New Book – No Return from Democracy: A Survey of Interviews with Fethullah Gulen
Date posted: August 8, 2017
It was rare, if not impossible, to find in ’80s and ’90s a Muslim cleric who spoke in favor of democracy, integration with the Western world, and universal human values. Fethullah Gülen was one of those. Many of his avant-garde ideas did not only earn him one of the largest and most influential faith-inspired social movements of recent history, but also many foes, especially from the Turkish ruling elite, placing him in the center of many social and political developments in Turkey. Despite the enormous defamation from some political groups in Turkey, Gülen is recognized in the world as a devout Muslim cleric, whose thoughts and life style are deeply rooted in the Islamic faith, but who also believes Islam is not in conflict with the progressive values of the modern world. This book collates Gülen’s ahead-of-his-time comments on some of the debated issues as he phrased in interviews in the past few decades.
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“The Hizmet movement has nothing to hide,” Alexander said. “We’re hoping people can learn more about it. Since Gulen is being accused of this, there will be greater scrutiny of the Hizmet movement, and we invite that scrutiny.”
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‘The Gulen movement is one of the very few that has managed to live what it preaches.’
Hizmet Movement is, in my view, an Islamically-inspired, Islamically-grounded movement, or Islamically-rooted movement, founded on the universal and fundamental principle of peace and—the essential values of Islam—peace, mercy and compassion, as normative, moral objectives and which seeks to translate these principles into—through the dynamic of ta’aruf, the dynamic of coming to know one another, especially coming to know the other—into a reality, into a living sociological and anthropological reality.
Fethullah Gülen’s Message of Condemnation and Condolences for Sri Lanka Explosions
I was shocked and deeply saddened by the devastating news of explosions in Sri Lanka. I firmly condemn this horrific attack, which turned a day meant for the celebration of Easter by Christians around the world into bloodshed.
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