They waited for the anti-Islam backlash to subside, then reached out to other Muslim writers, scholars, journalists, performers and human rights activists, asking what it means to be Muslim in Canada and what the country’s 1.1-million-member Islamic community — made up of people from four continents speaking many languages, with different traditions and perspectives, some members overtly religious, some avowedly secular, some eager to join the mainstream, some determined to preserve their heritage — has in common.
The conversation grew into a book, The Relevance of the Islamic Identity.