Launching a website while the world is on fire

It’s been difficult writing this essay. It’s been marinating for weeks. The world is on fire, and nothing else seems to matter. 

It’s not just me. I see the apathy in my students who struggle to concentrate on their coursework while witnessing senseless slaughter and realizing, perhaps for the first time, the naked failures and false promise of international law. I hear it in the conversations with friends and family, who struggle with unprocessed feelings of anguish, guilt, confusion, and shock. We’re slowly becoming aware of our complicity in the structures, institutions, financial systems, and thought economies that are wielded to crush the world’s most vulnerable children, women, defenseless. As we endeavor to do our part, we’re also struggling to find meaning in our lives.

Whatever work you’re engaged in, you’ve probably asked yourself some version of the question:

“Does the work make any real difference in addressing the injustices in our world? Does it make a meaningful contribution to creating healthier communities and a better world?”

Aerial strikes on Gaza.

I’ve thought about this question a lot in relation to launching my website and newsletter and to expanding my community service work. I believe the answer to these questions is yes. For my work, and perhaps for yours too. 

Before I share why, let me state clearly that I’m not suggesting that our communal efforts are the primary or most critical means for collectively addressing the injustices in our world. We also need to organize, divest, protest, fund, learn, and mourn.

But alongside these efforts, here are three reasons that I believe that public education, training, and community building are also imperative to creating the world we long for. 

1. Who we are individually has down-stream effects that shape our collective destiny. 

This is a theological premise repeated time and time again in the Quran, Sunna, and the collective wisdom of the umma. 

“God will not change the condition of a people until they change what is in themselves.” (Q. 13:11)

“As you are, so will your leaders be.” (kama takunu yuwallu ʿalaykum, Bayhaqi)

Who we are matters. What we each do matters. We may sense how who we are directly shapes the lives of those close to us, but we sometimes forget that it also indirectly shapes our communal reality and the state of the world. 

This isn’t the place to pontificate about the causes of the ummah’s weakness and our inability to protect the most vulnerable of our members. But suffice it to say we are suffering from moral failures and ego-driven passions that present as entitlement and selfishness, impatience and retribution, racism and xenophobia… the list goes on. These inward ‘diseases’ (to use a term of art from our spiritual heritage) are on full display on Muslims social media and are recurrently communicated in our interpersonal and communal relationships. 

While on a recent ʿumra trip I was reminded that these are global and systemic problems that need to be addressed (more on this in a future essay!). It renewed my resolve to work on my own impatience and selfishness, to start with rectifying my own ego and contributing as much as I can to collective healing, education, and building of healthy communities. 

This is because “who I am matters” cuts both ways; the ripple effects can be positive too. My work on myself, in my family, and in the communities I am a part of has positive effects on others, and it moves the collective needle in the direction of health and wholeness. 

2. Ideas matter today more than ever.

Although embodiment and service are always primary, ideas also matter. A lot. Every structure and movement in the world today was sparked by a provoking idea. 

At the root of many of our personal and communal failings are the wrong ideas - about ourselves, about God and how He relates to us, about the Islamic tradition and how we should relate to it, about our communities and what our priorities are. 

I’ve identified core ideas situated in Islamic studies and spirituality that I believe if we understand and adopt will produce meaningful change for us individually and collectively. I am producing educational and training programs to share these ideas with others. On the current horizon are two online courses: The Intimacy in Invocation course explores the theology of duʿāʾ, while the second, the Anatomy of Islamic Law, offers a framework for understanding how Islamic law works, historically and in the present day. 

3. We are responsible for our efforts, not the outcomes.

Ultimately, we are dependent on Allah and we resign all of our affairs to Him. But we are also responsible for our efforts. 

“He is not asked about what He does, but they will be asked about what they do.” (Q. 21:23)

Are we doing our part? Are we putting forth our best effort forward towards islah, the rectification and building of community? Each and every one of us has a role to play in this, and it is when we each discharge our responsibilities faithfully that change is really possible. 

My public education programming, research, and practitioner training are my humble contributions to uplifting the umma by centering our individual personal development, introducing new ideas and paradigms, and building beautiful communities. 

If my work can support you in making your contribution to the world, I invite you to join our community. Join the conversation by commenting below. Subscribe to my newsletter, join an online course or in-person program, and follow our work on social media. 

No matter what the future holds, our responsibilities towards God remain unchanged: we must show courage and carry on serving while maintaining trust in God and cultivating gratitude. We must love our families, care for our communities, and continue to build.

There is neither might nor power except by Allah.