Source: Democrat & Chronicle
In the days after 9/11, Rochester Muslims wondered if all the camaraderie they had worked for years to build with people of other faiths "would suddenly dissolve," says Husain Bawany, 19, a Pakistani native who has lived most of his life in Brighton.
The answer, he says, was a "resounding no," thanks to the years of interfaith work by Muhammad Shafiq, then the imam of the Rochester Islamic Center and now the director of the Center for Interfaith Studies and Dialogue at Nazareth College.
For years, says Bawany, who was just a child in 2001, Shafiq had emphasized close ties and shared community work with other religious faiths. He built relationships. And after 9/11, the Islamic center received bouquets of flowers from other religious communities, along with many supportive messages.