Source: The Miami Herald

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/opinion/14027233.htm

On March 6, 2006 The Miami Herald ran an opinion piece by one of its staff writers, Donna Gehrke-White regarding the empowering role religion plays in Muslim women's lives. "In Los Angeles, one doctor delivers beginnings: Babies. On the other coast, a South Florida physician tends to those in their last years, even making house calls to the infirm. Dr. Laila Al-Marayati and Dr. Amina Haq are gentle women in a gentle profession. They are also Muslims... [and they] do take their religion seriously... Anisah David's Islamic faith drove her to leave her South Dakota artist's colony to help Katrina survivors near Biloxi, Miss. In Louisville, Ky., Riffat Hassan started an international group to save women from 'honor killings' -- when families kill women for shaming them with alleged adultery or even an unmarried girl flirting with a boy... At Harvard, Sarah Eltantawi studies for her doctorate while helping lead the Progressive Muslim Union of North America. In a fast-growing suburb of Northern Virginia, Afeefa Syeed ran for county office and started an Islamic school... America frees them, they say, to practice Islam as it should be, with reverence and respect for all. They relish their ancient faith in a new world. They can be devout -- without being fanatical."