RAMADAN OBSERVANCE HELD IN CAPE

About 65 Muslims came to the Cape Girardeau Civic Center Saturday night to pray and break the fast they keep daily during the observance of Ramadan.

Muslims 12 and older eat and drink nothing during the daylight hours of Ramadan, the month-long celebration of the revelation of the Koran to Muhammad. Ramadan began Dec. 30 and will be completed late this month with the end of the moon.

Ramadan is the ninth month of the Islamic calendar.

In Southeast Missouri, Muslims can be found in Sikeston, Poplar Bluff, New Madrid, Caruthersville, Cape Girardeau and Ste. Genevieve. A number of international students at Southeast are Muslim.

Muslims arise at 5 a.m. during Ramadan to eat a meal before the sun rises. They can eat and drink again once the sun has set, a meal called the iftar.

The nights are taken up with reading the Koran. Muslims are supposed to complete one reading of the Koran during Ramadan, said Dr. Mohammad Shakil, a Cape Girardeau neurologist.

Muslims devote themselves to prayer, contemplation and fasting during Ramadan. "There isn't time for anything else," Shakil said.

The fasting is an act of purification and self-sacrifice, he said.

"God has ordered us to do that. Jesus did fasting, too," he said. "All the prophets of God have been commanded to."

Though fasting isn't required of young children, Shakil's 8-year-old is observing the fast.

At the Civic Center, the men ate and socialized in one room and the women in a different room. This separation of the sexes is beneficial to families in that it prevents people from getting involved in affairs, Shakil said.

"It nips the vices in the bud."

He said Islam guaranteed the rights of women long before the women's liberation movement came along. "Islam liberated women from the yolk of slavery.

"... Countries where you see women persecuted or suppressed, this is not Islam. That is a culture."

Dr. Byron Glenn, a Cape Girardeau physician, was born into the Catholic faith but converted more than 20 years ago. Glenn is a native of San Francisco and his wife, Aminah, is from Malaysia.

Being a Muslim in Southeast Missouri presents no difficulty despite their numbers being so small, Glenn said.

He said he was teased about fasting during Ramadan when he worked in Kennett. "They called it Ramadama or something like that," he said.

Muslims are not allowed to drink alcohol at any time of year. They also don't eat pork. "It's almost like we're Jewish," Shakil said.

Shakil, who was born in Pakistan, said he has never felt prejudice against him for his beliefs.

"I don't feel any prejudice. I feel proud of being Muslim," he said.

"I feel people look at you with appreciation," he said.

He says educated people know that religion is a matter between the believer and God.

"It has been revealed through different ways of praying," he said.