InterFaith21

Promoting unity among people of faith (or no particular faith) in the 21st Century.

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We paused to pray in the Park51 prayer space….

September 12th · America, Islam, Muslim

… the other day, before leaving The Mosque Cares 2010 Annual Muslim Convention & Ramadan Session at the Garden State Exhibit Center in Somerset NJ. And like passersby and other New Yorkers with whom we spoke, we wondered again why all the hate from folks as far afield as the candidate who’s not running for president from Alaska, and points between.

It's about unity, humanity.

Standing with my better half, Aneesha, with rear of prayer space in the background.

The prayer area inside the former Burlington Coat factory was what one might expect of an old New York warehouse room that has been refurbished just enough to provide overflow space for the real mosque just a few blocks away. That mosque and another nearby have served the hundreds of thousands of Muslim New Yorkers — law enforcement and emergency officers, doctors, lawyers, cab drivers, teachers, students, businessmen — for decades.

Photos were discouraged in the prayer space given the congregants drifting through for their own devotionals, but we were obliged a couple. Outside, as shown below, I tried to capture as many angles of the scene as my pocket Nikon could grab.

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Fall brings introspection in Jewish faith…

September 11th · Interfaith, Jewish, The Coastal Star

Things have been way too busy; am just getting around to posting this link to my latest InterFaith21 essay at The Coastal Star:

September is a very busy month in the Jewish faith, and one can learn a lot about the coming holidays from Rabbis Robert A. Silvers and Randall J. Konigsburg.

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Obama Insists Muslims Deserve Respect…

September 10th · Islam, Muslim, Obama

…President Calls Upon 4 Black Journalists at News Conference:

An impassioned President Obama declared Friday that it was in the national interest for Muslims to be treated with respect, responding to one of four questions asked by black journalists in a nearly hour-and-20-minute news conference.

— Richard Prince’s online Journalisms column

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Spotlight on service: Muslim American Veterans Assn, The Intl League of Muslim Women help close 2010 meet

September 7th · Chiara Lubich, Imam W. Deen Mohammed, Interfaith, Islam, Muslim, Ramadan


Documenting Muslim American History: No fuss, no muss — and thus, no news media that I could see. Meanwhile, dozens of representatives of the Muslim men and women who have served in our armed forces and/or in civilian capacities (such as police, fire chiefs and one of the first African-American paratroopers), were being recognized during Day 4 of The Mosque Cares 2010 Annual Muslim Convention & Ramadan Session, Sunday at the Garden State Exhibit Center in Somerset, NJ.

Not far away,  The New York Times’ editors cluelessly were proclaiming, American Muslims Ask, Will We Ever Belong?, even as the largest community of Muslims in the United States of America was celebrating our existence here before Columbus, our service to our native country since, and our seamless, productive participation in the fabric of our nation.

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The Focolare & Muslims: More history at TMC 2010 Muslim Convention & Ramadan Session, Day 3

September 5th · Chiara Lubich, Imam W. Deen Mohammed, Interfaith, Islam, Muslim, Ramadan

“We Cannot Stop Now” developing the ties of love, unity and mutual progress established by our dear leaders, the Blessed Lady Chiara Lubich and Imam W. Deen Mohammed. A look at our historic Muslims & Focolare workshop, and more Saturday afternoon scenes:

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Ramadan Sessions, Hajj Reunion highlight Day 3

September 4th · Imam W. Deen Mohammed, Interfaith, Islam, Muslim, Ramadan

… of The Mosque Cares 2010 Annual Muslim Convention & Ramadan Session. Also included, Imam Dr. Nasir Ahmad’s Saturday  morning session, “Hajj, In search of the Original Man. A discussion of Imam W.D.Mohammed’s insight on the language of the sacred pilgrimage.”

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Scenes from The Mosque Cares 2010 Annual Muslim Convention & Ramadan Session, Day 2 (Jummah)

September 4th · America, Imam W. Deen Mohammed, Interfaith, Islam


Brothers and sisters, husbands and wives, mothers and daughters, fathers and sons, scholars and babies and more: The largest community of Muslims in the USA  — the students of Imam W. Deen Mohammed — celebrate the blessings from the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful, the Maker, Nourisher, Sustainer and Perfecter of all Creation…

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Scenes from The Mosque Cares 2010 Annual Muslim Convention and Ramadan Session

September 3rd · Chiara Lubich, Imam W. Deen Mohammed, Islam, Muslim, Quran, Ramadan

Given the choice between catching up on my Quran reading (as we try to cover 1/30 during each day of this fasting month), or, providing details regarding the start of things at the Garden State Exhibit Center here in Somerset, NJ — well quickly, here are some scenes. Ramadan Mubarak (Ramadan Blessings) All.

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Ramadan & Friends (including Aneesha & me). PB Post’s serious yet lighthearted look

August 31st · Ramadan, The Palm Beach Post

Keeping with the month’s Ramadan-centric theme, here’s a look at the fasting month featuring me, wife Aneesha and some of our Muslim Community of Palm Beach County friends, produced in ’08 by some of my former Palm Beach Post colleagues.

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Beck? Just Steppenwolf’s latest ‘Monster’

August 29th · America

I mentioned this one earlier over at HanifOnMedia.com, but it it struck me that the best comment on Glen Beck’s Farce on Washington may have come back in the late ’60s, during Steppenwolf’s drug-addled Born to Be Wild, Magic Carpet Riding days. Here are links to video, and lyrics:

Monster

Words and music by John Kay, Jerry Edmonton, Nick St. Nicholas and Larry Byrom

(Monster)
Once the religious, the hunted and weary
Chasing the promise of freedom and hope
Came to this country to build a new vision
Far from the reaches of kingdom and pope
Like good Christians, some would burn the witches
Later some got slaves to gather riches

But still from near and far to seek America
They came by thousands to court the wild
And she just patiently smiled and bore a child
To be their spirit and guiding light

And once the ties with the crown had been broken
Westward in saddle and wagon it went
And ’til the railroad linked ocean to ocean
Many the lives which had come to an end
While we bullied, stole and bought our a homeland
We began the slaughter of the red man

But still from near and far to seek America
They came by thousands to court the wild
And she just patiently smiled and bore a child
To be their spirit and guiding light

The blue and grey they stomped it
They kicked it just like a dog
And when the war over
They stuffed it just like a hog

And though the past has it’s share of injustice
Kind was the spirit in many a way
But it’s protectors and friends have been sleeping
Now it’s a monster and will not obey

(Suicide)
The spirit was freedom and justice
And it’s keepers seem generous and kind
It’s leaders were supposed to serve the country
But now they won’t pay it no mind
‘Cause the people grew fat and got lazy
And now their vote is a meaningless joke
They babble about law and order
But it’s all just an echo of what they’ve been told
Yeah, there’s a monster on the loose
It’s got our heads into a noose
And it just sits there watchin’

Our cities have turned into jungles
And corruption is stranglin’ the land
The police force is watching the people
And the people just can’t understand
We don’t know how to mind our own business
‘Cause the whole worlds got to be just like us
Now we are fighting a war over there
No matter who’s the winner
We can’t pay the cost
‘Cause there’s a monster on the loose
It’s got our heads into a noose
And it just sits there watching

(America)
America where are you now?
Don’t you care about your sons and daughters?
Don’t you know we need you now
We can’t fight alone against the monster

© Copyright MCA Music (BMI)
All rights for the USA controlled and administered by
MCA Corporation of America, INC

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