Back in 2008, a controversy developed at Harvard University regarding the right of Muslims to sound the Arabic adhan(call to prayer) in a public space. Three graduate students published an op ed in the Harvard Crimson claiming that, unlike church bells or a menorah, these sounds booming forth in the center of the campus were inappropriate. Such a display of Islamic faith , they argued, “foisted religious beliefs on everyone.”
Many disagreed, and a fair account of the controversy (fair, according to the Harvard Muslim chaplain’s blog) appeared in the New York Times.
I just obtained my copy of the 2010 edition of The Best Spiritual Writing. It carries a reprint of an article by Leon Wieseltier, a Jewish writer for The New Republic, that offers some wise ruminations on this issue. The essay uses the Harvard dispute as a jumping off point to explore the wider question: the challenges of the cacophony created by a commitment to open civil spaces. In earlier discussions of this debate, I did not find sufficient attention to the questions that Weiseltier raises: What are the pleasures, as well as the problems, of religious diversity? How can we relate positively to the “ravishments” of other traditions?
You can read Weiseltier’s piece here. 
