02/28/1979
IWDM Study Library
Religion on the Line Men’s Dept Correction 
San Luis Obispo California

By Imam W. Deen Mohammed
Male Speaker: -representing the Central Officer out of [unintelligible 00:04:02] is Mr. George Warner, Assistant Deputy Director of the California Department of Corrections. What you're about to see in here would be Imam W. Deen Mohamed establishing rules and guidelines for conduct and behavior for Muslims who are incarcerated. This unique session, we feel, will serve as a model and future training tool which will have significant value and immeasurable benefits for all concerned.
George Warner: My name is George Warner and I'm the Assistant Deputy Director of Institutions for the Department of Corrections and on behalf of Director in the [unintelligible 00:04:49] I'm certainly pleased to welcome you to California to the Department of Corrections and to California Men's Colony at San Luis Obispo. Superintendent Dan McCarthy might have some welcome.
Dan McCarthy: I have a welcome not only from myself personally, but from our own Muslim group here as I was discussing with you earlier on, we're pleased and part of the Muslim contingent here at the Men's Colony. They are a real fine people as far as I am personally concerned.
Imam Mohammed: I'm happy to be here. I appreciate the opportunity.
Warner: Iman Mohamed, I wonder if you would perhaps give us a little bit of the history of the development of the world community of Al-Islam in the West and perhaps share with us some of the basic tenets of the religion. I know that this film is going to be shared with inmates in various institutions of the California Department of Corrections. I'm sure they will be interested in hearing from you personally about the basic principles of the religion are and perhaps a bit of history of how we got to where we are in 1979.
Imam Mohammed: Thank you, Mr. Warner. The organization began in the early '30s. About I believe exact it was a historical date in our records is July 4th, 1930. The organization was established as the Lost Found Nation of Islam under the name Lost Foundation of Islam in America. The purpose of that organization was to separate blacks from whites, but more importantly, the purpose was to regenerate the spiritual and moral life of people who were living poor and ignorant lives. Poor and ignorant lives.
These converts from the poor and ignorant society that the cities like Detroit, Chicago, Milwaukee, Washington DC and others, they were first taught self-discipline. We are best known for our self-discipline. We are best known for being people poor and uneducated, but very self-conscious of our moral and spiritual and hygiene, our personal hygiene. We were credited for keeping clean bodies, neat appearances and avoiding filthy language, a boisterous language and what we call ignorant display of manners in the public life.
Dignity came to our movement because of the heavy emphasis on self-discipline and self-control and cleanliness and high moral thinking. Later, some of the leaders became materialistic and were influenced by Black Power Movement. We got a great influx of people into our organization during the demonstrations. The Black Power demonstrations and those persons didn't receive the kind of saturated indoctrination that we received over a long period of time. So, they were just attracted to blackness and the Black Power and to making money. What it did, it brought a decline in the strength of our organization.
When I came into office, first thing I did was address this decline, this decline in morals, this false emphasis unhealthy emphasis, pardon me that we were putting on blackness and not enough emphasis on the moral development and the spiritual development and self-discipline and a display of high and refined manners in public life. Thank G-d that He blessed us with the help of the Book, the Quran to bring this organization back to where it was once in terms of our appreciation for bodily cleanliness, decency, clean language, clean tongue, fine manners et cetera.
I would like to make mention of something that I think is very significant for us, here, today and especially for our community. The teacher, of the Honorable Elijah Mohammed who we once identified as a Christ figure, as G-d in the flesh, Professor Fard Mohammed. He envisioned the whole idea and he put together the concept the FOI, the MGT, the University of Islam, the school for educating us. He put together that whole concept and he was the one who issued the first Identification Cards for the members of the movement.
Many of us who received those identification cards in the early times, I didn't receive one because I was too young, but my mother received the cards for me. We still have my own card. The card says, "This person, the bearer of this card is a Muslim." It was addressing law enforcement. Says, "If anyone find the bearer of this card other than righteous, take the card and punish the said bearer."
The organization from its inception believed in obedience to the law of the land. That we shouldn't break the law of the land. If the law says, "Don't pray", then that's another thing, but if the law says, "Don't kill. Don't steal. Don't disturb the peace in society." These are laws that are also religious laws, and the leadership insisted that these laws be respected by all members, even when we called white folks devils.
Discipline and respect for the laws of society have been our inheritance and I would like to remind Muslims in this brief talk on the history of the Nation of Islam and where we have the law from. I would like to remind members of the Muslims, of community that the criminal mindedness and criminal activities were not glamorized, were not dealt with, with any weak hand. They were dealt with a very firm hand. They had no place in the society.
Now as things have changed and I thank G-d that things have changed, we have different attitude and prison administration. There's more efforts made now to bring out the best in every man if it is possible. I also appreciate that about 10 years ago now, no, more than 10 years, pardon me, about 15 years ago I was a inmate of a federal correction institution myself and it was one of the better prison environments. Now, as I visit these prisons, I look back at that time and I've seen a great change. It's a great change and I just wish that all the inmates could appreciate the change in attitude by the administration. The improvement regard of the effort to rehabilitate inmates, and make them more ready to go out in the public life again.
As for our tenets, basic tenets they’re very simple. The characteristic of our religion is simplicity. That is the strongest characteristic of our religion. Simplicity. We believe in the oneness of G-d. We believe in the oneness of creation. Doesn't mean we don't believe that the human beings are humanly different from each other. We believe that they're culturally different from each other and that culture makes me different from a culture that is at a great variance, a great distance from my culture. We're culturally different.
The cultural differences give us our own individual opinions and concepts of the world, concepts of the people and our own prejudices. We have been as not so I would say crippled mentally by our narrow Muslim prejudices from the old administration as any racist Caucasian perhaps that is can be. So I would like to ask all of the members of the community to really keep some kind of focus on the history of our community and realize that we came from very narrow ideas about what life is and about what humanity is and that we were far from believing in the pure concepts of our book called the Quran. 
Warner: I see.
Imam Mohammed: Yes, sir we were far from being believers on the pure concepts of our Holy Book the Quran. But now, we have to accept this because the Honorable Elijah Muhammed he told us that the book, the Quran, is a holy book is a pure book and the book of all Muslims including the Nation of Islam. And when he left, he left us with the idea that some new knowledge should come now because he said that, "I am not teaching you so that religion, I am preparing you for the future." So I am preparing you for the future. So we expected religion and we have no alternative but to turn to the book, the only thing that he left us with that was pure and a holy book for us.
So we turn to the Holy Quran and reading the Holy Quran it says, "G-d is a G-d of everybody and he is a G-d who cares for all", not just for blacks, for Muslims, he cares for all. He is one G-d, one creation, oneness is the predominant idea in our religion. Oneness, one free G-d, one creation, one humanity. This oneness is a bounded idea in the religion. The first declaration of our faith is, "La- illaha-il-Allah" which simply means G-d is one G-d. That we say there is no G-d except Allah or there is no G-d except G-d. It simply means G-d is one. Then the other part of that declaration of faith or Shahada is "Muhammad rasulla-llah."
Many times we miss the message in that second-, the second part of that declaration. We think that it means Muhammad must be pushed like G-d. That we push G-d we push Muhammad but actually, the significance is this. That we believe in one G-d and we don’t believe man is G-d. Man can only be a messenger a servant of G-d. The prophet is a servant, a messenger of G-d. He is not G-d. So when Muslims say, "La-ilaha-ill-Allah, Muhammad-rasulla-llah" absolutely we are saying G-d is one and man is servant, not G-d.
Then we have the second belief, fundamental belief or practice of the Muslims is prayer. We have to pray to Almighty G-d, we're human beings. We are not the masters of our own destiny we need G-d's help so we pray to G-d. Salat it is called.
Then there is Zakat, which is charity. Charity I would say the strong principle of Christian faith. Charity is the third pillar of our faith and then comes fasting. Fasting, the purpose of fasting is self-restraint. Self-restraint is the broadest mode of man's spirit more in accord with the will of G-d. So that we do good to our fellow man so that we share our blessings with our fellow man. When we can fast he is able to do without and if he can do without that means if we have a lot that we can share what we have with other people.
And then comes after fasting comes Hajj and Hajj is pilgrimage, it’s something called pilgrimage. It's the holy trip that we make from all parts of the world to Mecca. To the holy house built by Abraham and his son Ishmael. This Hajj is a symbol of the will of G-d for the unification of all people. People come from Nigeria, people come from China, people come from all over the world. When they come there for Hajj they have to take off their national garb, they have to take off any symbol of nationalism, racism and they have to all put on the same set of garment and make the Hajj before G-d.
So we believe in the oneness of the humanity, we believe in the cooperation of societies to advance the common cause of the human society. After those five basic fundamental principles, we have beliefs and I say after because in our religion actions are more important than words. The emphasis of our religion is on actions, those who have no actions of good they have nothing in the judgment. Those who only have feelings of good they have nothing in the judgment. You have to have deeds of good. You have to have actions and deeds of good.
Our beliefs are very simple too. We believe in an Almighty eternal G-d who has no beginning, who is separate from creation, who is present everywhere who is the G-d of all. This is the Iman, belief it’s called. Next, we believe in the angels of G-d, that G-d reaches man and that G-d runs the whole creation through agents and these agents are his angels. So our religion is very much like the religion of the people of the scripture, of Jews and Christians. We believe that G-d through these angels have also reached the mortal human being and that's the prophets. So we believe in the prophets and we believe that through the prophet, through the mortal being, G-d also can give his will in the language of human beings and that's scripture. We believe that through these prophets man get divine revelation of scripture when it comes to us.
We believe after that we believe in judgment and second life. We believe that G-d is going to judge us for all that we do that no soul can escape the justice of G-d. The graveyard does not close off the door and prevent G-d from executing justice on that soul. We believe in a future life and on just judgment and we believe in the ordinance of G-d. That whatever happens to us in our lives, whether good or bad it is determined by the law of G-d, the ordinance of G-d. It is called the Qadar[Arabic language], which in English means that G-d has established a law that operates throughout creation and that law is an unshakable law.
It doesn't bend for me, doesn't bend for anybody. If you do wrong if you misuse G-d's creation, the life that he's given us if we misuse our intelligence that he's given us. If we misuse the blessings of creation that he's given us, that these things are going to work adversely to punish us. If we use it correctly, we are going to walk positively and in a good way to bless our lives to give us more meaning and more fullness of life. Except for a few other less important beliefs, I believe I have stated the basic tenets and also the beliefs of the religion.
McCarthy: Well, thank you very much it was quite enlightening.
Warner: I certainly appreciate that explanation, it helps me understand and place in perspective a number of things that I see. Some questions came to my mind as you were talking there and one of them that I think this kind of answers your reference to the oneness of G-d and the G-d of the entire creation in your comments about your present tenets suggest to me that a prior posture if I can use that word of a separatism kind of thing apparently that's not where you are now in terms of--yours is not a separatist religion.
Imam Mohammed: The idea explained is foreign to Islam, it’s foreign to religion, it's not acceptable, it is a big corruption in religion. A big corruption in religion!
Warner: I have another concern, Imam Mohammed that I'd like to discuss with you. We have in the 12 institutions in the Department of Corrections resident Imams who attempt to guide and lead the Muslim inmates there in so far as their understanding of the tenets of faith and so forth. Questions arise from time to time that have to do with perhaps rituals of prayer or of cleanliness or of dietary concerns, things of this matter. We want to be able to accommodate every individual’s religious beliefs in every way we can. Yet we are in a closed environment.
We are in a situation where there are constraints on people and perhaps there could be some misunderstanding as to what might be mandatory and what might be desirable with regard to prayer, with regard to diet, with regard to fasting, with regard to attendance at services, anything of that sort. I think it would be helpful if you could distinguish for us some of the absolute requirements that people must observe with, and others that perhaps you can't make a trip to Mecca in the Department of Corrections. Perhaps there are things that you can do.
Imam Mohammed: Yes. I certainly appreciate the concern that you have just expressed. The administration, I’m very proud of it. I’m very proud to be a citizen of a country that has a prison administrative like yourself, who want to give people who have violated the law, who have injured society and have made themselves worthy of punishment. That you would have this attitude towards those people. It really makes me very proud. May G-d bless all of you.
There are some requirements that are not absolute, are not obligatory, under certain circumstances. For example, travel sometimes brings hardship into one’s life. We don’t have the conveniences that we have at home. Because of inconvenience that travel brings into our lives, we are allowed to shorten certain prayers to put them in half.
Warner: I see.
Imam Mohammed: Yes, sir. We’re allowed to combine two of our major prayers so that we don’t have to do them in two separate times. That’s the noon prayer and afternoon prayer. We’re allowed to combine the two of them. Instead of doing them in eight sections, we can do the two of them in four sections. The one that we do in four sections we are allowed to do them only in two sections. Then under certain conditions, we are even allowed to shorten what we do in that prayer.
For example, to illustrate what I’m talking about. The parts of a prayer is; declared intention, to make a washing, to clean yourself, and to then make the steps of prayer. Which is to face the Qibla, the holy house; of Abraham that Abraham built in Mecca. To face the holy house and to glorify G-d; Allah-u-Akbar and then to make a short dua glorifying G-d again; and after that ask G-d’s protection from the Shaitan, the enemy of man, the devil. Recite the opening prayer Al Fatiha and after that short verse or chapter from the Quran, recite it.
Then we go down and we make the bending of our knees, the bending of the body at the knee. We come back up praising G-d and go down in prostration position. At the second stage of the rakats, second rakat then we sit and we have to say At-tashahhud in completion and a prayer called salatul Ibrahimiyyah. But if conditions won’t allow us to do all of this, we can shorten even that. We shorten it to just say give the intention to make the ablution give the intention to glorify G-d, "Allah-u-Akbar," say, “I seek refuge with G-d from the rejected enemy Satan,” then we say, Al Fatiha and omit the recitation of Quranic verses behind Al Fatiha and we go immediately to the knees and we come back up and we bow down sitting at the second rakat.
We don’t have to say the whole tashahhud, we don’t have to say the whole Salatul-Ibrahimiyyah. In fact, we can only say Ash-hadu an laa ilaaha illa llahu wada and we can stand back up again and complete the prayer. So it will take maybe ten minutes, 15 minutes to do a prayer, it can be shortened to a minimum requirements, less requirements being done in five minutes. It can be done in five minutes.
Warner: Let me ask you this. Can an individual alone in his cell for example or his room or wherever he may be satisfy the requirements for a prayer? Does this have to be in any particular place, in any particular setting? Can a Muslim satisfy his requirements in his room?
Imam Mohammed: Yes, he can even without water. I think in most of the cells we have water.
McCarthy: Yes, I do.
Imam Mohammed: But even if he didn’t have water, he can take and wipe his hand on a clean towel, a paper towel. [unintelligible 00:30:37] He can wipe his hands and after wiping his hands, he can take his both hands and wipe his face three times and he’s ready for prayer.
Warner: So he has the capability within whatever setting he may be to satisfy the requirements of the religion as far as prayer.
Imam Mohammed: I believe so, yes.
Warner: On another matter, I know there is some very serious concern and understandably so about food. I know that the men want to make sure that they don’t unknowingly partake of pork products for food as for example. I know that we make an effort, I think probably pretty successfully in identifying on the menu what the pork products are so that an individual may elect not to use those. Even perhaps some lard was used in cooking to identify that so the people know. Are you aware of any problems with regard to that? Do you think that that is an acceptable and satisfactory way of dealing with a matter of diet?
Imam Mohammed: That has been brought to my attention by several people in the prison administration and also by some of our Imams who have expressed themselves as some of the demands that have been presented. They are not really demands and they shouldn’t be treated as demands. For instance, I’m told that some inmates, several have been a community, asked that they have a portion of the kitchen as provided for some Jewish people.
After that was done, inmates should have been allowed to have what was allotted to another religious body or religion should be also allowed to the Muslim religion. At the same time, I don’t want to create problems for our community that we don’t have to have. I know that we put too many demands on prison administration it’s going to affect the attitude of the prison administration toward us.
I’m thankful that now I believe that our community is getting equal attention, if not more attention, than the Jewish community is getting. I would like to see that continue. If it is to continue, then our leadership; myself and the Imams belonging to our society, would have to be very rational and practical in our demands. We don't think that we have to have a kosher kitchen for inmates. We have kosher kitchens at home. I hope all of us have kosher kitchens at home, if we live in an open, free society. [laughter]
Imam Mohammed: But when we go out with our wives and our children for a hamburger, for a snack in a public restaurant, we don't insist that we go to a kosher kitchen. So, why should we demand that inside the institution. That makes us look like hypocrites?
I don't think we should go that far. We shouldn't be fanatic. We should be rational. That's a trademark of our religion; is logical mindedness. Logical mindedness. I would think that the inmates would make no more demands inside the prison than they make on the outside.
I think that the light for us to use in deciding what attitude we should take is in the Quran teachings without the pork. Jews were told not to even touch the pig with their hand. In the Quran, you're not told that you can't touch a pig. We are told, "Don't eat the pig. Don't eat the pig." The pig is an evil that we should stay away from it. But the actual language of the Jew -- The testament is "not used."
McCarthy: I see.
Imam Mohammed: We're told in the Quran that if by necessity [unintelligible 00:35:55], and by necessity here means if you're starving. If you're starving. A man, a woman is starving. A child is starving. They have nothing else to eat but pork. We're told that it's okay to eat it, but not in excess. Eat enough to give you enough strength to go on until you get some food. The proper food.
If G-d had made that allowance for persons who might be in situations where they can't get other food and they're starved, they're at the point of starvation, I say we should apply that same kind of rational philosophy to the situations that we have inside a prison. We're convicts inside the prison. We're charged with the violation of law. We shouldn't think that we are free people. The freedom we've lost because of the violation.
If a prison says, "We don't have enough pork free food for you. We have nothing but food that's contaminated." [laughs] The mission is not to be silly minded and say, "I'm going to starve. I'll die as a protest." No, G-d says that if you're faced with such situation, it's okay to take a little just to survive.
If the bread has a pork then the Muslim, if he can't get bread free of pork, if it's too much of a problem for administration to have a bakery, to put a separate bakery for the Muslims, then the Muslims should either do without the bread, or he should ask G-d to forgive him for eating bread that has a pork. That I feel G-d that if I don't eat some bread, my body will be deficient. Some iron, some minerals and something that I need. G-d forgive me for taking this bread but [unintelligible 00:38:01] and eat the bread. The honorable Elijah Muhammad ate the bread. With the lard in it. In fact, the honorable Elijah Muhammad, and he represents extremism. 
We don’t represent extremism. The true spirit of the Quran is moderation. Not extremism. The honorable Elijah Muhammad represents extremism. He said, "If someone serves you a meal, a Christian,” he told us this very often. He said, "If a Christian serves you a meal and you were their guest, if they have pork on their plate," he said, "Don't insult the host." Say, "I can't eat this pork." He said, be diplomatic. Say, "The doctor has me on a diet. I'm not allowed to eat pork. Would you just take the pork away. I can eat the rest of the food."
Now if the pork is on the plate, the essence have already contaminated the plate. The honorable Elijah Muhammad says, "It's okay to eat out of that plate." I hope that in someway, give what I think should be the attitude toward eating pork and pork products inside the prison.
McCarthy: I find the attitude of the brothers that I am dealing with here, it's pretty much along that line. I think cooperation is a two-way street though. I think in here, we don't intentionally try to feed them pork and they're any guys -- If we have to serve ham or something like that, for the rest of the population they'll be made aware of it. But, we keep talking about lard. I insist that my purchasing agent use vegetable shortening rather than anything made out of pork fat.
I think both are [crosstalk] I think you and your religion have come a long way. I think it's up to us also to show we have to give them -- and many areas we were definitely more rigid in the past. I think my association, I've been in the prison business 30 years, but I think I've seen major changes on both sides thankfully.
Imam Mohammed: We're very, very happy because of that. I remember in Minnesota Correctional, Federal Correctional Institution, since then, many days I had to just make out with beets. Maybe some fruit if they had any fruit. I couldn't eat anything and maybe bread. The bread -- well I knew the teachings of my childhood so I didn't ask them, "do you have lard in this bread?"
[laughter]
Imam Mohammed: I didn't even ask. I ate the bread. But the pork was practically in everything else.
Warner: Well, I certainly appreciate your comments. It's helped my understanding. It's been enlightening to me. I know that your coming here and sharing this information with the people here is a blessing to all of the Muslim inmates. I certainly appreciate it. It's good for me too because I'm really glad to hear these things, glad to know a little bit more about it.
As Mr. McCarthy says, I think that we have come a long way. There has been a lot of changes. Our understanding, acceptance and awareness of the world community of Islam, has changed quite a lot.
Imam Mohammed: I believe that soon enough, the attitude that you have here is going to spread to more and more institutions. There will be less, what I call "legitimate complaints" coming from your inmates. Before ending my own expression or address to certain problems that we have, I think it's important for Muslims to know that Jumu’ah, that's Friday service, is a demand, an obligation on Muslims when they have their own lives in their hands. But, when their lives are in the hands of prison administration.
I think that, again, if we can't get time for Jumu’ah, because there're some prisons I don't think they allow the inmates to be in a hall or to have Jumu’ah. We should be patient. We have to be patient and wait until state prisons or whatever, find a way to cover what they ask. If we can't make Jumu’ah, we can just make the noon prayer, if they allow us to make the noon prayer. We can make that prayer individually. We don't have to be in congregation especially under these conditions.
I would ask all those Muslims who are not yet allowed to form, to make congregation of prayer, and to have this lecture, the Khutbah for Jumu’ah prayer, to just be patient. And to let our goodness influence change for the better by insisting upon justice and also by using the rule of mercy and goodness. We're told that G-d, He rules everything, not just with justice, but also with his Rahma, that's mercy and goodness.
Many times we should come from the Christian principle, that is also the Muslim principle to effect change. Be patient and show people that we have good intentions, that we mean well, and perhaps the attitude will change and our demands will be accommodated.
Warner: I think I'd like to mention a couple of other things. I'm sure you are aware of these, but I'd like to share them with you anyhow. My relationship with Imam Abdul Hassan, who has been a member of the state advisory committee on institutional religion has been very helpful to us because this has given us an avenue. When we have questions and there was some confusion and perhaps lack of understanding on the part of some of the inmates, we were able to go to an authoritative individual and ask for his guidance, that's been very, very helpful.
I'm also particularly pleased with someone like Imam Earl Shah, who was able to come to the institutions and answer what I know must be a lot of questions from people who really don't have another ready resource to some authoritative individual, in terms of the tenants of the religion. Because they're many questions that come up, but Imams Hassan and Shah have been very, very helpful to us. I hope to be able to do more of that sort of thing.
Imam Mohammed: It is a requirement of our religion that we obey G-d, that we obey the prophet of G-d. The prophet of G-d is not physically among us, but we have to obey his life. We have to travel in the example that he set for us. Follow his teachings, but also is we're obligated to obey those placed in authority. Muslim society must have Muslim leadership. The Muslim says that the members of that society must respect their leadership. No member of our society should be interpreting the religion independently. They should be given guidance from those knowledgeable persons in our membership, and those persons are the official Imams in our community.
We would like to see more cooperation between the prison administration and our Imams because our Imams want to help eliminate problems in the institutions. We're now through the council of Imams that have been established now, we're now trying to find more capable persons who not only know how to read and the knowledge of Quran, the language of Quran and perform prayer service, but we're finding people who have more knowledge of human behavior in the society, the problems of society. So that those persons will be more qualified to propagate the faith inside the prison. So, through a prison Imam, an outside person can reach the inmate population of Muslims with religion in the proper way.
I'm certain that with chaplains, we have few chaplains now who have qualified. They have college education. Most of them now, in fact, most of them- all of them have college education, either second year, none of them have less than two year college education.
Warner: Yes.
Imam Mohammed: Yes sir. They have studied psychology. They have some knowledge of human behavior, the nature of human behavior. We want all of the prison Imams to be in touch with these able, capable teachers on the outside. This is the way that we really keep the identification with the Muslim community, with the world community of Al-Islam in the West.
No Muslim member can expect our support when they're having problems, when they think that they're dealt with unjustly in the prison society, if they ignore the advice of our Imams and the free community. No inmate can expect to have support if they interpret what is in religion independently and put unreasonable demands on the prison administration.
We have a very good Imam out here, Imam Hassan, and as you mentioned there are others. There are many others, and I hope that all of us inside the institution will respect these men because if they expect to come back out and be honored as Imams, they're going to have to respect their brother Imam who's already out.
Warner: Very good, thank you. I wonder before we have our questions, you've been most gracious in your advice. I wonder if there are any questions you would like to address to superintendent McCarthy or to myself. Are there any things you would like to ask us about the department?
Imam Mohammed: Well, there is one question that not that I wouldn't like to address particularly to you, or to the superintendent but to prison administration. I feel that the community would be-- I would say more educated, better educated if there was some way to have Islamic literature that is approved by our community leadership come directly to the members of the Muslim community in prison, in prison system, in prison society, instead of coming through chaplaincy that is not Muslim. I'm not of the grammatical interpretation that believe Christian priests, ministers shouldn't touch our holy Quran.
G-d says in the holy Quran that the non-believers can't touch it, and some of us think that, that should be interpreted literally that a Christian is not allowed to touch our Quran, you know. I know that it means that they can't reach the meanings in the Quran, simply, because they're mind is not in-tuned with the message of the Quran. It doesn't mean that they can't touch the physical book. The physical book is printed in Spain sometimes. [laughs] It's printed in different places so non-Muslims are touching it all the time you see.
I would like to see the literature, the Quran, and other acceptable literature, approved literature, come directly to an Imam in the prison community rather than through a Christian minister, et cetera. Now I know that can't come all of a sudden. Perhaps it will never come to all institutions, but we can make an effort with-- we can work with prison administration to find more people on the outside who can bring Islamic literature to the prison.
McCarthy: This can be easily arranged.
Imam Mohammed: [crosstalk] I'm positive, yes.
McCarthy: I see no problem with an issue. Just thinking of a way as you were talking about it, is that we would handle them at almost essentially like we do our legal mail and then say it was a box of religious materials sent to our Imam here. It would be addressed to him, what we would have is a staff member present when it was opened up. He could take things out of the box and look at it and put it back in the box the staff member wouldn't touch at all.
Imam Mohammed: Yes.
McCarthy: They could be delivered, but I'll talk to our Imam about it. I'm sure at this institution we'd work it out.
Imam Mohammed: Okay, that's very good.
Warner: We can certainly review our procedures. There's probably what we see here is the situation where the protestant chaplain by and large in all of the institutions department has been made the coordinator, if you will, of any-- well, virtually any of the religions other than the Jewish and the Catholic whether it be Christian or not. I think that it maybe because of that some remnants of that sort of thing-
McCarthy: Yes, that's what I was [crosstalk].
Warner: - that we see happening but if this is a concern then certainly-
McCarthy: Yes, I was [crosstalk]
Warner: - yes, we're certainly willing to take a look at that and see if there are some ways we can address that. I don't see any reason why we can't find some way to deal with that problem satisfactorily. I think, it's just something that we probably weren't even aware of.
McCarthy: That's right, I wasn't aware of it at all.
Warner: We're being aware of it now I think we can do something to change it.
Imam Mohammed: Well, many of the Imams would be very happy to hear. I mean I'll go back and I'll tell our community, and we appreciate whatever you can do.
Warner: Well, we're not sure that we will accomplish everything overnight or in all places because there are as I think you can probably appreciate greater restrictions at Folsom and San Quentin and or more secured prisons than there might be here or certainly somewhere like Chino but at the same time we'll take a look at it and where we have unreasonable restrictions that are not defensible and that are not needed, we'll change those.
Imam Mohammed: I'm referring only to literature directly from our community.
Warner: I understand. Yes. I'm sure we can handle that.
McCarthy: Once again, thank you for the visit and it was indeed a pleasure.
Warner: Thank you so much. Assalamualaikum.
Imam Mohammed: Walaikum salam.
[laughter]
[00:54:34] [END OF AUDIO]

