Asra Nomani spent 15 years reporting for the Wall Street Journal before writing “Standing Alone: An American Woman’s Struggle for the Soul of Islam.” Today, she teaches journalism at Georgetown University and writes for the Daily Beast Web site, where she published her unabashed support for this week’s congressional hearings about the radicalization of American Muslims. The pink colors donned by the Mumbai-born and West Virginia-bred 45-year-old symbolize the power of Islamic feminism to counter extremism. She spoke with The Washington Examiner about a faith with which she wrestles and ideals to which she holds true. Do you consider yourself to be of a specific faith?

I was born Muslim and I grew up in that faith. When I became older, I went out into the world — I went on a Hindu pilgrimage to a Shakti temple on the banks of the Ganges River, and I climbed into the Himalayas for a Buddhist pilgrimage. I heard the Dalai Lama speak, and his advice was not to convert from your own faith, but to try to make peace with the religion into which you were born. I honestly think sometimes that I don’t have the moral courage to be an atheist — though I would love to be one because religion expresses itself so dangerously in the world today. But when I was delivering my son, Shibli, and his heart rate was dropping, I immediately turned to the Muslim prayer for protection I was taught as a little girl. Islam is my default, and it gives me a great moral compass in the world.