Skip to main content

I believe in the Mercy of God.

Today I received an email about a woman I have never met, a child I will never get to meet, and a family in despair. I learned of a woman with brain cancer, whose baby died. I have not met Fatima Qasim but I believe in the Mercy of God. That in this pain, grief and sadness, there is also mercy.

I believe in the Mercy of God who allows good people to fall sick, to die. I believe in the Mercy of God who allows us to veer so terribly off the course that we can hardly recognize ourselves. I believe in the Mercy of God despite the harm we inflict on our selves, our bodies, and our families. I believe in the Mercy of God to purify our hearts, to remove the blackness that grows like mold. I believe in the Mercy of God who solves all problems, and creates so many more problems for us to solve. I cannot understand why I am crying for a woman I have never met, but I believe in the Mercy of God who reminds me of who I am. I believe in the Mercy of God who allows a young woman my age to survive triple bypass surgery. I believe in the Mercy of God who allows me to see my mother, to call her, to have her still be here. I believe in the Mercy of God who punishes and reward, who gives and takes, who does and undoes what we try to create. In a moment there is a light, and in the next, it disappears. The world we construct is hardly real. The comforts we seek are not real. The true path is one of remembrance. The true path is of sacrifice and righteousness. The only things you take to the grave are your good deeds, the things you taught others. I believe in the Mercy of God who allowed me to remember this.

Suban'Allah.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Mourning loss as a philanthropy worker and mom

As a new mother, I see my daughter growing up in a world in which there is no Mohammad Ali.  I am writing as a mourning mom. By the time my daughter goes to a healthy school , and learns about Dr. King, will she also learn about Muhammad Ali? Who will she look up to as the ethical leaders of her generation? Who will she look up to, to show her how to laugh in the face of xenophobia? How to joke in the face of racism? Sure, we will watch the videos, read the books, and do our best to teach our kids what is truly important. That social emotional skills matter. That people matter. That culture matters. That faith matters. That what matters most is that we are all in this together.   Our interdependence requires us to step outside of our comfort zones and engage people who are different from us who don’t think the same way we do. Philanthropy seems more akin to academia, removed from the actual needs of people, producing and disseminating research to the people who are our...
Post a Comment
Read more

And Today I was Called an Intellectual Whore

Today I was called a intellectual whore. I was told that all i want to do is intellectually screw people because what I like most about people are their ideas, experiences and thoughts. I have shown little regard for emotions, and sentimentality and for the UMPTH time this year, I find myself saddened by the loss of a friend. Here's his top 10 of most (im)memorable quotes: 1. "You're like Sex in the City, minus the sex." [Mindless stupidity is the implication] 2. "I am a warm person. You're not" 3. [paraphrase] I am a very sensitive person. I can't have you constantly hurting my feelings. 4. "I don't respect you" 5. "I am a generous person" 6. "We can't be friends, Sadia." 7. "You are emotionally crippled" 8. "What you need is a wall." 9. "I don't mean to hurt you." 10. "You're an intellectual whore." And the best question of today, and of the week perhaps, is when ...
3 comments
Read more

Amina Wadud and Dr. Umar Faruq Abd-Allah: Gender, Quran, A reading

If you really are that ambitious, here is a 2660 word essay submitted late for your enjoyment. Gendering the Qu’ran: Analysis of Amina Wadud’s Qur’an and Women (A Draft) “How can ideas that transcend gender be expressed in gendered language?” In her Qur’an and Woman, Amina Wadud asks a hard but uniquely modern question of the timeless text of the Qur’an (xii). She contextualizes the language and ideas of the Qur’an with a model of hermeneutics that is characterized by standard notions to context, grammar, and Weltanschauung, or world view. Rather than simply extend medieval exegesis, Wadud returns to the original text of the Qur’an in order to derive the fundamentals concerning Muslim women, their roles, and responsibilities. She does this through an analysis that is critical of both the cultural context of revelation, as well as the context of classical tafsir, or interpretations of the Qur’an, given that the androcentrism of seventh-century Arabia still pervades society today. She pr...
4 comments
Read more