Moroccan forum debates women's role in religious guidance

2009-07-23

About 25% of new clergy members in Morocco are women, thanks to a variety of training programmes and opportunities. Experts met in Skhirat this month to discuss the ideal role for female religious leaders in the kingdom.

By Siham Ali for Magharebia in Casablanca – 23/07/09

[Abdelhak Senna/AFP/Getty Images] King Mohammed VI says women should teach girls to be proud Muslims who support principles of tolerance.

With women's participation increasing in Moroccan religious institutions, a discussion has emerged on the best role for this growing segment of society.

Some 600 alimates (female scholars), morchidates (spiritual guies), and female preachers met for three days on July 17th in Skhirat, near Rabat. These women, meeting for the first time, shared experiences and debated their role in religious guidance.

The issue has come under much scrutiny in recent years. According to official figures from the Ministry of Islamic Affairs and Habous, the Supreme Council of Ulema includes four women and every local council of ulema has one or two women among its members.

Since 2006, roughly 50 women have joined the programme for morchidates each year, forming one quarter of Morocco's newly-trained clergy.

At the end of the three-day forum, participants made a number of recommendations to improve training for women and to establish priorities for future work.

The first concerns the creation of a website for female preachers and morchidates (www.alimates.ma) that will use new information technology to convey religious discourse.

An action plan to improve the performance of female teachers and morchidates was also approved. This plan is aimed at supporting and standardising religious training to women. Local councils of ulema will also help create religious programmes for broadcast on national radio and the Mohammed VI Qur'anic radio station.

Monthly meetings will be held to discuss the messages given during this initial meeting and the goals of the training.

Mohamed Yessef, Secretary-General of the Supreme Council of Ulema, said the plan would open up broad new horizons for learned women in their social and spiritual mission.

King Mohammed VI, who served as patron of the meeting, addressed a message to the participants. He attached importance to the "eminent role that is incumbent upon women of learning" and the contribution they can make to "refining religious reform and programme content".

This role is particularly important, he explained, in terms of guidance on family life, women's issues, and the obligation to help young girls and to instil in them a love of country. Furthermore, these girls should be proud of their heritage and should become citizens who are staunch supporters of the values and principles of tolerant Islam, he said.

The king said he hoped that major religious forum would lead to the emergence of "a new archetypal woman of learning who can reconcile the old and the new".

Karima Abou Amri, president of the forum's organising committee and member of the local scientific council of Salé, said that the participants grasped the importance of the king's speech and the responsibility that they carry on their shoulders. "They will strive to take on the challenges that await them," she commented.

Salwa Zaki, a preacher from Tangier, said that female preachers could be of tremendous use to young people and women facing hardship. "I've realised the impact of my work through the discussions that I lead in prisons," she said.

Ilham Chafik, a morchidate from Temara, said her goal is to raise citizens' religious awareness by instilling in them the precepts of Islam, paying particular attention to orphans and the disabled.