My Islam: human rights activist Irshad Manji, an outspoken Muslim lesbian, has a vision for Islam.

In her controversial book The Trouble With Islam Today (St. Martin's Press), she forcefully argues for critical thinking in the Islamic faith. Via e-mail from Yemen, where she is filming a documentary about Islam and the West, the 37-year-old Yale University scholar offered her thoughts on Islam's treatment of gays and lesbians.

The trouble with Islam today is literalism, an uncritical approach to the faith. Of course, every religion has its share of literalists. Here's the difference: In contemporary Islam, literalism is mainstream--worldwide. Even moderate Muslims in the open societies of the West believe that Islam's holy book, the Koran, is the final, untouched, and therefore perfect word of God.

You can't say that about moderate Christians. A few years ago I hosted Toronto's Queer Television, a commercial TV show that explores the lives of gay and lesbian people. Whenever I would air antigay comments from Bible-quoting Christians, other Christians promptly phoned in with tolerant interpretations of their holy book. That never happened when I aired antigay remarks from Muslims. Not once did moderate Muslims follow up with more compassionate interpretations of the Koran. Apparently, there was no question that homophobic Muslims spoke for Islam--all of it.

I'm not saying that every last Muslim objects to homosexuality. But the point is this: Although a growing number of Muslims don't share the prejudices of mainstream literal Islam, not enough of those Muslims are creating conversations with the mainstream.

That's because literalism is so widespread that most Muslims don't ask hard questions about what happens when faith becomes dogma. Instead, we clam up and conform. In so doing, we allow the worst representatives of Islam to get away with crimes--whether they are European mullahs preaching the murder of gay men, or are the religious police in Iran, who have tracked down suspected lesbians, draped them in pristine white sheets, lowered them into dirt pits, and stoned them alive. Why aren't my fellow Muslim moderates pouring into the streets to protest such defamations of our religion? Christ, even Catholics have a large band of vocal dissenters with the Vatican! Clearly, we Muslims have a lot of catching up to do in the dissent department.

We also have the Koran to back up human dignity. It contains many pro-diversity passages that allow us to reconcile Islam with women's rights, religious pluralism, and--gasp!--homosexuality. For example, the Koran tells us that "God creates whom He will." (Even the use of "He" is to be questioned, since God is gender-neutral in Islam.) Think about that passage for a moment: If the all-knowing, all-powerful Creator didn't wish to make me a lesbian, wouldn't God have made someone else?

Another verse expressly states, "If God had pleased, He would have made you all one people, but He has done otherwise so that He may try you in what He has given you." This implies that not only is there virtue in tolerating difference, but that the worlds breathtaking multiplicity is divinely and deliberately designed. I don't believe this is the only way to interpret the Koran. It is, however, one way. Rather than chant "Islam means peace; trust us," we moderates have got to steel our spines, free our minds, and articulate humane interpretations of the Koran if we're going to compete for Islam's soul.

The United States is a key place from which to do this because it's here that Muslims already enjoy precious freedom to think, express themselves, challenge, and be challenged. Unlike in Europe, where religion is considered to be irrational, religion in America is a given. Even in the era of the Patriot Act, Muslims can be all that they are. No wonder household income for Muslim Americans is almost as high as the national average.

In the U.S., status can still be earned. In much of Western Europe, status is inherited. Muslim families who've lived in Europe for two or three generations continue to be referred to as immigrants, even when they're bona fide citizens. This feeds into the perception that Muslim communities have about whether they can ever be good enough for their "host" societies. And that, in turn, can only influence how hard--or not--they try to integrate.

That's why many of Islam's reformers are emerging in the U.S. Forget the boys running the mosques and political action committees; most of them are cowards who parrot the puritans. But young Muslim Americans have been issuing clever challenges to orthodoxy. Last year in New York City they organized Islam's first mixed-gender prayer to be led by a woman.

Afterward, a friend of mine recruited Muslim women across America to crash their local mosques, sit on the "men's side," and insist on their right to equal worship. Later this year young Muslim Americans will drop the smartest of "smart bombs" in Islam's wars of ideas: an explicitly reformist translation of the Koran. The authors have asked me for an endorsement as well as security tips. I was happy to give both.

Personally, I've launched a project to develop the world's most inclusive leadership network for reform-minded Muslims. Among the first people I met with about it were gay and lesbian Muslims from the Palestinian territories. Because they couldn't be out in their Arab towns, we all gathered at Israel's gay community center, Jerusalem Open House. My heart soared when they made the gutsy move to have their photo taken with me so I could post it on my Web site: www.muslim-refusenik.com.

Gay and lesbian Muslims exist. Sooner or later other Muslims will have to recognize that. Allah, I think already has.