I love reading books that tell stories from history. Recently I have read a lot from the wars we’ve had and Germany’s role in the atrocities. Needless to say, what happened in Europe was horrifying and there are many lessons to learn from it. I have always heard the term: ‘History repeats itself’ . That is a very scary thought indeed when you see what history is capable of.
When I meet eastern europeans with Muslim names, they tell me that somewhere in their ancestors they had Muslims but now they don’t have a religion. The reason they give is what I have read in those books: That religion was outright banned. You’d be jailed for attending a church/mosque, for even having a name that had religious connotations. One lady told me about her grandfather jailed for 25 years because the neighbours heard him say some arabic verses and reported him. This was in Bulgaria.
We live in this delusion day and night that in our ‘modern’ world, this simply cannot happen. We wouldn’t let it. UN wouldn’t let it. Our ‘western’ leaders wouldn’t let it. The Jews and the Polish people thought that as well. But have you heard about the concentration camps in China? Millions of Muslim Uyghurs are being massacred, tortured and their men used for selling organs and experimentation. Religion is banned there and they are forced to eat pork, women raped, their children given to buddhists and absolutely no form of religion allowed.
Have you also heard of the Muslim people known as the Rohingyas? Burnt, kicked out of homes, stripped of nationality, living as refugees in camps.
This is 2021 – the modern world- and its happening.
But here is what is happening in the west: Our children are leaving their faith. Just like the Christians and Jews left theirs and resorted it to mere festivals like Christmas and Hannukah, our kids – who don’t pray and fast – are also just resorting it to Eid and anything involving gifts and parties. More and more Muslim youth are leaving the folds of the best way of life and embracing the norm around them. I hear adults cry about this, deny this but no one says: Why is this happening? No one says: What can we do to change this?
When you are a diabetic who loves sugar, you’d be a fool to work in a bakery.
When having clean pure clothes matter, you’d be a fool to go live in a place that had mud everywhere.
Otherwise, your diabetes will kill you or your clothes will always be dirty.
When we bring our children to a country, where our faith is a minority and the lifestyle goes against our faith – we have gambled with the future of our generations to come. No one wants to constantly go against the current. Its tiring. Even adults give up and these are our children! It takes us adults decades to become so conscious of how our faith matters above all else – some adults don’t even get to this stage – how can we ask our children to be so strong when they have not even established in their heart that this is the best way to live?
Well now that we are here and maybe realized this after a long time of getting used to living here, what do we do? Pack up and go ? No, most of us can’t do that. Plus where do we go? Look at the Muslim world around you. The problems there are endless on a different scale.
Here are a few things that we can get started on:
- Be the best role model in practice, not preaching (don’t do what you don’t want them to do)
- Answer their questions with patience and love and if you don’t know how to answer them in a way that satisfies them then seek those answers from others. Tell them you don’t know but will find out
- Be kind and gentle so their experience of home is one of love and attention and Allah being the only one we all answer to as the way you live.
- Don’t take them away from society but rather help them integrate keeping their standards in line with Allah’s pleasure. e.g. Art, Drama, Politics, etc..when they want to do it, just say: You can do anything as long as you are sure you don’t do anything against what Allah allows.
- Don’t be stuck in your old ways: Reform where reform is allowed. Not everything is black and white in Islam and you will need to understand your faith with a new insight than what you learnt back home.
- Make dua constantly and do good with others so their duas come back to bless you.
- Be active in making your family life and your neighbourhood safe, happy, pleasant. This also brings back blessings from Allah in ways you can’t imagine.
Its time to wake up and let our youth take over. Immigrants, aunties and uncles need to let the youth lead, encourage young imams in the mosque and support them via their wisdom, not their wrath! Remember the time of the Makkan period when Islam was new. There were no rules. All that was there was Allah and believing in His message of Tawheed. Stop focusing on so many rules. First establish the love and consciousness of Allah.
Let’s hope that before history repeats itself, we are strong enough to emerge strong.
The Saudi Expat 