The believer is harder than a mountain, for the mountain - The World ...

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Living as Muslims in BritainPeterborough, UKMore than a 100 visitors attended an open house heldat the Husaini Islamic Centre in Peterborough. The eventtook place on 29 June 2008 and followed the previousyear’s theme: ‘Living as Muslims in Britain’ with the aimof providing the locals an insight into the Mosque and thecentre.The purpose of this event was to foster greater intercommunaldialogue and help dispel myths about Muslims.Resident Aalim, Mullah Muhammad Kassamali said, “In aperiod where the word Islam is only associated with terrorismand repression of women, we felt that this Open Day helpedpeople to understand more about true Islam and also witness the positive contributions Muslims make tothe local community. The ladies of our community demonstrated that it is possible to play a dynamic part insociety whilst maintaining their Hijab and dignity. Visitors were amazed to see the outstanding involvementof our members to the city of Peterborough.”The event was attended by a cross section of the community ranging from local church vicars and policeofficers to youths and children. Visitors were given guided tours of the Mosque, viewed exhibitions and aPowerPoint presentation, and had an opportunity to discuss contemporary issues about Islam and Shia’ism.This year saw the introduction of two new exhibitions: ‘Rites of Passage in Islam’ and ‘Muslim Contribution toScience through the Ages’. The visitors were gifted with a newly released book by Sheikh Shomali.Bring a Friend DayWessex, LondonTo celebrate the month of Ramadhan, youthfrom the Wessex Jamaat organised “Bring a FriendDay”. The programme, led by 12 year old AmirNasser, had over 30 teachers from local schoolsand friends of the community come to the Al MahdiCentre to break their fast.When asked why hold such a programme, Amirreplied, “There are too many distorted storiesabout Islam and Muslims and we wanted to dispelthe myths locally by sharing our faith and the truemeaning of Islam that it is a peaceful religion thathas co-existed with others for hundreds of years.”14Insight Jamaadi al Ula 1431 / May 2010
United by HolyMary - AustraliaThe main event of the day was a play based onfasting and its spiritual reasons. Young Muslimgirls gave an account of the true meaning offasting, that it is not only abstaining from food andwater but the fasting of the ears, eyes, hands andmouth.The highlight of the programme was a questionand answer session where 3 girls, Zahra Alkadhimi(13), Zahra Jaffer (15) and, Maryam Rahim (15)answered questions from friends who had come.The moderator, Mohamedabbas Jaffer began thesession by asking friends and teachers to askany questions and prefaced his remark by saying,“please park political correctness outside and askany questions to the young girls.”The range of the questions asked by the guestswas as powerful as the responses given. Onelocal teacher who attended the evening said:“Never have I seen such powerful exchange offrank dialogue where faith was presented by threeyoung girls.”Another teacher said: “We generally get ourquestions answered by men and women. Wenever get a youth perspective. This opportunityyou gave us was unique“Questions ranged from, “what is the differencebetween Shia and Sunni?” to “why do you wear thehijab and were you forced to wear one?” to “whyis there segregation between men and women asthey pray together within one faith to one God?”.To foster unity among various faiths, the ImamHasan Centre hosted the “Hills Interfaith Dialogue”on 3 September 2008. The discussion was about‘Holy Mary’ from various religious perspectives.The evening began with namaz, followed by ashared Iftaar.3 students sang a song in English and Arabic towelcome Ramadhan. Then, Mariam Asar spokeabout why she was named Mariam. Mary Bagaric,a Catholic from St. Michael’s church spokeabout Holy Mary from a very frank and personalperspective. Syeda Tahira Kharazmi gave a wellresearchedspeech about the life of Holy Mary,and how the Quran speaks about her, from herbirth, to the birth of Jesus. The evening ended witha question and answer session.One of the highlights of the evening was thepresentation of Imam Hasan Centre’s AppreciationMedals, which are normally presented inRamadhan on the celebration night of ImamHasan’s birthday. This medal was awarded to BillColebrook, whose friendship with the Imam HasanCentre began before it was even built. When theCentre was experiencing problems during its earlydays, Bill and his friends from St. Madeleine’sChurch offered the facilities of their church fortheir use. The Imam Hasan Centre is indeed verygrateful to Bill, Father Chris, Pat, and all theparishioners at St. Madeleine’s Church for makingthe community feel so welcome in Annangrove.A religious education teacher commented: “Whilstone could not help but notice that the young girlsdid not have some script in front of them that theywere reading, a thought crossed my mind: ‘Thisgeneration of Muslim girls in Wickham are not onlycomfortable in their faith but also in the societythey find themselves in’.”Insight Jamaadi al Ula 1431 / May 2010 15
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