Living Islam #09

Shakeel live Nigella Allah

smilla rahmanir rahim al hamdu Lillahi Rabbil alameen wa sallahu wa la ilaha illAllah Walia sila hain. Why shadow under Mohammed Abdullah who was solo Hot Tamale ambia even more saline Allahumma salli wa sallam, Allah Abdi COVID Asuka Mohammed Weiler alihi wa sahbihi edge My bad.

My beloved brothers and sisters to our friends, our listeners, our viewers a salaam aleikum, wa Rahmatullahi wa barakaatuh.

We have been looking at practical guidelines for facing the crises that the world is experiencing in the 21st century.

And no doubt as time unfolds, things appear to be getting more confusing. It is confusing concerning the vaccines, it is confusing in dealing with variants of COVID-19

are dealing with political issues connected to medical issues. And so it's important for Muslims

to hold on to the rope of Allah subhanaw taala, to hold on to clear guidance, and have a type of practical way to approach these issues. And in many cases, when we are able to refer back to our sources, and then look at the issues are things come very clear, immediately. And so in this light, we were looking at different aspects, or different groupings that are important to us. In terms of facing our issues.

Last week, we looked at women and the critical importance of empowering Muslim women.

And bringing justice back to the oma.

Another important area, which I believe may be one of the most critical areas of our emphasis, in a practical way, is the use. And surprisingly enough, United Nations study was done

a few years ago, this is what we turned into the 21st century. And they surveyed the world. They surveyed the countries, the ethnicities, the religions,

and they came up with some startling information. That was that we are actually in a century of youth, the youth are making up the majority of people on the face of the planet Earth.

And when they studied the issue of the youth, and these are not Muslims primarily who are doing the study, they found out that at least 45% of the world population is under 25 years old.

When Muslim countries were surveyed, and many cases 60% of our population were young people.

Even here in Canada, in the GTA, in Toronto, if you were to take all of the Muslims, and we see this many, many times on a day, if you were to take all the Muslims and put them on one field,

then you would see the overwhelming majority are young people. And surprisingly enough, if you took the youth and then you took women and and put that group together, had separated the other group, you'd find that somewhere around maybe 25%

are actually men, and especially men over 50 years old.

But many of our programs and our Islamic centers are geared towards men over 50 years old.

And so it's critical for us to look at this area to again, get an overview of some of the challenges that our Alma is facing, and then try to look at some practical solutions.

The problems facing the youth are numerous.

One of the issues that we have identified especially in February and Black History Month, is that the youth especially in the West, are being directly influenced by racism and white supremacy.

And that is the Eurocentric way of looking at things were European type people

are generally the heroes, generally, the beautiful people are generally the intelligent people. And this is not only in the movies of the past, or the movies of the present, it is in cyberspace as well. And yes, it is not as bad as it was 30 or 40 years ago, when in the movies and and the programming, you would hardly find a person of color. Still, the overwhelming majority of the heroes in the programming that are young people are watching European people, they are people who do not look like them, who have a different background. And this forms part of the justification for racism. Because as we understood racism is first an ideology. It's a belief based on myths based on

history, that one group is superior to another group. And so white supremacy permeates

everything, you will find it in clothing, you find it in our concept of beautiful and ugly, you will find in in the educational system in the justice system.

And it is critical for us as Muslims especially to be able to deal with it because for a long time, we were not directly under the shade of white supremacy. But now we are living in the West, our young people are growing up in the West, and many of us have don't have an understanding of their own country.

Their life, for the most part, except for a summer vacation, or a visiting group, or something left within the family is Western. It is not based on our countries, and so on. So therefore, the issue of white supremacy and racism, it is critical.

The issue of atheism that we found striking the community in general, is is more specifically geared toward the young people.

And it comes sometimes in a very subtle way. We are superheroes, mutant creatures, aliens, are given tremendous powers. And in some cases, the superheroes almost godlike. In some cases, like in the case of Thor, who was an ancient Viking God is actually projected as a hero for the young generation. And many of our children are playing video games, with thought, not realizing that this was part of the shirk, of the polytheism of the Northern European people. So atheism comes in that negates the Creator. All of these powers are struggling against each other, the gods are fighting, the aliens are fighting the mutant creatures are fighting human beings, where's God, not in the

picture. And so without making a philosophical argument, they negate the concept of the Creator.

And so it is critical for us to be able to counteract this onslaught that is hitting our younger generation, because the young people are the ones who will live in the future. The young people are the ones who are supposed to be taking the baton from the older generation, and then taking the leadership.

The loss of traditional values, which is striking the whole Muslim community is especially severe amongst the youth. And I recall, when the Raptors are the Toronto Raptors a basketball team, we're playing for the championships of the National Basketball Association. And this is a sport that was never really loved in Canada itself. But the Raptors had joined the NBA and they were on the top. And some of my own youth went out to a place called Jurassic Park. And this is a flat area, which is outside the stadium.

And there were so many people inside of the stadium that 1000s were gathering outside and my own grandchildren took the time suffering in the rain, you know, hiding underneath bridges, huddling in the cold in order to see who would win the basketball game but I thought about how much I thought about that spirit of the judge who are actually going through physical changes in the desert to please Allah subhanaw taala their Hajj, so to speak

Their pilgrimage was to Jurassic Park.

And that's something to think about in terms of what motivates them, and what direction they're going in.

And this creates a type of peer pressure. Because the people who are huddled together in Jurassic Park, those who were leading them, the singers, the announcers, the players have certain types of tattoos on their bodies, certain baseball caps, certain type of clothing. And so it is a pressure, it's a cultural pressure. That impacts This is peer pressure. And the worst form of it is when it actually touches the belief system, our concept of God and our concept of our profits, and our important people. So peer pressure is another issue that needs to be studied. It needs to be understood and how we can counteract

this dangerous quality.

Poverty is striking people, especially Canada has been blessed. But outside of Canada, and we even have it here to a certain extent. In the younger generation, there is unemployment. And surprisingly enough, there are even people in Toronto itself, who are starving. Our food backs are being crowded by people, not just refugees, but sometimes people who are actually living here, and maybe second or third generation. So another issue facing the younger generation is poverty. Of course, violence is on the rise throughout the world. And unfortunately, young people are caught up in this violence. And violence is being propagated through the media, even their video games. And so we see the rise

of

gangsterism

we see the rise of murder happening amongst young people, like never before.

So violence is an issue

that this generation will have to deal with

idle time.

And the lack of alternative recreation. And this idle time is really, really important to understand. Because one of the dangers of the urban lifestyle, especially for people who are not employed, is that they spend that time sitting around and I remember vividly traveling and I'll say the country, I was in Morocco. And in Morocco, I was traveling in Casablanca, and then in Marrakesh, and as I was moving along, I kept noticing the coffee house, and that there were dozens of young people sitting around drinking tea and drinking coffee for hours. And the question came in my mind, what are they doing with their time? What are they talking about?

What are the challenges that they are facing? So idle time, and this is where the shape time what the other biller is able to come in, in idle time, when people are just sitting around and don't have direction in their life, don't have positive activities, to keep them busy.

Also,

disease and the lack of health facilities. Here in Canada, we don't face disease, although the COVID now is something which is hitting the world. And we are faced with that. So we could put ourselves in the area of the virus and the disease. Because there are some countries in Africa, for instance, we're not suffering from the COVID-19. Like we are suffering. So this is a challenge for the youth, if you grew up, and you're coming into your teenage life, and you have to wear a mask, you have to be locked down in your house. You can't go to school. This is an issue.

And it may be plaguing us for the next few years. And above all, Islamophobia. That is the illogical fear of Muslims and Islam, which is hitting the young people young people are very susceptible, because when you're forming your personality, it's natural for human being, to want to go with the crowd, to be affected by the people around him or her. And so when there's a negative narrative, constantly on the television constantly in the books constantly, when a negative narrative about Islam is there, it causes depression, and low self esteem. So these are just a few of the challenges that young people are facing and we need to have practical ways to

Come out of these very serious issues. I want to propose seven power solutions. The first, of course, and within our 10 points of survival, to revival, the emergence that we have been sharing on our YouTube page. And in our Facebook,

set the Add from them these points The first is always taqwa Allah azza wa jal, and that is the consciousness of Allah. And it is critical for young people to develop this feeling, or this quality of the presence of the power of Allah subhanaw taala.

And also the love of Prophet Muhammad, peace and blessings be upon you. And that's sometimes it's difficult from a book. And so living Islam, being around people who fear Allah, who love the Prophet Sal Sal, when you're around people like that, it affects you. And so it is important for older brothers, older sisters, for parents, to spend time with the youth quality time

going out, traveling,

seeing the earth, being outside, for instance, in a camp, and waking up and making salaat, sitting at night and looking at the stars, and starting to realize there's something bigger around us than the tube, that what we are looking at all the time, there is a vast universe, just just to sit down with a young person, and to look at the heavens, and to look at the stars, and to talk about it. And to listen to the to the creatures that are around us. This is the type of practical experiences that young people are so much in need of and when we come out of this lockdown, as it appears in Sharla. To be happening, we need to spend quality time to spend our wealth to get our youth re engaged in

the IDI.

The second point is an emphasis on relevant, useful education. And so studying Islam, having skills development training, not just to study. In other words, we don't just memorize the Quran, to say I am a half is because that's not the way of the companions of the Prophet SAW Selim. They would memorized short chapters, certain verses, and then implement it before they went on to the other ones. The Quran was a living revelation, not just something that you memorize, like a parrot memorizes sounds, but it is a living thing and relevant, we need to be relevant, they will the profit cells are used to address this companions, especially our Juma

sometimes his eyes would get read, he would his voice might raise somewhat, and he would talk as though there was an army in the mountain, right and backup them. In other words, I'll walk their reality, what is going on on the ground. So what we teach needs to be useful, that needs to be relevant, and we need to look at what we are teaching. And the intention of the teaching is empowerment. So that if the core and that we are memorizing, becomes part of our way of looking at the world, if we understand the verses, if we ponder on the verses, if we apply the verses to the world we are living in, then the Quran can actually empower us. Because it's given us a solution. In

something they're always in the background, to give us that information that we need, in order to face up to these overwhelming challenges that are around us. So empowerment, education should lead to empowerment. And that needs to run through everything that we do with the youth because the more that youth are empowered, is the more self esteem, they will develop. It is the more that their originality can can come out because they have skills and when the masjid when the community when the family is a need, and then the young people can be part of the solution.

The fourth point I wanted to emphasize is positive peer pressure.

In the same way that the Jurassic Park

outside of the Raptors basketball Stadium, where the pressure to wear certain clothes

To get a tattoo, to do certain things to your hair, to talk in a certain way, maybe to swear, and to curse, and even taken toxins, while yours will be law, that can be counted with activities, where young people are involved. While they are building together, struggling together, it develops a type of positive peer pressure, where people would even struggle with each other to implement more of the sooner that their brother or their sister.

So a positive peer pressure needs to be developed. And that can come out of some specific activities that we hope to talk about. Five, this is your is alternative Islamic recreation, and entertainment. This is where we need to empower our spoken word artists, we need to empower our physical education instructors, those who are involved in the basketball training, the football, the track and field, the swimming, those who are involved in alternative Islamic education, alternative recreation, away from a young age for young people to be able to go outside to the parks, and still be a Muslim. And when I say alternative, it means that you're engaged in what you're engaged in. But as a Muslim, you

don't have to succumb to the society when you are involved in these activities. And small initiatives that are taken are overwhelming, and you still hear about it, when Muslims make the move, for instance, with swimming, and I can recall that we

would rent schools that had swimming pools, and we had some of the young sisters take swimming lessons. So they actually became lifeguards, had they wore their bikinis. This is the Islamic type of bathing clothing.

So we opened up a woman's swimming session.

And it was to three times a week after awsa women could come out and swim in the pool. And it would be specifically for women, and Muslim women in particular. And you wouldn't have to worry about men walking around and gazing at them in the pool. And surprisingly enough, I'll never forget the sisters came and they said when the non Muslim woman found out about it, they crowded into the pool as well, until the pool became so crowded that all you could do is stand there in the pool.

Why? Why would the non Muslims want to have this because they also are assaulted by the wandering eyes of the men who are coming to the pool not to swim. So this is alternative Islamic recreation. So Islamic doesn't have to mean that you're saying something in Arabic or praying.

Just the fact that they were in the pool and they were covering themselves up. Right, and they were not exposing themselves to the public data Islamic. So this is what we mean, something that is practical, something that is real. And we need to now really support this. Because there's an onslaught that is happening with the video games, an onslaught with the entertainment industry, this time where our young people have been on lockdown, they are spending more time online than ever before. So therefore, when the lockdown eases up,

when we have a chance to go out, you need to think about something to do. We think about it as families and think about it as communities. What are we going to practically do

when this is over?

Let's start thinking, number six,

special attention

to women and girls. And amongst the youth, it is critical because again, there tends to be more emphasis on the young males. But know the young girls, this is critical. And we can see what is happening in the world with the International Women's Day. And women women marching in different parts of the planet. But we have to recognize that the rape, that the abuse, that the mistrust, the insults is not just hitting non Muslim women. It is hitting our own women and especially the way wearing the hijab

We're covering the face, or whatever Muslim women may choose to do, is being insulted to the point where even in Europe, there are countries like Switzerland, we're trying to ban it altogether.

What does a woman covering itself up have to do with politics? What does it have to do with abuse, especially when she decides to do that? herself. So special attention needs to be paid in this area, and empowerment, and wealth needs to be thrown in this direction.

Also, that the youth are involved on all levels. And that means that we don't just have youth programs, or youth,

or youth entertainment, but that young people are heard on all levels of our society. And we can start in our families, by listening to the young people and see what their opinion is about some of the big moves that we may be making as a family. What is their opinion? What is their opinion about how we are living the things that we are doing? In the masjid in the Islamic Center, on our board of directors, or executive committees, especially, are the young people, they should be a young person on every Executive Committee.

Because the young people are the majority. So if the majority of your people are from a certain group, it makes sense to listen to the group.

I mean, if people if you did a survey of an area, and people want to buy Apple,

iPhones, okay, and you have to decide what type Samsung, Samsung or Apple, if you know that they want the apple, then that's what you'd sell.

Similarly, our centers need to realize the overwhelming presence of young people in our community, that overwhelming presence needs to be in the masjid.

And not just outside, in the streets.

And so involvement on all different levels. And that means that the young people need to feel their ownership that their word is actually listened to. And they actually are involved in leadership. So I want to look at a couple practical guides, because this is what we're trying to look at, in a sense of being very practical with this not in terms of the education.

One of the great lessons that I learned from one of the objectives of West Africa shekel demand and fodio is that he was emphasizing to his followers, and he was trying to build movement in them. So they could face the attacks that were coming from the evil kings. So they can be involved in the revival of Islam, that he encouraged them not only to get into the core ad to get into the Hadith, but Sierra, the life of Prophet Muhammad SAW Sunnah, here encouraged them to do that. And also the stories of the Sahaba the stories of great men and women from Islamic history, we can empower ourselves with this. These need to be our stories, and not the stories that the young people might

know about Batman, and Superman, and add man, and all of the mutant creatures who are supposed to be walking around in society, and they can literally name them and give you their body size and talk about their life. What about companions of the Prophet Sal Sal? And what about great people in our history? Who are pretty close to us too, you don't have to go back 1400 years to find people who fall into this mold this mold. And so, this type of these teachings bring the core and the Sunnah alive. It shows a living example of how they were implemented in the lives of human beings. Secondly, a great emphasis on skills development training.

And by learning skills, you can see that you know, even in the concept of the Boy Scouts, and the Girl Scout Girl Guides, you know, and the Rangers and whatnot is a lot of it is skills. So they're teaching them how to do not how to survive how to build a fire themselves. How many of our young people have these skills? Yes, they're very skilled at their iPhones and their video games, but put them outside in the field.

let them sleep overnight, give them a tent, let them survive and see what they know. This is where learning skills. having that ability, it makes a more complete person. And it builds self esteem. Our young people need desperately to have self esteem. That means they are not afraid they believe in themselves. And that's so important today, when so much is against us, in terms of where we are going.

And that should lead us to engage with with society.

And that means that sometimes we need to go out with them, in the malls, into the schools in the society, and we engage as Muslims. In other words, we live our life, if it's time to pray, we can pray, you know, knowing how to choose what is halau from what is haram, taking our knowledge needs to be something which equips us and gives us ability and frames the way that we think, and the recreation and this next point is the is that the action oriented alternative recreation action, things that that that makes the young people sweat, that that that new, gives them vigor and strengthens their body. It's so important for us today, especially coming out of this lockdown,

where many of us have actually been fossilized. So we need to come out with this practical programs for our young people. And I want to look at education, the concept of education, because one of the subjects that we teach many times, in one way or another is fit.

And fit is our understanding. Or you can say your jurisprudence, it is your halaal and haraam. It is what permissible, what is not permissible. It is how to approach prayer, how to approach food, it's your understanding of things. But many times it's taught as a dry subject, where you are just learning

facts, and how to memorize facts and what they are. But there's a spirit of IQ. And it got even codified emammal of azali where he will hold on, who many people may know as a great person have to saw off, or the heart, he was actually a *y. He was a Master infec. And his most as far as also the effect is is is one of the most important books on the foundations of fic. So in other words, this is the foundations on how you think, as a person, how you look at the world. And that's so important, especially today, where there are issues now facing us, which are unprecedented. And so we will have to be making decisions that weren't there before.

And

one of the issues, or one of the principles of solid phip is that the basis of all things is permissibility, Ocelot, Asha, Alabama. And this is a very important point. Because for many young people who are growing up in Muslim households, when they start to learn about Islam, you get like a list of do's and don'ts. And it's mainly don't and even people who are embracing Islam, many times a person becomes Muslim, and says, Okay, what should I do, and they say, don't do this, don't do that. They list about 25 don'ts and then they start with the dues. That's the opposite of the original concept of porcelain feck the foundations of our understanding that the basis of everything is

permissibility that Allah subhanaw taala first made everything permissible.

Everything in this world is halaal.

Everything is not Haram. I know that sometimes when you go into a supermarket, when you're when you're going in society, it may appear like everything is haoran that we have to literally choose between so many things that Okay, that's how one out of 20 but no the basis in this world, Allah's creation.

It's permissibility. So when we look at any issue, we start off with permissibility and then we look at the issue to try to understand

is there something about that

issue, which is not permissible, which would take us away from things. So therefore you look at these, these fruits, look at these vegetables here.

And the basis of allows creation it's allow

it is it is permissible. But there may be certain vegetables that are poisonous, there may be certain foods, you have the animals of the world, there are certain animals that we don't eat.

Okay, but the basis, the overwhelming majority of things, is halau. And that is a positive way of looking at life, it's a positive way of looking at the world. And that's really important for our young people today. Because there's a narrative out there, that Muslims are negative. And if you want to be truly free, then you leave religion organized religion, and you just free yourself, free your mind, do what you want to do. Okay, but the true Islamic principle, that the basis of all things is permissibility.

Now the issue that we want to look at tonight, and inshallah, in the final classes, we'll be looking at other issues

in also that fit along with some of the important areas. And that is that the prohibition of things is due to their impurity, and their harmfulness. So therefore, when when Allah made things Haram, there's something which is impure about that. And that is islamically, impure. So that is harmful to the body about that. And one typical example is the pig. The pig is a creation of Allah, subhanaw, taala.

And pigs, if you dissected a pig, you would find that the internal part of a pig resembles a human body, maybe more than any other animal.

And so in many biology classes, they use pigs as a means of showing you what are the internal parts of a human body. So the pig is a creation of Allah subhanaw taala. The pig is not evil within itself. It wants to live. But there's something about the pig, its lifestyle, that you know, it tends toward filthy things. And even some of them, you know, have passed glands, your turn led out because they take in so much impurities, that they have to let it out. And I'll never forget that one of my new Muslim classes, there was a new Muslim who, from Poland, he was about to accept Islam. And he raised this there. And he said, I have one question. And that is,

I love pork. And we've been raised eating the pig. Why is it wrong.

And Poland is has one of the highest percentages of the eating of pork in the world. We China is way up there. But Poland, pound for pound, if you see what they're actually eating at all of their meals, there's probably more pork than anywhere else in the world. And so I said to my friend, who was a good person at heart, I hope I told him that that the pig itself, if you watch the lifestyle of the pig, you will see it tends toward impurity, it tends toward waste and things like that. That is how it lives. He said no, no, no, no, no, not our pigs. And he said to me, these are his words that are pigs in Poland and not like your pigs. Our pigs listen to Symphony music. And they eat

grains. So they are healthy pigs. They are sophisticated pigs. And I said to him very clearly

being very practical. You can take a pig, put it in a tuxedo.

Take it to the Waldorf Astoria Hotel, put a beautiful meal in front of the pig, he will leave that meal and go to the garbage

because a pig is a pig. And you cannot take the pig out of the pig, because that's the way the pig is created. So you can't make it hollow. You cannot take a pig, even if it's a Polish one and say Bismillah Allahu Akbar. And then it becomes halau it's permissible because the pig is not just eyeing. The pig itself is unclean. So Allah subhanaw taala

created the pig and

The pig eats garbage in many places, it may even be useful in certain societies, in terms of eating the debt, and cleaning up areas, but we're not supposed to eat it.

And so the basis of everything is permissibility. But prohibition, it comes about from impurity, and what is harmful to our life. These are important practical ways to look at the foundations of our understanding our effect. That's the kind of education that we need to give to our youth. So they can make decisions in this very difficult time that we are living in today.

So I want to leave you with these points. And I want to open up the floor for any questions that you may have concerning the youth and some of the issues that they are facing.

And some of the solutions are that we are looking at, to come out of this very serious crisis that our young people are in.

So I want to open up the floor for any questions or comments that anybody may have. The floor is open.

Just as a reminder, for those of you who have any questions, go ahead and please type them up with the question and answer session, we're only taking questions from the Zoom Room inshallah, and those who are on the social media, you'd have to register for the class to get into the discussion, inshallah, the registration is free. And you'll have access to all the previous classes on the the, the other ones as well, the ones that are coming up as well, that's a slam that ca.

So with this, if there are no questions right now, if you can think about it during the week,

you can write it down, and we can still deal with it. So there's a question, Jeff.

So just there's a question here from what is the appropriate age for a child to begin understand the Quran.

Of course, when a person is very young, they're just beginning to understand language. And so, but once the child reaches five, six years old,

then you know, when when their thinking process starts to, to to to form, then, you know, they're able to understand what is in the core app. There's a system that has been developed for kindergarten grades, and for say, first grades for very young people. And that is to teach principles, through pictures and through objects and through activities. And so similarly, there are certain Quranic principles that could be taught through activities, and through drawings.

And through ways of communication, that don't require

a lot of reading and writing your abilities that come on later. So even from an early age, principles of the Quran of Islam can be taught to the youth, but it's not the principle, it's how you apply the principle. So so try to develop this. Things like honesty, being honest, helping each other, you know, sharing things, where you can teach us how to share how to, to give to other people, give it to them, show them how to share it to activities. And this, this is a skill and it's being taught to young people in the kindergarten level. And we can also apply this to our Islamic teachings and it's later on once they're at six, seven years old and are getting older now and

they've been able to understand more things that we can begin to break it down. So as they move in stages, the teaching would become more complex.

There are no more questions. Okay. So with this, we will end this session and inshallah, we will continue on with our practical guide, trying to get more principles to help our society to be able to maneuver in this very confusing world. May Allah subhanaw taala give us the light, give us the guidance, and help us to make the right decisions in this time of crisis. I leave you with these thoughts and I asked a lot to have

semi annual, well acha da Juana and I'll have to rely on Rob Bell alameen wa sallahu Thailand and cedar Mohammed. While he was happy he will baddeck wasallam suppiler a bigger a blizzard DMARC phone was a laminal dama Salim al hamdu Lillahi Rabbil alameen wa salaam aleikum wa rahmatullah wa barakato cat