In a question-and-answer format (edited for clarity and space), Esposito discusses his background, how he became interested in Islam, plus his concern about the anti-Muslim tone — also called “Islamophobia” — in some U.S. communities.

A: I was born and raised Roman Catholic, and at the age of 14, I went away to become a Capuchin Franciscan. I left at the age of 24 before becoming ordained as a priest. I wanted to be a priest, but something told me that it wasn’t something I wanted to do for the rest of my life. I wasn’t really quite sure what that meant. ... I ended up teaching Catholic theology at a women’s Catholic school for six years. Eventually, I got a Ph.D., and my major was Islam and my minor was Hinduism and Buddhism.

Q: How did you become interested in Islam?

A: I was teaching at a Catholic college, and you need to get a Ph.D. The normal thing in those days, this would have been the late ’60s, early ’70s, would be that I would go to a Catholic university to do a Ph.D. in Catholic studies. The school that I was at had a doctoral program where you could major in one area of study and minor in two. A professor encouraged me to take Islamic studies and minor in Hinduism and Buddhism. I was older than most graduate students and married. I wanted to finish a degree quickly, so I was very, very reluctant but ... I agreed to take one course in Islamic studies. I was just stunned ... because in those days people always put Christianity and Judaism on one side and all the other religions on the other side — they were known as world religions or Eastern religions. So Hinduism and Buddhism were grouped with Islam, but when I studied Islam, I realized that no, they’re in the wrong family. They are part of the Jewish-Christian-Islamic family. That got me to discovering a whole history that I didn’t know and that we were never taught in school. Most Americans in my time even then didn’t realize that Islam is the second-largest religion and had no sense of the early centuries of Islam and the connections both structurally and historically.

Q: How did you become known for your knowledge of Islam and the Middle East?