This presentation addresses the difficult question of differences within the Islamic communities in the Gulf, and how this is addressed in museums. What is the proper place of religion in Gulf museums? While the image of the global has led many museums to a general and broad approach to society and in particular religion, there is a backdrop of local religious identities which are more difficult to engage with in the museums. Based on extensive ethnographic field work since 2003, the presentation takes Bahrain as the main example, where the National Museum focuses on collective narrative of Islamic traditions, while the Bahraini society is repeatedly and these years increasingly split over sectarian issues with a Sunni regime ruling over a largely Shia population. Thus, while Islam as a category is duly represented in the museum, there is no mentioning of what kind of Islam, and which Muslims, this includes or excludes, nor of the varieties of Islam that are otherwise hard to neglect in contemporary Bahraini society. In the wake of the revolts in the Arab world since 2011, these questions have become even more pertinent. I will point to the paradox that the National Museum works towards inclusion, by giving a broad and national narrative of Islam rather than a divisive one, but in doing so come to exclude narratives that really matter to people, which are specific stories for particular groups. The presentation will in this way employ Talal Asad’s critical assessment of the place of religion in modern societies and address this in a museum context. This place of religion is not least difficult in the global cosmopolitanism that Gulf museums aspire to form part of, and the presentation therefore intends to serve as a discussion of the challenges of the museums in finding a proper place for religion, in particular in these years of increasing sectarian conflicts.