ShareThisNewly announced GOP presidential candidate Rick Perry is finding himself in the spotlight over the cooperative education and scientific agreements Texas has forged with the Aga Khan, the leader of a Shia Muslim sect.
Online news reports have tied Perry to the spiritual leader of the Ismailis Muslim sect, emphasizing his friendly relations with Aga Khan and earning the ire of some commentators watching Perry's bid for president.
Salon.com and others have recently reported Perry's relations with the Ismaili sect, which has somewhere between 15 million and 20 million adherents worldwide.
Prince Karim Aga Khan IV is the 49th Ismaili Imam who claims he can trace his lineage to Ali, the cousin of Muhammad, Islam's founder, and his wife Fatimah, who is Muhammad's daughter.
A wealthy figure, he is the founder of the Aga Khan Development Network, which works toward a variety of health, educational, environmental, and other goals.
According to Salon.com, Perry and the Aga Khan forged two cooperative agreements between the state of Texas and Ismaili institutions, among them 2008's Muslim Histories and Culture project, a "far-reaching program to educate Texas schoolchildren about Islam."
At the signing ceremony for the program, which trains high school teachers about Muslim history and culture, Perry said he had "always" supported it because "we must bridge the gap of understanding between East and West if we ever hope to experience a future of peace and prosperity."
Perry, who met the religious leader in 2000 during a family trip to Paris, also forged a 2009 agreement that called for cooperation between Texas and the religious leader's organizations in education, health sciences, natural disaster preparedness and recovery, culture and the environment.
"He's obviously not known for having many friends of the Muslim faith," said Abilene Christian University political science professor Neal Coates of Perry, who is an active evangelistic Christian and grew up not far from Abilene.
Coates said Perry and other presidential candidates are trying to define who they are. That is especially true for Perry, who was barely a blip "on the radar" a month or two ago, Coates said.
But now, when President Barack Obama's approval ratings have sunk to record-low levels, getting the message out about Perry, his credentials and the tone of his politics is vitally important, Coates said - to people of all backgrounds.
Thus, the goal is defining Perry as "someone who is pretty tough but also is a big believer in freedom," he said. "But this isn't a story about Rick Perry being a friend to people of different faiths."
Muslim cleric Redda Al-Sadat, who often leads a Friday prayer service in Abilene, though, worried Perry's longtime association with the Ismailis might simply be a political maneuver, rather than a true show of bridge-building.
"My worry is that he will get Muslim endorsements like Bush did -- and then likewise, treat the Muslims accordingly," he said, indicating his displeasure with the way he saw the Bush administration treating those of his faith.
Al-Sadat said he believed Obama "was trying to help all Americans," whether Muslim or not, though he felt the president had compromised perhaps too much with Republicans on matters that could have helped the country's poorest people.
Al-Sadat said that generally, trying to get political candidates to "do us (Muslims) a favor" misses the point of the faith, calling the faith "apolitical," while still being able in certain ways to influence society.
"Islamically speaking, there's no real advantage to us being very politically active," he said. "The worship of the creator, the more active we are in that, by God's mercy the better our circumstances will be."
Perry has not taken a stance on proposals by some Texas Republicans to ban Shariah law, a code of conduct many Muslims believe is derived from precepts set forth in the Koran and examples set by Muhammed. Some Muslims take a fundamentalist approach to the Shariah code, which has been criticized by some for its harsh rulings.
In January, Texas state Rep. Leo Berman, a Republican from Tyler, filed a resolution for a "constitutional amendment prohibiting a court of this state from enforcing, considering, or applying a religious or cultural law," according to the Houston Chronicle's blog.
The proposal did not specifically mention Islam, but was general enough to include "to include Shariah law, Jewish codes, the Ten Commandments and any other religion-based legal system," the Chronicle reported.
"It blows my mind that some people think that Muslims shouldn't be allowed to practice Islamic law among themselves, especially when it comes to marital law or business law," cleric Al-Sadat said. "That's part of our religious freedoms and for me it's unacceptable if you're talking about a pluralistic society."
(Brian Bethel is a reporter for The Abilene Reporter-News in Texas.)
