Suddenly, the news is full of talk about Afghanistan, the fate of Afghanistan and the Taliban, and I cannot help but think about how the world responds to the way that news is weaponized to focus our attention on issues and, at other times, to distract our attention from other issues. For years, ex-military have been writing books warning about defeat that actually transpired in Afghanistan. My library is full of books published all the way back in 2005, published during the Obama...
We begin another khutbah with the clarity that comes from illness. God grants human beings a sense of clarity when they are plagued by pain and forced to face the limitations and humility of their condition. Part of reflecting upon challenges is to go beyond yourself and think of how insignificant you are in relation to the universe that God created. If you are truthful with yourself, your own pains remind you of the pains of other human beings, and especially the pains of your ummah. Our ummah...