flowertiare – Adobe Stock Jana (an alias) is a twenty-eight-year-old Iraqi ex-Muslim. Like nearly every girl in Iraq, Jana was raised as a Muslim, specifically a Shia. She was forced to adhere to its strictures, teachings, and basic rules—as well as its unwritten ones. Jana followed these beliefs and rules but eventually found her faith waning. She sought to understand what she was taught to believe without question. Muslim children and teens who question their religion receive swift punishment. Islam and the Qur’an are not to be questioned. Jana suffered unprintable horrors as a child, including sexual abuse and regular vicious assaults. As Jana grew up and became a young woman, she continued to be on the receiving end of various beatings from family members. She was even stabbed by her brother. She boldly pushed forward and began to express her doubts. She began to question the Qur’an. “Some things were just not reasonable,” she told Secular Rescue. “I kept telling myself that I can’t have doubts.” Gender-based inequalities associated with social and religious norms …