LYNC INTERVIEW Elsanousi
Jessica: You are watching LYNC interview. I'm Jessica Eturralde. In a world increasingly divided by differences, how do we create lasting peace and understanding across faith communities? Today we'll hear from someone who has dedicated his life to that mission. mission. We are honored to welcome Dr. Mohamed Elsanousi global leader in peace building. Multifaith dialogue and a current commissioner of the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom. Freedom. As the executive director of the Network for Religious and traditional peacemakers, Dr. Elsanousi bridges grassroots efforts with international initiatives to foster sustainable peace. Welcome, Dr. Elsanousi.
Dr. Elsanousi: Thank you.
Jessica: Dr. Elsanousi, you are known for bridging religious divides, advising on international religious freedom policy, and supporting grassroots peace efforts, and with a background
In Islamic law and Interreligious engagement, you combine theological insight with diplomatic skills, prevent conflict, and strengthen religious freedom worldwide. So to begin, may you share how your personal story and faith each shape the way you build religious freedom?
Dr. Elsanousi: Thank you so much and thank you to you Jessica, for this interview as well as of course to the LYNC audience. I'm familiar with LYNC the organization and the good work that you do.
So we definitely appreciate that. It's always I say that my personal. Upbringing and story shaped my way of not only thinking but also the way that I continue to engage in advancing and promoting religious freedom for everyone, everywhere all the times.
I grew up in, in a family that's very devout my faithful mother and fathers and siblings and the whole village that I was raised in, they were, are very committed believers. And I think that. Commitment and the believing in God and love of neighbor and all of that actually contributed significantly in my upbringing as well as in my interest in not only pursuing, I.
Theological studies, of course in Islamic faith, but also looking into how I can implement the teaching of the sacred of the scripture in term of extending and building bridges with others who are not necessarily affiliate with your own faith.
We have a clear teaching from the Islamic sources that telling us that we have to build bridges. We know that from our own teaching that if God wills, he would have brought he would have, made all of us in the same shape and the same language in the same culture and religions, but I.
For for God himself. That is he made us as different, right? And that is just to further know the science of God and his existence. And that's why all of these teachings actually helped me as I continue to pursue my education. I, as I continue to build bridges and and that basically developed to my interest in further working on this field of religious freedom and interfaith their lock.
Jessica: I see. Thank you for sharing that, Dr. Elsanousi. As someone with the builders approach, what has it been like to serve on us on an institution legally mandated for advocacy?
Dr. Elsanousi: I'm blessed to be serving on USCIRF right now - United States Commission on International Religious Freedom.
It's a commission that's an independent. It is bipartisan. It is a commission that basically provide recommendations to policy makers to work with countries so that we can further advance and promote religious freedom. It is a challenging, of course to look into violation of religious freedom and to work with different countries around the world.
To help them, how they can improve religious freedom in their countries. In the same time, we also wanted to support those marginalized communities, those persecuted communities on the ground. So we continue to dialogue with the, with countries around the world, with our own government here in the United States.
States how we can help those countries to improve religious freedom. So it's a, a blessing to work with my colleague commissioners. And it is a blessing also to work with civil society organizations. And it's also a blessing to work with governments as well. So it is challenging to balance.
The policy aspects as well as understanding the local context and realities on the ground of some of these countries. When we visit them just Jessica yesterday, which is March 25th, we actually release. Our 2025 report of the Serv. It happened yesterday at the Congress and huge interest.
The room was packed as well as we had about 10 senators and us house of Representatives members. They came to show their bipartisan support to serve. And to the movement of religious freedom or belief. So I think all of this give me really encouragement as we continue to find the best ways to advance religious freedom.
Jessica: Yes, I saw that the report came out, and how exciting to hear about this bipartisan support and
interest. You mentioned something just a minute ago about the difficulty and balancing. Could you give an example?
Dr. Elsanousi: I think there are a number of examples. I could share with you and Jessica, I want to just let you know that I always enjoy when I travel, I. And meet with persecuted communities or minority communities in majority context. Because what that does is that it gives them, empowerment they feel that people are coming to stand in solidarity with them.
They feel that, they have, people that live so far, but still they are thinking about them all the time. We, my example, I traveled to Uzbekistan, January of last year, of 2024 with my close friends that I mentioned. Their names here, Dr. Chris Sippel as well as wait, za and my sister Nadine Menza.
We went to Pakistan. And just to as a civil society to look into the state of religious freedom, to meet with government, to meet with the religious communities, to meet with civil society, and to assess and see how we could be helpful in in, in a collaborative manner.
So one of the, one of the examples that we visited a number of cities in Uzbekistan, and we visited the famous city called Boha, which is an icon of Islamic civilization, right? But in that city, they are Christian communities also living in the city. There are Jewish communities living in the city and we visited with them and, one of the Christian communities that we visited is is a Baptist BA pastor, and we visited with him, and the meeting with him was in a community center. It was not in his church. And but that basically brought to my attention why it's not in the church. So I ask the pastor, I, where is the church?
I would like to come and visit you in the church, and tomorrow is Sunday. I would like to also join you in service. So he basically mentioned to me that, the church probably might not be ready. The church undergo some water damages and things like that, and it's not ready right now. But I said to him, pastor, how you are dealing with that situation and how you are catering.
To the believers that they come to your church, particularly the elderly people. They said it is difficult for me. I try to visit people in their homes and all of that. Then given the background that I have in Islamic teachings and Islamic theology, I know that Christians always, lived with the Muslim communities, and particularly during the time of the Prophet of Islam, prophet Muhammad, peace p upon him. They were Christians in that peninsula, and the Christians were welcomed by the prophet, not only in the city and worship freely, but he welcomed them even in his own mosque. And give them a portion of the mosque to practice and to pray.
And so that is the Prophet of Islam did that now, 1400 years later. Why not? We are not welcoming the Christian communities and accommodating the Baptist community in Boha in one of the mosque. To worship until their church is fixed. So I brought that to the authorities in Stan and I told them, this is an Islamic practice.
You will be doing not only service to your own citizens who are Christians, but also you are actually. Upholding one of the principles of Islamic theology as well. They really took it seriously. The authorities on Ostan and they, collaborated and work with the pastor and they decided to build a church brand new.
I. And they came actually to Washington here a few months ago to show us the old church and the construction is going on right now to build that church. So we definitely thank them and appreciated that. This is really a classic example I gave always from my experience. There are a number of other examples that I can talk about, but this one really stand out.
You know how we, our visits. And standing within solidarity with the minority communities is sometimes is really rewarding.
Jessica: Yes. I really like that example that you gave at the beginning of your comment, speaking about majority faith coming to stand in solidarity with a minority faith that encourages them. Not too long after you all returned from Uzbekistan and LYNC had our event in Washington at the Army Navy Center, I remember you talking about that. You seemed to be so excited about that, and I can only imagine how encouraging it actually was on the ground in Bukhara, so thank you for bringing that up again with this detail. How do you see the role of government and civil society, multi‑faith and multi‑sectorial collaboration in advancing religious freedom, and what lessons have you learned from engaging diverse religious communities?
Dr. Elsanousi: Yeah. No, thank you so much, Jessica. This is really an excellent question. You are bringing up, I always say that it is important to know the facts. It's important that we can research and analyze and it's important to bring reports like ours you serve to light.
We want to bring and to speak truth to power. It's very important to describe what's happening on the ground. Particularly in in, in the violation of religious freedom a fundamental human rights religious freedom, which is when it is uphold, it reflects in the entire, basically, aspects of life.
And we have seen that happening. On the ground when countries that uphold religious freedom always there're prosperous, always there is social cohesion that you mentioned is there, but the absence of which basically it gives the opposite, results as well. So that's why I say that, it is good to to know what's happening the realities, but also it's important not just to continue naming and shaming.
It is important to engage in a dialogue, in a collaborative manner with government, with civil society, with religious communities, for the sake of improving. The condition of those prosecuted communities. So I personally believe that dialogue and engagements will provide minority communities on the ground with religious freedom.
Will impact their progress much better, that have a good impact in the progress and will also strengthening them on the ground when you have a dialogue with them. And they feel that actually empowered when we visit them on the ground and those government, they know that we're visiting those communities, right?
And then engage in a dialogue. Engage in a dialogue. We have seen that, and it reflected posi positively in some of the context where registration of houses of worship is challenging, right? But when we have that dialogue the result, we see that the registration is improved, right?
There are people that prisoners of conscience, right? Which we engage with government in a dialogue. It also reflect we just celebrated last month the release of a Christian believer in Egypt, right? And that happened after. Almost three years in prison. And that happened because of the dialogue and discussion and negotiations and all of that.
We also seen the release of Mubarak Bah from Nigeria after a number of, years in prison as well. That also happened last month. Also is the result of a collaborative efforts between government, civil society and many other people. So that's why dialogue and collaboration is very important.
So we can't do this work alone as civil society. Government cannot do them alone. And as a USCIRF, we cannot do that alone.
Jessica: Thank you for that.
Who do you look to for inspiration and partnership? Both in the US and globally.
Dr. Elsanousi: In the United States we are blessed in this country. I. We have a strong interreligious collaboration and understanding, which reflects positively in our social cohesion.
Of course, we're not perfect. We have our own problems, right? But it still, when you look into the way that we work together as people of different. Faith, collaborating and addressing issues that basically impacting everyone regardless of any, religious affiliation or color or background.
So the interfaith movement and the interreligious collaboration in the United States is quite rewarding and that always give me encouragement, particularly in addressing, a number of issues, whether it is anti-Semitism or Islamophobia, or. All sort of discriminations and all of that. So there is that spirit of working together.
And of course, we also address some of the issues that we are facing here at home. Interfaith collaboration to address issues of poverty issues of homelessness. Or all of these kind of issues, we do them in the interfaith way, in, collaborating with religious communities.
And also we see that religious communities stand with solidarity as well. It's it's something that is really very nice to see. Just yesterday after the launch of our report I was invited to speak at the celebration of the no rules. NRU is a, it's a, it was in the Congress and it's brought Christians and Muslims and Uyghurs and everybody else in the room, right?
So these kind of events and this kind of solidarity and collaboration definitely continue to inspire us and it's a model for us to encourage us as we continue this work globally. Also I get inspiration and encouragement. And from those committed believers on the ground still continue to practice their faith, to do the work to do the good work in spite of the challenges that they're facing on the ground.
So when I visit with those people, they're always a source of inspiration, right? As a model, actually, we're blessed in this nation, in the United States. We have just abundance of resources and all of that. But when you go to these countries and with the limited resources that they have, but still they're very committed.
Committed believers committed, helping the others committed, standing in solidarity with each others and all of that. So I think all of this give us really a good source of encouragement as we continue this work,
Jessica: Your comments are very encouraging, and we were we're talking about inspiration. We're talking about solidarity, we're talking about collaboration. What could be better better in the US and globally?
Dr. Elsanousi: Yeah. I think what I would like to see is that I would like to see.
More collaboration, more partnership between government and civil society. And more basically engaging in a dialogue that may lead to a result. I think that what I wanna see happening because because. My personal experience on, in the field and around the world, it is working.
So if it is working, why not continue to do that and increase the efforts so that we can help those who are still looking for support from us and all of that. So I think that's what I would like to, what I would like to see. Also I would like to see and hope that currently in the United States we are in new administration, that I think they're more committed to advancing religious freedom.
And I personally, I see religious freedom is a fundamental human rights that could bring. So many positive things. So I think investing in more in religious freedom I think is something that important. So we need to continue doing that around the world.
Jessica: I see.
Going back to your experience. How has your experience bridging grassroots, peacemakers, and global policymakers within the network for religious and traditional peacemakers shaped your approach to religious freedom and diplomacy?
Dr. Elsanousi:
Yeah, no, thank you so much. I think it is really a blessing to lead this network.
And the network was created to support and to increase the capacity of religious. Leaders and actors on the ground and to support them as they continue to work day in and day out. Bringing that added value for thousands of years. These groups, religious communities are doing the work.
And I always say that, we need to strengthening our relationship and increasing our support. To grassroots communities, particularly religious communities. Why that? Because they are there to stay. For thousands of years, political establishments could come and go, but they're there to stay. And we have seen that functioning during disasters, right?
You have eight distributions. Happened from churches and houses of worship and mosques and synagogues. We have seen eradication of diseases has happened because of the engagement of religious communities. I. Just to mention, the polio eradications, for instance, we work with religious communities in Nigeria and Afghanistan and back Pakistan border to help eradicate polio because the religious communities, stood up.
We have seen what the church has done to address hiv aids, right? In West Africa and other places. So I think because these institutions are there to stay, these religious institutions has a direct connection to the grassroots that you were talking about earlier. The political institutions probably lacking these things.
And then above all, communities at the grass root levels actually trust religious institutions. Trust religious institutions, which is something that is very critical. So that's why at the network we are working with them day in and day out. And I think, and they are making difference as well.
And in our work as well, we want to make sure that we do it in the way that women are included. In the work youth are included as well in the work. Make sure that their participation in what we do is very critical as well. Particularly when we engage in peace mediation and dialogue because they are just, enough evidence to show that when women's involved.
In dialogue and mediation, peace agreements always the likelihood of peace agreement to hold is very high. So that's why we, one of the thing that we focus on to make sure that the table is really included, those influential and dynamic and effective women there as well.
Jessica: I imagine having the collaboration at the grassroots level, like you mentioned, women as well as youth, really gives this opportunity for a cohesive community feel - that everyone is contributing and that you're passing that down to the next generation. I imagine that trickles down at the family level, and then on and on with each generation.
Dr. Elsanousi:
Absolutely correct. You know we had a training for youth. In religious and me religion, we call it YRMC, youth Religion and Mediation Course. And the story of Joseph from South Sudan right, is a Christian. He was, he applied, and he was selected, and he attended training that we did in Roman.
And I was just having lunch with Joseph, just talking to him. He's in his late...
