Source: The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/03/31/AR2010033103944.html
If there were a prototype for an American-style imam, Adeel Zeb might be it.
In Koran study groups, the 28-year-old volunteer chaplain at American University weaves in references to U.S. Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.) and comedian Dave Chappelle (both Muslim), TMZ.com, frat life and President Obama.
He preaches tolerance and civic idealism and sports a pinstriped suit, a GQ-ish trimmed beard and an animated delivery he learned from the Baptist college where he minored in communications. He'd like to become part of the first generation of American-born imams, but it's a career path that is proving much more difficult than he expected.
"From what I'm hearing from my elders," Zeb says after months of fruitless job hunting, becoming an imam is "something you do when you can't do something else. It's like the last-choice career track."