A group of South African queer Muslims and allies have asserted that it is indeed possible to be LGBTQIA+ and Muslim, in defiance of a recent anti-LGBTQIA+ fatwa. Last week, the South African Muslim Judicial Council (MJC) issued a fatwa – a ruling by Islamic religious leaders and scholars – which said that queer people could not be part of the Islamic faith. The imams instead called on members of the LGBTQIA+ community to not act on their desires and abstain from the “sin” of homosexuality so that they “will be rewarded.”