December 30, 2023

The new year is just around the corner. I am not wishing ‘happy new year’, or accepting any. Not this year. Not when there is a human tragedy going on in Gaza. How can we celebrate new year when over 20,000 innocent civilians have been killed, with well over half of them being children and women. The death toll accounts for 1% of the entire population of 2.2 million in Gaza. The death toll continues to rise at about 300... Read more

December 16, 2023

Palestine has been in the limelight in the past couple of months. People don’t know very many famous Palestinians. As we approach Christmas, we are reminded of the most famous, and perhaps the Most Valuable Palestinian of them all- Jesus of Nazareth. He is in the thick of things in the interfaith circles. Obviously, the Christianity is centered around him. Muslims love him and he is one of the 5 most elite Prophets in Islam. Jewish people may feel differently... Read more

December 9, 2023

It feels good to be back after a long hiatus from blogging on Patheos. It was not because of the “writers’ block” or anything like that. It’s just that the daily grind and the rat race got in the way in a big way. As I started thinking about the topic of the next post, I turned back to a trusted guide- the Qur’an, something I read every single day. The title of this post is basiacally a part of... Read more

July 23, 2023

Yesterday’s Jumah khutba (sermon) was once again a reminder of how some of the inventions have crept into Muslim minds. The Imam quoted a hadith from Prophet Muhammad, spending nearly all of the khutba on the importance of fasting on Ashura- the 10th of Muharram, and didn’t mention the tragic events of Karbala in 61 AH, when the beloved grandson of Prophet Muhammad, Imam Hussain, was brutally butchered, and marks a turning point in Islamic history. (OK, he actually spent... Read more

July 1, 2023

There is an outrage in the Muslim world over the burning of Quran in Sweden in front of a mosque on the occasion of Eid-Al-Adha, at the peak of Hajj and commemorating the sacrifice of his son by patriarch Abraham. The Swedish government was complicit in allowing this “protest’” to occur in the first place, and even worse later defending this as “legal but inappropriate”. Even the US representative called this as part of freedom of expression. Can you imagine... Read more

June 18, 2023

Shame on you, Joe Biden for rolling out the red carpet for the Gujrat butcher, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and the US congress for giving him the platform to address them. You are all ignoring the international human rights groups calls to not welcome a well known extremist who has transformed secular India into a hate-filled, Hindu extremist/nationalist nation where the minorities rights are systematically abolished. What happened to standing up for international human rights? On the occasion of... Read more

May 17, 2023

This is probably one of my most “fun” posts. NBA is one of the four major sports leagues in America and second most popular behind NFL. Like so many other fields, Muslims are key contributors to the success and popularity of NBA. I can list the Muslim NBA players in various categories: current vs past, position by position, born Muslim vs converted, outwardly Muslims vs “quietly Muslim”, starters vs bench players, or by teams.  I will combine these categories in... Read more

May 3, 2023

To mark the National Day of Prayer on May 4, Skylight, a sister organization of Patheos, compiled a comprehensive survey of Americans aged 18-64 last month on prayer, providing an interesting insight on this subject. There are a large number of charts and graphics on the response to various questions. I am going to provide my perspective here from an Islamic viewpoint on a selected set of questions and responses. Before I dive into the specifics, it would be prudent... Read more

April 7, 2023

I am about to do my Iftar and then fly out of town for the weekend but felt like I need to express my gratitude for this rather rare intersection of the holy week(month in the case of Muslims) for the people of the three major Abrahamic faiths. The Passover and Easter week generally coincide during each spring. For the past year and the next couple of years, the month of Ramadan is also falling and crosses over the passover... Read more

April 2, 2023

I am not a Christian but this is some sort of a confession that my spirituality had waned lately. I was still firmly rooted in my faith in One true God and the articles of faith in Islam, but the soul was restless and I lacked peace of mind. I was still searching for that alluded internal peace. I was distracted by the rat race and the mechanical aspects of our fast paced life. I was too busy at work.... Read more


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