Engage Minnesota » Engage Minnesota

Ramadan Mubarak (Blessed Ramadan)

engagemn — Wed, 11 Aug 2010 00:00:06 +0000

By Fedwa Wazwaz, Engage Minnesota

Ramadan Mubarak (Blessed Ramadan)

“O who believe, fasting is decreed for you as it was decreed for those before you; perchance you will guard yourselves.”
…
“The month of Ramadan is the month in which the Quran was sent down, a guidance for the people, and clear verses of guidance and criterion.”
Quran: Chapter 2, 183]

The fourth pillar of Islam is Sawm, or fasting in the month of Ramadan. Fasting is also practiced in many other religions and is mentioned in the Torah and Bible as well as in Hindu scriptures. Observant Christians fast during Lent by giving up a particular food. Hindus fast on certain days of the week or on holidays, and for Jews, the most important day of fasting is on Yom Kippur, which lasts a little over a day.

Ramadan is the 9th month in the Islamic Calendar. Because Ramadan follows the lunar calendar, it rotates through the seasons, moving back around eleven days each year. Last year, Ramadan started in August 22nd and this year, the Islamic Society of North America, declared Ramadan to begin on August 11th, 2010.

Pride Is Source of All Problems

engagemn — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 03:39:01 +0000

By Engage Minnesota

We need to purify our hearts before we solve the world’s problems.

KFAI airs ‘Meeting Minnesota Muslims’

engagemn — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 08:24:28 +0000

KFAI FM and the University of Minnesota’s Institute for Global Studies are presenting a special series of stories on Muslims in Minnesota. The stories aim to illuminate the lives of Minnesota’s Muslims and provide listeners greater understanding of the state’s wide variety of Muslim residents. The installments include Faith in Hip Hop, One Strike And You’re Out, Wearing Faith On Their Sleeves, Empowered Muslim Women, In Search of the Minnesota Muslim, Muslim Immigrants Learn English, Music and Sufi Islam in the Twin Cities, and Muslim Burial Traditions.

Details:
Faith in Hip Hop

Minnesota Muslim rap artists connect with their religion and the original roots of Hip Hop as the voice of a population pushed to the fringe of mainstream culture. Reporter Ramla Bile goes behind the pounding rhythms to find rappers who see a higher purpose for their art.

One Strike And You’re Out – Facing the Criminal Justice System
Streetwise immigrants know that a felony conviction could put their immigration status in jeopardy. But under current immigration laws even a minor crime could get a non-citizen immigrant deported. That’s what some young Somali immigrants are learning – after it’s too late. Joel Grostephan finds immigrants struggling to make sense of the court system – with little help from their lawyers.

Wearing Faith On Their Sleeves
Every sports team, radio station, band and cause has its own T-shirt. So why not create a series of T-shirts that celebrate Islam? One Minneapolis company is doing just that, designing fashionable T-shirts on a wide range of Muslim topics. The name of the company: Muslim Tees. Todd Melby takes listeners behind-the-scenes at a company photo shoot and design meeting.

Empowered Muslim Women
What does it mean to be a feminist? What does it mean to be a Muslim woman in Minnesota? Reporter Emily Dussault introduces two local Muslim woman and gives an inside look at their challenges and experiences.

In Search of the Minnesota Muslim
Muslims come from a variety of cultural and professional backgrounds. Reporter Ahmed Naumaan asks a few people what their faith means to their daily lives and whether they are different from other Minnesotans. Their serious statements intermixed with spontaneous humorous remarks and an uncommon twist or two, paint a richly textured picture of Muslim life in Minnesota.

Muslim Immigrants Learn English
Many Muslims are newly arrived immigrants, and acquiring English language skills is a major aspect in gaining acceptance from the broader community. Reporter Sarah Boden explores the frustrations and accomplishments of this timeless experience to get a better understanding of what immigrants are going through.

Music and Sufi Islam in the Twin Cities
Sufism is an ancient religious philosophy which, despite criticism from some modern orthodox Muslims, maintains a strong tie to its Islamic origins. Stephen Manuszak explores the Sufi tradition, its expression in Minnesota, and one key feature of its practice: music.

Muslim Burial Traditions
Minnesota’s Muslim population has expanded by roughly 20,000 people in the past three decades, which has forced the community to create a unique infrastructure in order to fulfill particular religious obligations related to death. Reporter Sarah Boden talks to individuals in the Twin Cities Muslim community about Islam, death, and what steps family and friends take when a loved one passes on.

To Our Readers

engagemn — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 11:40:27 +0000

As people of conscience, the editors of Engage Minnesota deplore the violence consuming the Gaza Strip.

We denounce violence by the Israeli government and its military, as well as that perpetrated or allowed by Hamas.

However, a factual accounting shows that the retaliation carried out by the former party far outweighs, by a massive magnitude, the deaths from missiles and mortar fire by the latter party that was the stated reason for the current military onslaught.

We are disappointed at the dominant chorus in the U.S. media and body politic that obscures that lack of proportion.

We are hopeful that the new U.S. presidential administration will lead a re-accounting by Americans and their elected leaders, one that demands that Israel try much harder to find a peaceful and lasting resolution to its crisis and one that no longer permits the excessive use of force against a captive population that we now witness.

Thanking the Twin Cities Daily Planet

engagemn — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 16:35:57 +0000

A brief note:

We at Engage Minnesota would like to express our gratitude to the Twin Cities Daily Planet (which regularly reposts columns from Engage Minnesota) for being committed to fair journalism and serving as a true mirror for the views of the communities living in the Twin Cities.

Kudos, TC Daily Planet!

Support the Same Standards for All

engagemn — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 19:32:12 +0000

Since Katherine Kersten’s column regarding Tariq ibn Ziyad Academy (TIZA) in yesterday’s Star Tribune, the Minnesota Department of Education has been inundated with negative calls.

Kersten’s column claims that TIZA is violating its charter and the “church and state” separation. She bases this largely on the observations of one short-time substitute teacher who was immersed in a different school culture, and could easily have been mistaken in her impressions and interpretations.

However, whether or not TIZA has violated the strictest interpretation of religion-state separation is not the issue. What school in Minnesota has not? Indeed, last December, the Minneapolis public schools launched a large faith-based initiative weighted almost entirely to Protestant congregations. Read about it here.

If we are going to examine TIZA’s practices with a fine-toothed comb, then surely all faith-based initiatives, Easter pageants, Christmas trees, and even our choice of holiday vacations should come under strict scrutiny.

If you would like to urge the Minnesota Department of Education to be fair in its scrutiny of Tariq ibn Ziyad Academy, and to be wary of Islamophobic motivations, the department is steering all calls to this number: 651-582 8570.

MN Writer’s New Children’s Book Inspired by Hadith

engagemn — Sun, 10 Feb 2008 14:12:17 +0000

The Runaway Scarf, a new book by Twin Cities-based writer Corey Habbas, is a story about human justice and freedom inspired by an Islamic hadith. The 52-page illustrated children’s book is set to be available at the end of February.

Habbas is also a regular contributor to EngageMN.com.

“I was mad after watching that movie Hidalgo,” Habbas said, “because it was such a distortion about Muslims, and that is what inspired this book. I wrote it in 2004 [after the movie was released], and it took me a long time to get it published!”

The book follows an African slave, named Ibsitu, who finds compassion and freedom once she escapes to the first Muslim community established by Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) in the city of Madinah.

“It’s important that Muslim children learn about who they are by taking from Islamic sources, not from an entertainment industry that feeds on a climate of misunderstandings,” Habbas said in a release.

The book, issued by Muslim Writers Publishing, is now available through the publisher and Amazon.com and is scheduled to be available on IslamicBookstore.com. Look for more about the book, and its journey to publication.

Read more:

New partnership with Twin Cities Daily Planet

engagemn — Sat, 05 Jan 2008 05:02:54 +0000

Engage Minnesota is now a content partner with the Twin Cities Daily Planet, a pioneering web portal that brings together a wide array of Minnesota’s community and neighborhood news publications. The Daily Planet invited us to contribute columns from our web site to theirs in exchange for them linking back to us. We felt it was a natural match, since the Daily Planet shares our mission of highlighting Minnesota’s diversity — that’s why we have linked to them ever since we launched this site.

We are delighted for the chance to share Minnesotan Muslim voices with a broader audience, and we’re grateful for the greater exposure that the Daily Planet is providing us.

Engage Minnesota also has been invited to join the Blogburst network that provides content to the web sites of USA Today, Reuters news service, the Washington Post, the San Francisco Chronicle, and others.