I have been invited by the Canadian Muslim Union to officiate at a mixed-gender juma (the Muslim Friday congregational prayers) in celebration of International Woman's Day. This event is co-sponsored by the United Muslim Association of Toronto, who invited me to deliver the khutbah and lead the prayers at their mosque in Etobicoke in 2005.

Event Details:
DATE: Friday, March 9, 2007
TIME: 1:20 PM
PLACE: Steelworker’s Hall
25 Cecil Street, Toronto

For more information:
Visit muslimunion.ca or iwdtoronto.com
Email secretary@muslimunion.ca

I will also be speaking at the Univeristy of Toronto, Scarborough, Saturday March 10th. I'll be talking about how authoritarian/totalitarian trends in Muslim communities intersect with conservative/fundamentalist thought and the impact that intersection has upon Muslim women.

The American media is falling down on the job when it comes to reporting on Muslim communities both here in North America or world wide.

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The conditions we created in Iraq present one of the greatest moral challenges facing the U.S. today. For decades the U.S. supported and armed Saddam, turning a blind eye to atrocities he committed. Then for ten years we put draconian sanctions on the country, sanctions that did not hurt the dictator they were aimed at, but which did make life hard for the average Iraqi, and which is said to have caused hundreds of thousands of deaths due to lack of medicines, food, and other basic necessities.

Finally, for reasons that remain largely unexplained, we decided Saddam had to go, and invaded in order to take him out. Despite huge public sentiment against the invasion, in the face of those who revealed the fallacy of the supposed terrorist and weapons of mass destruction connections, ignoring those who warned of precisely the kind of civil war we see today, we invaded and toppled a brutal regime we had been propping up.

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I have been a bit missing in action over the past few weeks as preparations for the Muslims for Progressive Values conference took up a great deal of time. At the conference, we held elections for the board of directors, established priorities for the next year, and announced winners in the first annual al-Hajj Malik el-Shabazz (Malcom X) khutbah competition. The conference was a phenomenal success. And I should be back to more regular posting and discussion now that I am home and somewhat recovered.

Below is the official write up of the conference.

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It seems to me that there are two visions of how to implement the First Amendment. The first involves ensuring that the government does not promote any religion. The second prefers to allow all religions equal opportunity. I find myself torn between these two positions as the first is stifling and over-controlling, while the second is impractical, as there are thousands of religions practiced throughout the world.

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The Prophet Muhammad taught us that we should chose our leaders from among the best of us. Leaders are expected to display the characteristics of a good Muslim, including humility and self-control, commitment to consultative government, and dedication to compassion, care for the less well off, and a peaceful society in which all can prosper.

I can well imagine that many of you reading this column are shaking your heads and wondering where one might find such a leader in the Muslim world. Certainly the rulers of many Muslim countries fail miserably when compared to the standards Islam holds up for leadership. As do many of the self-proclaimed leaders of Islam, like Osama Bin Laden or Ahmed Yassin.

This failure in leadership, aside from the fact that it has resulted in horrific violence and atrocious living conditions for millions and millions of Muslims around the globe, is also responsible for much of the rising tide of Islamophobia that plagues certain groups in the West.

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The Question: How should Barack Obama have responded to inflammatory remarks made by his former pastor, Dr. Jeremiah Wright? Are you responsible for what your spiritual leader says from the pulpit?

The relationship between a politician and his avowed spiritual mentor is, naturally, like any other relationship. While a spiritual adviser can have profound effect on an individual, it would be nothing short of miraculous if Obama, Bush, or any of the other politicians who have declared they benefit from spiritual guidance from a particular religious leader, were to agree 100% with everything their advisor said. Nonetheless, when a spiritual adviser to a very public figure makes egregious comments, it would be wise for that politician to at least say, "I disagree with that particular statement."

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When I was a young voter, I was greatly impressed with Gary Hart's idealism. His positions appealed to me and I was prepared to vote for him in the primaries. That was all ruined by his claim that he was not having an affair, and his challenge to the media to catch him if he were. Which, of course, they did, exposing him not only as a cheat, but as a liar. Needless to say, Mr. Hart lost my vote. Not because he was having an affair -- God knows enough of us have succumbed to that temptation -- but because he lied about it. If he lied about one thing, I reasoned, how could I be sure all the rest of his positions were true reflections of his personal sentiment? I wasn't about to vote for someone I couldn't trust to work toward all the wonderful things he was proposing.

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