Hi brentw,
Is the other mother a Christian? It is ok for a Muslim man to marry a woman who is Christian or Jewish - any monotheistic faith - but not an idolatrous faith such as Hinduism.
As far as your daughter going over there to play, I would keep it quite strictly time-limited to a certain number of hours, such as two-ish, and be very faithful to your daughter to go over and bring her back - even though she is old enough to make the return on her own. I don't think she is old enough to be discerning about matters of faith, but she will be soon.
Nine is a good age for a child to begin to demonstrate spiritual intelligence with a faith other than that of their own family. Teachers and neighbours might not appreciate it, but keep at the back of your mind all the time, that they (any other family - not just one Muslim family - will feel no obligation whatsoever to keep your child pure or to protect her from their belief system), and won't think it's important. You're primary responsibility is for your own child.
When my children were younger, I had a very strict rule for school, which was that they could hear about any other religion with the class, but under [u]no[/u] circumstances were they to take part in [i]acting out[/i] any part of a myth, [i]take part[/i] in a Divali procession (festival of light - I know, mean of me they might have thought - it's so nice to get to hold that flame!) or eat food which had come to school from a special feast of some other faith, or, been made at school as part of a religious ritual.
I was not a popular parent with the Head, as I also insisted my child did not learn reading from a story about witchcraft, and he didn't attend morning 'prayers' either, because the message was so garbled and indistinct (deliberately, by them, you understand). This school had African masks on the wall in one classroom - not just for the time of discussion their place in a religion local to a member of the class, but for the whole year the kids were using the room as their base :roll: . I'm digressing because I want you to get a broader perspective....
So, back to your daughter's friend. For yourself, show a lot of respect to her, so she can take a good report about you, home.
I would definitely not allow sleepovers unless during all the times you go to collect your daughter, you have reassured yourself that the home is a safe place, and have begun to develop a personal friendship with the other parents.
If your wife does this, then you should support her in it so you can get to meet the man (who may not be comfortable mixing with your wife, out of respect to you). If anything 'wrong' happened at a sleepover, it's the sort of situation which is irretrievable for every single person in all those relationships - and that is completely avoidable.
Instead, if you're willing, you and your wife can supervise late nights,'midnight' feasts and all kinds of girly treats without the sleepover element just yet. This has the advantage that all four of you parents can sleep properly every night, also.
I have Muslims in my family, and worked in various situations with them. They are just ordinary people for the most part - warm, funny, friendly, having set social rules which simply everyone in their culture follows for the sake of everybody else (but well thought out), hardworking ... and genuinely concerned about the salvation of their souls... therefore always willing to do good things for other people, in the hope of balancing tha scale against sin and judgement.
Regarding your daughter's friend's silence about her father, if he is saying prayers five times a day (minimum), how many other people do you know who do this, and how much of a lemon do you suppose your daughter's friend feels?
What would you like her to say?
What does your daughter say about you to them?
Just be normal... but not naive.
Sorry if my reply seems to take this all too seriously. I would give the same advice about any cross-cultural situaion until you know what they consider 'normal'. Always give your daughter permission to bale out and if there would be nobody at home when she needed to bale out, a back-up arrangement with another neighbour or relative who will drop everything if your daughter needs that level of support.
I don't say this because I think there might be a problem, but the amount of peace of mind that a 'plan B' can bring, is disproportionate by a long way, and may never need to be implemented. Plan B could contain a codeword or password, so that even if a host family wanted to keep your daughter there, she would be in control, knowing that the adult who would come for her would [u]insist[/u] on taking her back with them.
The adults can sort things out afterwards if there is anything to discuss.
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