A question of religion

At my son’s small, private Turkish elementary school, I have never spotted any of the mothers of his classmates sporting a scarf, and only a handful of grandmothers who attend the occasional school ceremonies arrive covered. From comments I have overheard, it seems to me as if the majority of these mothers are disdainful of religious women, especially ones who choose to cover their heads. It has been interesting for me to hear these women dismiss covered women as uneducated or backwards, especially since a large number of the mothers themselves have no education past high school, if that. In my son’s class, the number of mothers who currently have careers outside of the home, or who have previously held professional positions, amounts to only a handful. These working women have attended universities, and from my limited conversations with them, they tend to have a broader view of the world than the other mothers who did not pursue a higher level of education.

On the other side of this issue, I have many friends who do cover up, ranging from those who wear stylishly draped scarves to those who choose to wear long coats and scarves. As with the mothers from my son’s school, some of my covered friends only have high school educations while others have advanced degrees. There are more similarities than differences between the two groups of women. Many are married, some choose to stay home and raise their children, while others juggle the demands of work and home. There are single parents as well as couples. As with the mothers from my son’s school, those who continued to pursue a higher level of education seem to have a much broader view of the world than those who opted to only finish high school.

There are many people, however, who fall into a grey area somewhere in between these two extremes. For instance, I am Muslim by choice, but I choose not to wear a scarf except when praying or visiting a mosque. Since I do not cover, many of the mothers at my son’s school assume that as a foreigner, I am not a Muslim, but possibly a member of a different religion. If they saw me exiting a mosque, donning a scarf, they would probably be quite surprised.

An interesting twist that I have noticed in the last couple of years is women in business attire entering the women’s sections of mosques. Once ensconced in the women’s section, they open their briefcase and pull out a scarf and long skirt to slip over their street clothes. Thus properly covered, they perform their prayers, and then remove the scarf and long skirt, placing them securely back into their briefcase and exit. I suspect that these women too live their lives somewhere in a grey zone by being religious, but being uncovered at the same time.

The reason I began thinking about this peculiar Turkish dichotomy was that recently, a mother of one of my son’s classmates hosted a small coffee get together at her home for other mothers who were available. She and I have visited each other’s homes, and our children play together often. When she called to invite me to her event, I was grateful for the chance to get to know some of the other mothers a little better. However, her social event was scheduled to begin at noon on a Friday. I politely declined the invitation, explaining that I had a previous engagement.

 I did, in fact, already have plans for that same time. I had arranged with another friend to attend the Friday prayer services together at one of the few mosques in our neighborhood that keeps the women’s section open for women during Friday prayers. It can be hard to find mosques in Turkey that have room for women on Friday since it is mandatory for men to attend the Friday services if possible. The result is that the women’s sections tend to be taken over to accommodate the number of men attending, while women are given the option to either pray at home or wait until the service is over in order to reclaim their own place in the mosque.

If I had told her what my plans actually were for that Friday, would I have become one of the topics of gossip among the other mothers? I suspect so. To me, whether or not someone is religious and how they practice their religion is a private matter. I have chosen not to discuss my beliefs with the other mothers in part because of a sense of privacy. I am one of many people here, Turks and foreigners alike, who keep their religious practices quiet. For some, it is easier to keep their feelings about religion private so that they do not have to face criticism or questions from others.