Acts of Faith: The Story of an American Muslim in the Struggle for the Soul of a Generation

Acts of Faith: The Story of an American Muslim in the Struggle for the Soul of a Generation is a book by Eboo Patel. Part memoir, part treatise on the vulnerability of youth who are preyed upon and radicalized by religious zealots, the book examines Patel’s search for his identity, following him from childhood to his time as the founder of the Interfaith Youth Core group. Themes of faith, family, religious doubt, pluralism, and the risks of unchecked anger appear throughout the text.

In the book’s beginning, Patel recounts a 2005 bombing in London. He is disturbed to realize that the stories of the four bombers remind him of his own story. As an angry, disaffected young man, he was also in search of a way to make an impact and was without a concrete identity. Patel was able to emulate religious people who had never used their faith as a justification for violence, but this was obviously not the case with everyone. These are the central questions of Acts of Faith: Why do some people drift toward religious violence? How can nonviolent religious leaders reach young people before radicals do?