data (on community are increasingly felt. This process arrival experiences, difficulties and benefits)... which is already well under way will not be an indicate that after homesickness, Australian easy one for either the Islamic communities or culture was the most frequently cited source of the larger society. Both have new things to difficulties. learn, adjustments to make, and new tolerances and appreciations to develop. No person or Some people are concerned that the task of group finds change easy, but both Australian finding an appropriate multicultural way of society and many of the religious groups within operating as Muslims in Australia will be made

Making Multicultural Australia Mosques and Muslim Settlement in Australia 4 difficult by the fact that some voices within uniqueness within it. Islam view it as the only true religion. The question can be put this way, 'How can the only How fares Australian true religion tolerate the diversity of those who multiculturalism? differ or disagree?' This is, of course, also a problem for other religious groups already Each new national, cultural, religious, or established in Australia, particularly Christian lifestyle group stretches the fabric of fundamentalists. Sheikh Fehmi El-Imam multiculturalism and adds to the diversity of a provides a clarifying answer: 'All Muslims culture. Each new group is usually subject for a believe that Islam is the only true religion, but while to harassment, to legal limitation or to at the same time they are given the right to live scrutiny by those who are suspicious of its with non-Muslims, without prejudice, as long as activities. Minority Christian groups are often they are allowed to carry out their religious called sects, or cults, and wild claims are made duties and performances. As long as no one about the practices they engage in (see disturbs them, confronts them or attacks them, Richardson 1988, 1991). It is useful to Muslims are duty bound by Islamic law to live remember that early Christians were accused of in peace with others'. This pluralist, cannibalism, because their description of the multicultural position is taken by many within Eucharist involved 'eating the body of Christ'. Islam and is expressed by many, though not all, Jehovah's Witnesses are at times forced to do in other religious groups. things they consider ethically and morally reprehensible, for example consent to, or submit Promoting open understanding between groups, to, blood transfusions. What are some of the each of whom see themselves as having the only challenges and opportunities Islam brings to answer to the ultimate questions of human life Australia? and the only correct ethical view is, and has been, a major challenge to community relations How will Australia cope with another set of as well as local and national politics in much of holy days? Probably as badly as it has with the Australia's history (Hogan 1987; Breward special days of other religious minorities whose 1993). It is not a problem that has been brought calendars do not agree with the western about by the inclusion of Muslims, since Christian calendar. Jews do not have legal Australia was well on its way to being ethically recognition for their holy days. University, bank, plural before Muslims arrived in numbers. This and governmental calendars do not take them is a challenge to all of Australia and Muslims into account. Seventh Day Adventists can take will be involved in shaping the answers. advantage of Saturday, but the Orthodox are not given recognition for their celebration of Easter What kind of relationship will the Muslim or Christmas. I do not expect that Muslims will communities develop with the larger society? get Friday off. It is very doubtful that the full The evidence is clear. Muslims have formed range of non-Christian and Christian holy days significant communities in Australian cities. will be recognised as public holidays. However, Muslims are involved in all sections of the work recent changes in the economy, labour market force and institutions of education. Muslims and industrial rel