Ahmad Saleem – Redefining The Role of Imam’s in North America
AI: Summary ©
The Shabbat holiday is important for everyone, and finding a safe place to stay is crucial. The community is responsible for protecting the Sharia era, building a culture of tar bi guestrielly, and creating a culture of tar bi guestrielly. The community is also responsible for protecting graduates from graduation and finding talent, including finding ways to encourage others to join. The success of Halifax and the doo field of nature are also highlighted.
AI: Summary ©
No so don't want you gonna have to before we begin just a word so inshallah we have a janazah today
are the family members of the deceased here
you're here okay so if you can have I'm sure you have a WhatsApp group if you can message them that we will be taking the disease in the men's masala here after Salah only the family so I just want everybody just a family to go with me to the area where whatever because there has opened doors and if we try to bring it it has a single door here so we can enter the season is going to be in the masala and I will lead the prayers from there it this way you know we're not all going here and then the initial plan was to go all outside it's going to take too much logistics right so if you can message the community the family that after salah the immediate family not everybody the immediate
family and the brothers were helping with the janazah they can be in they can meet us in there and then we will go in there and I'll manage everything with you guys in Sharla okay just go ahead and a set Amati kumara how to lie over cattle
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In our football last week, for those of you that were here, we discussed the very important topic and the concept of success. And how Allah subhanaw taala define success in the Quran.
And we talked about it that our definitions need to be redefined.
In the context of the realities of the world.
You cannot tell
your child who happens to be, let's say, the best swimmer in the world, even Michael Phelps, the best swimmer in the world, and there's a storm in the Atlantic Ocean and you tell him in sha Allah, He will survive.
The fault is on who the parents, not the child.
Last night before I left Russia, a father came to me crying.
And his only plea was my son has left Islam. Can you bring him back?
That same corridor, that same spot we were standing
what happened? He went to university and never came back.
So this is not a reality that you and I can say cello cello cucine, alto, let's you know shove it. Like, let's hide it. Let's put it underneath the rug and we can walk away from it.
So a lot of parents came to me and said, What's the solution? I said, that's exactly what I wanted you guys to think about? Why do you think I left the solution behind because I want an entire week for everybody to really think about it, that there has to be a solution.
And in the example that I gave earlier, the solution is that if your son has to or your daughter has to traverse the Atlantic Ocean, you provide him a very powerful and a strong vessel.
So his chances of survival increase. That's all you can do. As a parent.
I read for you a passage today. In English, going away to university is a priceless opportunity to mature and thrive intellectually, socially and politically.
For the Jewish students, it is also an opportunity to deepen and broaden one's Jewish identity and to enhance the sense of commitment and responsibility to the greater Jewish community on campus at home nationwide and throughout the world. Here at Shabbat, which is the Muslim Students Association version of the Jewish people. We pride ourselves on creating a home away from home for all Jewish students in Georgia Tech and Georgia state. Our home is open to students and we welcomed them with warmth and family love care. We strive to create meaningful relationships while preserving their identity as Jewish students
and broaden their spectrums and provide them safe havens
through our diverse and dynamic programming, and I'll get to that in a second. We offer everything from a weekly Shabbat service led by our main rabbi of Georgia
the main guy goes there to protect the kids over here if I miss one salah the entire community is upset that why did the Imam go why was he not there for a shot today?
It's we really need to rethink
these things
then
dinner services, excursion trips, exciting events, social activities, dinners, engaging Jewish educational opportunities, leadership camps for Jewish kids to lead in the Jewish communities.
We understand that as parents now they're talking to the parents, those students over there.
There can be many worrisome moments for your child as they're attending university. That is why we want you to know that we are here for you, our team of 15 full time staff members.
There is no Masjid in Atlanta that has 15 staff members.
They hardly make it to one Imam and they're like Battaglia.
Rethink we have to rethink as a community.
We have no problem going to lavish banquets dava thing, spending tons of money, catered food, every person is trying to make the best many Oh, that person served mango. Let's see, I'm going to have mango lassi and HR with it.
Right, every person is trying to up the ante in a communal battle that we're having with one another to show off to one another, where our entire generation is being lost.
Now, I want you to look at this. There. If you go and find who they are. They have
a CEO for this organization, our Muslim Students Association, people when they came to me and I was hitting March, they wanted to do two or three stars. No Masjid was willing to support them.
Right this goes to the management of this message and every other Masjid.
Right, and literally there are people in the community that I reached out to them personally and they donated $500.
Now in Georgia Tech alone, there are 20 chaplains. Now I want you to understand the word chaplain. Chaplain is a person who is appointed by the community. He is paid by the community, the community pays the salary of this person, how much is it 80 and 80,200. They pay the salary. His job is to be on the campus to protect the emaan of those children.
There are 20 chaplains I counted on the website. Not one is the Muslim chaplain.
Even the Zoroastrians, there's only 75. Zoroastrians in Georgia Tech. They have a full time paid chaplain of $60,000 salary.
Wake up people.
It's your kids that you're destroying.
You go to Emory, they have chaplains for every faith. If you go to the Muslim chaplain, it says to be decided.
Because nobody in the community is willing to pay the salary of a person who can save the amount of the children they don't care when they do care is when like that father, he comes last minute and everything is gone. There's nothing we can do at that point.
So as a community, we need to have our concept of Enam redefined.
And we have to correct this concept of the responsibility of Eman. I can go on and on and on about stats, but I think it's enough for you guys to wake up and understand what the reality is on the ground.
The primary responsibility when an imam is hired in the masjid is to establish the Sharia era, the sign the visible sign that there are five daily prayers in the masjid. That's number one.
But as most of the scholars would agree, that is the least important job that he has.
His value in the community is not driven by just leaving salah.
That is an important task. There should be people appointed to deliver that task led by the Imam himself if he's available, but the greater responsibility of the Imam is education
to educate the community
to do at ma'am to be concerned about the education of the community. Every single one of us yesterday who prayed arratia where they were there you saw the seven or eight kids that were making the noise.
And they've been making noise and every smile class. And every single one of us the elders and the younger everybody knows the other of the masjid All it takes is love and care to sit these kids down and explain to them you know when I was asked one of the kids yesterday like Why were you talking he said all of you guys say loud Amin anyways.
That small child doesn't know he's five years old. He says everybody screams I mean, why can't I talk? Why are you telling me not to talk? He doesn't know. So
that conversation and care is what Imam but most importantly the regular Musa Lee's are responsible for to pass on that torch that other rather than us getting frustrated and I know it is very difficult when I'm praying and I have some kid running around it's frustrating, but your frustration is going to be rewarded if that child's Eman is protected.
We got to look at the long term vision.
So the primary responsibility the secondary primary responsibility is that Masjid in general should have a higher level of understanding of Dean the masses should not make mistakes in their will do.
The Masters should have the basic understanding of walking with socks in the bathroom is not the heart all
right, fair
understanding of Allah connection with Quran connection with W Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. Once those are established in the masjid, then there is a third responsibility of the Imam which is communal dunbia, the tarbiyah of the community.
What you noticed when we conducted our Friday and I tell us there was a meticulous plan put in place by the sisters and the team that was there literally postcards creating a culture of tarbiyah of how to behave in a Quran class.
And last Friday was the best class we had not once did I have to tell anybody do not talk.
But it took us nine to 10 weeks to get there. It took us a team of 12 to 15 people constantly reminding do not talk put the phone down. This is the time of the Quran that added that communal Adam, okay. And when we are instilling that communal adopt, you're going to have to make decisions that people are not going to be happy with.
But that's part of an Imams responsibility to look forward and say yes, little bit of pain but for better pleasure in the future. So the community that we are not only takes place in the masjid, because in the masjid, you and I all combined in all the massages everything and if I give a rat generous that every Masjid has a crowd of 1000 people, we will still not reach 1% of the Muslims living in entire Georgia.
The 99% of the Muslims that are out there, that's the other responsibility of the Imam to figure out how he can make himself available.
When the Pakistani doctors forum is having that thing, and obviously their invites, they're not very religious people, they're good Muslims, they know what they know. And when they might invite an imam. Right? Two of us were invited for something and me and other mm. We went there we felt out of place but our responsibility is to bring those brothers and sisters who are Muslims.
But they have a misunderstanding about Islam. They have a misunderstanding about Quran about me, they may be may have been treated badly somewhere and they have taken a backseat approach and said we don't want to get involved in my students. Our job is to bring them when our brothers that came I don't know if their hair from Kazakhstan. You know, there's a national champion of wrestling for Kazakhstan. He's amongst her if he's aired for July today. He's visiting us. And I was so excited because I saw another community represented in this community.
They're coming to the center, masha Allah, that's amazing.
And that outreach is one of the primary responsibilities of the Imam. But that cannot be done if he is tied to five daily prayers.
And the people who were involved in me coming here, I was very clear about my vision. Right that I will be here to support me, but Salawat there are much better people that can lead a lot better than me.
You have half his use of hair, you have our own roofers that are much better than me and leading Salah half his mood is here. They are more worthy because that's their skill they're good at my job is to chaperone them so they can perform that job.
Or any other amount for that sakes. Literally, I was so hurt. I met an imam. We were sitting on that chairs over there. He came to me and he said there's a masjid in Atlanta that offered him a job.
And he wanted my advice.
And they asked him they said as part of your responsibilities you have to clean but clean bathrooms.
This is a masjid in Atlanta.
Shame on those board members. How could you ask a person to lead salah? Yeah, if he does it out of his own will Al Hamdulillah but to make it part of his job responsive
ability and fire the cleaner
wake up people,
this is not going to end well for us as a community.
The next part, the next responsibility of the Imam, after he is completely done with engaging with the community is to spread the message of this masjid or any other massage that he's in, not to just the four corners and four walls of this Masjid.
But to other people, and Alhamdulillah with our technology that we have invested in, it is paying off, you have more than 15,000 people that have been viewing our content. And inshallah we hope that by next year, it's in 1.5 million, right that the number is even greater, the benefit has to go beyond that. The third responsibility
is to look at the leaders of our community, within our community, and have structured therapy sessions for those leaders of the community within our community.
Private gatherings with them so that their Eman Levin can be resurrected because we are nothing but the followers of who our leaders are.
And all of that
cannot be done by one man.
It is a responsibility of an entire ecosystem that will have to build
the Baptist Church of Georgia
has deployed just in Georgia alone 58 chaplains
58 Each one of those chaplains, their salaries are coming out of either a group of doctors and engineers together and say I will donate this much to this charity and I will pay or it is coming from a specific font that has been created in all of them besides its combined.
When the Georgia Tech people came to me, and they have a hamdulillah finalized an MSA has finalized a chaplain. He happened to be the one who gave the hotbar two weeks before me brothers obeyed. He has now agreed that he will you know he'll take out some time from his work and he'll spend 10 hours on the campus.
They came to me and they said but we don't have any money.
Here we hired a person but how are we going to pay him? We don't have any money left. I mean, we have barely enough money to do pizza and some basic things.
So as a community, we have to restart rethinking that Imams sole responsibility doesn't just lie in Salas. That's a wrong understanding of Imam that is our understanding of the Imams of India, Pakistan, Saudi those countries. That's all the Imam does. He comes to you suddenly Salawat or Hollis Hollis. He comes lead Salas and he's gone. He's not involved in any education. He's not involved in any segment of the society.
So to protect our kids, we have to start thinking how we as a community can start supporting our students on campus.
In Toronto alone, in one university, we have something called the Muslim chaplains in the University of Toronto, for example,
just that
chaplaincy program, their operating budget is close to half a million dollars.
They have female chaplains, male chaplains, all of these people who are graduates of Sharia, and graduates of psychotherapy, and they can provide spiritual care, they can provide mental health care, they can provide all of these cares that our kids and our our students that are in their in use on campus desperately need.
So as a community, my ask is to everyone that as as we come across the school year, let's start thinking about this. Right? It's, again, somebody has to take the charge on that, that how are we going to put together a task force and saying our kids eventually are going to go to university, the solution is that we have to fortify their Iman on campus. We have to look for other people that can come and not just 10 hours a week, because Muslim Students Association are the third largest minority on the group on the campus.
We are a very big segment of the society. And it's pretty sad that we don't have anybody there.
If you go to the Georgia State University, and look at all the religious groups that are there, and this is so so painful to see, and it could be you know, benign neglect, but it's not an acceptable thing. As we were there. I clicked on one and I clicked on second and I clicked on third and I clicked on fourth and I clicked on fifth. And when I clicked on the Muslim Students Association, it says please update the subscription for this website you haven't paid.
That just tells you
where our students associations are. On the contrary, the Shabbat is
sociation had 15 different ways or something to donate, you can Venmo you can this you can cash app, this app, this app. And when you click on that donation app, the first donation amount is $5,800. Please donate to cover the cost of one student.
Everything single one of us can donate $5,800 a year.
You just need to skip on your Starbucks or your coffee fetishes. That's it. And you can
but it's at what expense and cost
I pulled up already had our stock for Allah howdy welcome Melissa Elin Muslimeen for stock farofa in the Hall of Famer Rahim
if I can ask the brothers to please stand up and and move forward and fill all the gaps there are people at the back that are standing so it will give them space and we have a little bit bigger crowd today.
Form absolute stuffs and rows. So if you form all the rows this way there's no gaps left.
If there's a gap in the front line as if you were preparing for Salafi has
just come alive
Where's
you coming here? Okay, the funeral is coming here. Okay.
Okay.
Bismillah Alhamdulillah wa salatu salam ala Rasulillah, Hyderabad, rubbish rock, the southern US silly Amedeo, I love the Tamil assignee of the holy.
In the end, I wanted to take this opportunity, because
many of the students associations, they spoke to me, and they brought up these concerns to me. And I've been talking to different Imams on the ground in Georgia. And I think it is time that maybe few of the brothers within the community that are well to do take a pass and they set up like a charity or something, hire a person that needs to be hired and get this task done. Because it is not going to be done. And again, more Imams like myself or imam or chef can be involved in terms of the guidance in terms of how to structure it in terms of even on site Halifax like I've already you know, Tuesday, Halifax that we're doing in our Masjid. As soon as the school starts, I will stop
that Tuesday halacha because I will be doing that halacha on campus. Right? For me. That's where my future is. That's where the future of this semester there's going to be, you will still have the Holocaust on Thursdays, Fridays and Sundays. But our my one of my held office will be dedicated to serving the student associations either in Georgia State or Georgia Tech or alternating right. And we're finalizing those details. But again, that's something I'm doing on my personal Accord as part of being the message and hamdulillah domestic accommodates that. But that's not enough. One halacha is not enough. I mean, they're they're surrounded with facade 24/7 and one hour of halacha
Inshallah, we'll go somewhere, but it's not going to protect the Eman.
So as a community members, I mean, those of you that are here, if you have the drive, get together, get in touch with me. And you know, let's put together some resources and really, really do something productive to protect our next generations. And you can start with one or two centers, or one or two universities and we can grow it into every university in Georgia and hey, let's think big the entire United States the entire Canada, right, this is where our next will suddenly is are going to be. Either we're going to lose them there or we're not going to have anyone.
And the times when you and I and my generation who are in their 40s they went to university it was a very different time.
It was there was no mass indoctrination of liberal agendas being shoved down our throats.
None of that was there. Today is a very, very different time.
We ask Allah that He protects the Eman of our youth. We asked Allah subhanaw taala to and in this blessed day that Allah gives us the tofield to truly serve his ummah. And we ask that Allah subhanaw taala makes us from the torchbearers of Islam and protecting the Iman and faith of all of our children. We ask that Allah subhanaw taala allows our massages to be centers where our youth find safe havens. And we ask that Allah subhanaw taala protects them on campus as they strive in their pursuit of knowledge and, and protects them from deviants. We ask that Allah subhanaw taala gives every single one of us to feel to protect our own families and to protect their emotions and to
protect them and be role models within our household so our children can be inspired by our efforts, we ask that Allah subhanaw taala open our hearts to the message of the Quran and gives us true hedaya And tofield a doe field of nature there after that there is no misguidance we ask that Allah subhanaw taala gives every sin
single one of us that which we want, if it is good for us in dystonia, and saves us from that which we want if it is not good for us in our akhira Allah provides every single one of us the success in this dunya and the success in the akhira and forgives all of our relatives who have passed away and raises their ranks and makes them from the soil or Hain and makes their graves garden pieces of garden Allahumma salli wa salam ala Nabina Muhammad wa ala alihi wa sahbihi wa sallam to see him in Kathira
he died Allah in the La Jolla Moroccan Bill Azrael so anyone either eater in Cordoba and in fascia you want to carry well buddy Your eyes will come the Allah come to the Quran further Quran Allah holiday Maya Skokomish Kuru Allah near me, he has it come. What are they called? Allahu Akbar, Allahu Allah. Allah will notice now in Rocky masala