Skip to the content of the web site.
University of Waterloo UW E-newsletter UW 50th Anniversary

Bringing diversity to Muslim leadership

Ingrid Mattson
Photo courtesy of Hartford Seminary

Islamic scholar Ingrid Mattson (BA '87, PhD '99 Chicago) was elected president of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) last fall. The first woman to hold this post, Mattson heads the largest religious organization to represent Muslims in North America.

As president, she leads ISNA's board of directors to build bridges between Muslim organizations and North American faith communities, and represents the interests of North American Muslims to the government, general public, and media.

A former Catholic, Mattson converted to Islam after graduating from UW and pursued an academic career in Islamic theology and law. As a professor of Islamic studies and Christian-Muslim relations and the director of the Islamic Chaplaincy Program at Hartford Seminary in Connecticut, her schedule is full, but the seminary has reduced her administrative duties during her appointment.

Mattson says there is great diversity within the North American Muslim community -Sunni and Shiite, men and women, young and old, immigrant and native-born - and her goal is to expand the ISNA's ability to serve those populations. To help achieve this, she has directed the ISNA's regional officers to increase the diversity in their councils. "It's important that other women and native-born North Americans have the opportunity to develop as future leaders of our community."

After her appointment, the media focused on the unusual step of electing a female president, but Mattson insists, "Many people assume Muslims cannot accept a female leader, but half of the Muslim world has been governed by female leaders, including Indonesia, Turkey, Pakistan and Bangladesh." The views of a conservative Muslim minority have been broadcast so widely, she says, that they have "distorted the reality."

"We see a great deal of bad news about Muslims but in every community I visit I see dynamic, intelligent Muslims of all backgrounds contributing positively to their communities," she says. "I also see many non-Muslims reaching out in friendship and solidarity to their Muslim neighbours," which Mattson finds immensely gratifying.

Mattson has written a book called The Story of the Qur'an: Its History and Place in Muslim Life, due to be released this fall.
www.isna.net

Written by: Jude Doble

Reprinted from the University of Waterloo Magazine, Fall 2007