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Sharing insights about gender issues in interfaith, women as peacemakers, and medical ethics.
Imam Jamal Rahman (http://www.jamalrahman.com/home.html) is a popular speaker and author on Islam, Sufi spirituality, and interfaith relations. Along with his Interfaith Amigos (http://interfaithamigos.com/Home.html), he has been featured in The New York Times, CBS News, BBC, and various NPR programs. Jamal is co-founder and Muslim Sufi Imam at Interfaith Community Sanctuary (https://interfaithcommunitysanctuary.org/), and adjunct faculty at Seattle University (https://www.seattleu.edu/). He is president of Northwest Interfaith a non-profit, non-denominational organization (http://www.northwestinterfaith.org/). Jamal travels nationally and internationally, presenting at retreats and workshops. Jamal’s passion lies in interfaith community building and activism. View brief teachings and spiritual practices video collection on Call of Compassion NW YouTube channel:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_hqbzgW7Sg8pXxpn-PCV9A
Sabeeha Rehman is the blogger, public speaker and author of the memoir, “Threading My Prayer Rug. One Woman’s Journey from Pakistani Muslim to American Muslim”. The book was Short-Listed for the 2018 William Saroyan International Prize for Writing, received Honorable Mention in Spirituality, by the San Francisco Book Festival Awards 2017, and was listed by Booklist as Top 10 Religion and Spirituality Books 2016; and Top 10 Diverse Nonfiction Books 2017. She was selected by Wiki Ezvid as 5 Non-Fiction Writers Telling Captivating Stories. She has coauthored her second book with Walter Ruby, titled We Refuse to be Enemies. How Muslims and Jews can make Peace, One Friendship at a Time. Her next book It’s Not What You Think. An American Woman in Saudi Arabia, will be published in September 2022. Sheis an op-ed contributor to the Houses of Worship column of the Wall Street Journal. Her pieces have been published in the New York Daily News, The Baltimore Sun, Forward, Salon.com, Tiferet and Patheos.com.
Sabeeha Rehman migrated from Pakistan to the United States in 1971, after a hurried arranged marriage to a Pakistani doctor in New York. She holds a Masters in Healthcare Administration, and has had a 25-year career as a hospital executive. Her career spanned hospitals in New York, New Jersey, and Saudi Arabia.
Raising children Muslim in the absence of a Muslim community was a daunting challenge. With time running out, in the early 1980s, she began the work of establishing a Muslim community on Staten Island, which culminated in the building of a mosque.
When her grandson Omar was diagnosed with autism, she left her career as a healthcare executive, and devoted herself to serving families affected by autism. In 2008, she co-founded the National Autism Association New York Metro chapter and served as its President from 2008-2011. www.nationalautismny.org
As a public speaker, Ms. Rehman has spent several decades engaging in interfaith dialogue, including keynote speaker. Since the publication of her book, she has given over 250 talks in nearly 100 cities at houses of worship, academic institutions, libraries, and community organizations, including Chautauqua Institution. She has lectured on the art of memoir writing at academic institutions including Hunter College, New York.
Sabeeha serves as a board member of the Muslim-Jewish Solidarity Committee. She has served as a judge in the non-fiction writing contest for Tiferet. She blogs on topics related to American Muslim experience at: www.sabeeharehman.com/blog .
She lives with her husband Khalid in New York City. www.sabeeharehman.com
Ms. Sabeeha Rehman lives in New York City with her husband Khalid, a retired Hematologist/Oncologist.
Khalid L. Rehman. MD, graduated from Nishtar Medical College in Pakistan in 1968 and immigrated to USA in 1969. After being trained in Hematology and Oncology at the Long Island Jewish Medical Center, he moved to Staten Island in 1975. He joined the medical Staff of the then St. Vincent’s Medical Center (now the Richmond University Medical Center), Richmond Memorial Hospital (now the University Hospital South) and Doctors Hospital. He was appointed the Chief Div. of Hematology–Oncology at SVMC and Assistant Professor of Medicine, New York Medical College in 1982.
For most of the past four decades, he has served the Staten Island community through various professional and community organizations.
In the late eighties, the Muslim community of Staten Island had grown to a critical mass which led to the creation of Muslim Majlis of Staten Island, a religious community organization. Dr. Rehman felt the urgent need to connect this new group to the larger Staten Island Community. He approached the Staten Island Advance as one of the ways to reach out to Staten Islanders. He became a special correspondent for the S.I. Advance and wrote a column about Islam in the religious section every Saturday for almost a decade. He and his wife met with the other religious leaders in Staten Island and were eagerly invited to speak at the various synagogues and churches. It is around that time that he met Rev. Terry Troia of the Project Hospitality and learned about its mission. He asked her if at the upcoming Muslim Festival of Eid-al-Adha, the Muslim Community could donate meat to Project Hospitality. That year and many years after that, Project Hospitality would send its representative to the halal meat shop on Victory Blvd and collect hundreds of pounds of meat, donated by the Muslim community for its soup kitchens.
The association between Dr. Rehman and Project Hospitality grew from then on. During the later years, he would bring cooked food and serve meals at the drop in center of PH. In 1997, Rev. Terry Troia, recruited him and he joined the board of Directors of Project Hospitality. Till today, he has continued to serve the organization in one or the other.
Dr. Rehman has also served on the board of directors of the SI unit of the American Cancer Society, the Visiting Nursing Service, Doctors Hospital, The Richmond Memorial Hospital, the Muslim Majlis of Staten Island and is the Founder of the Pakistan Cultural Association of S.I.
He is the past President of the Richmond County Medical Society and the Academy of Medicine of Richmond and the past Medical Director of the Richmond Hospice.
In 1991 the Visiting Nurse Association of SI honored him with the Smith Stanley Award for Community Service. The following year in 1993, he was recognized by the Center for Migration Studies, with the Community Leadership Award. The American Cancer Society, Staten Island Unit bestowed on him the Sword of Hope Award in 1998. He was also the recipient of the third Annual Community Service Award of the Academy of Medicine of Richmond in the year 2000.
Dr. Rehman maintained a medical practice on Richmond Road while being on the teaching faculty of the department of medicine at the SVMC until 2001.
He is married to Sabeeha Akbar, is the proud father of two sons, Saqib and Asim, a grandfather of four, and lives on Light House Hill.
He has retired from the practice of medicine and now serves as the Chair ; Awareness and Advocacy Committee, of the National Autism Association New York Metro Chapter serving the five boroughs, LI and Westchester.
