8 years on and I want it back..

It has now been eight years since the World Trade Centre attacks completely reshaped the world that we are living in today. I remember it as if it was yesterday, and although I was thousands of miles away, I was very much at home with the people of New York watching the news screens with disbelief. Then a few years later, it was a lot closer to home when London was attacked on the very Tube lines I travel on every day. Sept 11^th was a turning point for many, and for me. It wasn’t only the flights that were hijacked; my faith, my religion and everything I believed in was also hijacked. How is it that these monsters have taken a religion with such beautiful values and transformed it into this hub of evil?

I marked the eighth anniversary of the attacks by remembering the lives that have been lost and reaffirming why I became a Faiths Act Fellow. I work with people of other faiths because I have something to learn from them; we have mutual understanding and we take our shared values towards positive social justice. I do this because I’m taking Islam back from terrorism and back from extremism. This is my faith and it is a beautiful faith, and it has no room for these misguided ideologies.

My Personal Struggle

Islam for me is a beautiful religion and way of life and one of the strongest values that I draw from Islam is compassion. This value is what inspires me the most and I take this value with me in all that I do.

I work to alleviate poverty and Islam is what inspires me to do this. Allah says in the Quran in Chapter 5 verse 32, ‘He who saves a single life, it is as if he has saved all of mankind.’ This is a very important verse for me in that God is telling us in all His wisdom the value of saving a single life and that is not a Muslim life but A LIFE regardless of race, gender or religion. To save the life of a Christian, Jew, Hindu or Sikh is just as important as saving a Muslim life.

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