A gay imam was killed in South Africa. His friend says his death ‘will not be in vain’

Muhsin Hendricks showed the world that “it’s possible to be both queer and a devout Muslim,” says his longtime friend and colleague.

Hendricks — a South African imam who dedicated his life to helping 2SLGBTQ+ Muslims reconcile their identities with their faith — was shot and killed on Saturday in the city of Gqeberha. He was 57 years old.

“Muhsin put himself out there. He made himself visible,” Rev. Jide Macaulay, a gay Anglican minister and Hendricks’s longtime friend, told As It Happens guest host Helen Mann.

“It’s a great loss not just to the LGBT community and not just to the faith community, but indeed to the world we live in today.”

Motive for killing not known

Hendricks, who described himself as the world’s first openly gay imam, was shot after being ambushed by two men in a pickup truck whose faces were covered, according to police.

A security video of the shooting shows one of them jumping out of their vehicle, running up to the car Hendricks was in and firing a pistol multiple times through a side window.

Police have not established a motive for the killing, but political parties and advocacy organizations say they believe Hendricks, who had long faced death threats, may have been targeted because of his work.

The Democratic Alliance, South Africa’s second-largest political party, said that “the nature of the killing strongly suggests a professional hit.”

Julia Ehrt, executive director of the International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association, called on authorities to “thoroughly investigate what we fear may be a hate crime.”

The Muslim Judicial Council of South Africa said that while it had consistently stated that Hendricks’s position was incompatible with Islamic teachings, “We unequivocally condemn his murder and any acts of violence targeting members of the LGBTQ community or any other community.”

South Africa’s Justice Department said it was investigating claims that he was the target of an assassination.

Hendricks was a world-renowned imam and activist who argued there was nothing in the Qur’an that forbade same-sex relations.

He advocated for inclusion through his Al-Ghurbaah Foundation and ran a mosque in Cape Town specifically for 2SLGBTQ+ people.

In the 2022 documentary The Radical, Hendricks spoke about the risks of being a gay cleric but said that his need to be his authentic self was greater than his fear of dying.

It’s a feeling Macaulay said he’s all too familiar with.

“Our authentic self is likely to put us in harm’s way. Our authentic self has been criminalized. Our authentic self has been demonized,” said Macaulay, founder of the faith-based 2SLGBTQ+ organization House of Rainbow.

“He went as far as to become a cleric, you know, in the very same religion that condemns him, that demonizes him. And that is why it is very painful to see the violence against him.”

‘Gay Pastor Meets Gay Imam’

When Macaulay first met Hendricks 16 years ago, he said, they cracked jokes that the headline would be “Gay Pastor Meets Gay Imam.”

“As radical as it is, then it was unheard of,” Macaulay said. “We were clearly, you know, counterparts.”

The parallels between them, he said, ran deep. Both grew up in Africa, Hendricks in South Africa and Macaulay in Nigeria. Both married women when they were young men, then came out as gay in their late 20s. Both went on spiritual journeys to reconcile faith with their sexual orientations.

And both shared a mission: to create safe spaces for other queer people of faith.

“I think the fact that we were both previously married before we came out as gay men is actually evident in the fact that we were quite focused on the African tradition of, you know, very normative, you know, patriarchal system,” Macaulay said.

“Breaking out of that takes a lot of guts and it takes a lot of fierceness. And I think that the unfortunate ending of his life is brutal. It takes away something precious from our world.”

Macaulay said that as a friend, Hendricks was “gentle,” “jovial” and “playful,” but also hard-working and deeply dedicated to his mission and his faith.

“He loved to dance. He loved to have lots of fun,” he said. “But at the same time, he’s also very, very intellectual, very creative.”

Macaulay said that Hendricks was also a loving and dedicated father to his three children.

“They have taken him away from his children. And that is heartbreaking because, at the same time, we do have communities that look up to him as a father figure as well,” he said.

In a message on its official Facebook page, the Al-Ghurbaah Foundation called Hendricks “a great father and a guardian of many. Continue resting with angels.”

Macaulay said Hendricks’s impact on others gives him hope that even though his friend is dead, his mission will continue.

“His legacy is so strong that I’m praying and hoping that it will continue,” he said. “We need to let the world know that, you know, his death will not be in vain.”