In a world where the very worst people pose as defenders of "Judeo-Christian" civilization, priests have always raped children with impunity, Buddhists slaughter Rohingya women and children, every Evangelical Christian pastor seems to be in bed with Donald Trump, and endless violence in the Middle East seems to get much of its sanction from religious affilation (I could go on), I was struck by the article "What's a Muslim to do about Hajj?" in Slate magazine online.
I’ve always dreamed of converging with fellow Muslims on the location believed to be the birthplace of our final prophet, and where the first words of the Quran were revealed: Iqra. Read.
Now I’m starting to wonder how I can go at all. And I’m also wondering why more Muslims don’t question the powers that control our most sacred site—and how the Saudis have already twisted it to their own political and financial ends.
...To participate in one of our religion’s most important rites, we shouldn’t have to look past the Saudis’ merciless, brutal campaign in Yemen. We shouldn’t have to look past decades of notorious and flagrant human-rights abuses.
