Muslim charity serves up chicken in Toronto

According to its website, the Muslim charity MuslimServ, based in Brampton, has delivered 2,898 lbs of chicken to the Daily Bread Food Bank in Toronto this Ramadan. They're planning to make two more deliveries, on the 7th and the 14th of September.

What I most like about this programme is that it helps Muslims who donate their money to the organisation take part in helping their needy neighbours, regardless of religious or other differences.

What I don't understand, however, is the focus on chicken. Last Ramadan, MuslimServ donated a total of 14,000 lbs of chicken, and is hoping that people will ramp up their donations of money this year, allowing it to donate more chicken to the food bank. My question is: why only chicken? Why not donate a variety of food items?

Ramadan lunch breaks

The Toronto Star has a good article up today about Muslims and lunch breaks during Ramadan.

The author, Stuart Laidlaw, points out that Muslims tend to become more practising during Ramadan, which means that more of them attend Friday prayer. For Muslims who work, that means taking an extra-long lunch break in order to make it to the mosque, listen to the sermon, perform the prayer, and arrive back at work.

Nadir Shirazi, president of Multifacet Diversity Solutions, suggests that non-Muslim co-workers should not think their Muslim colleagues are slacking off. Meanwhile, Liz Chappel, who is vice-president of the Toronto Area Interfaith Council, reminds us that "Our workplaces are centred around Christian holidays", and urges non-Muslims to be aware of what a spiritually important time their Muslim workmates are going through.

My favourite line in the article is "Shirazi and Chappel say employers should avoid holding lunch meetings". Having sat through some of those myself during Ramadan, I can tell you they're painful.

One thing the article didn't bring out, though, is, what about Muslims who attend Friday prayer at other times, during the remaining 11 months of the year? This story almost makes it sound as if Friday prayer is only important during Ramadan.

Greyhound killer not culpable due to delusions

Vince Li, the 40-year-old Chinese immigrant who beheaded fellow Greyhound bus passenger Tim McLean, 22, near Portage La Prairie, Manitoba last year, has been found not criminally responsible for the act. Li claimed to psychiatrists who evaluated him that he had heard the voice of God tell him that McLean must be killed. When he was arrested after a standoff with police, Li reportedly told them, "I'm guilty, please kill me." Li has been found to be suffering from schizophrenia. He has been committed to a psychiatric institution in Manitoba, and can be released only once a board determines that he no longer poses a threat to the public (CBC).

This wasn't the first time Li, a Baptist, heard the voice of God; in fact, he told his wife Ana back in 2004 that he had seen God. In 2005, Li thought God's voice instructed him to walk from Toronto to Winnipeg (a distance of 1,518 km). Eventually, the police picked him up and took him to a psychiatric clinic in Toronto.

Li told a psychiatrist that "God choose me to kill him.... God choose my hand to kill, I truly believe that.... But sometimes I ask God why he picked me to do these things. I'm an average person. I still trust God. God is 90-99 percent good" (Ottawa Citizen).

What a tragic story. The Portage Daily Graphic/Central Plains Herald-Leader (seriously long-name for twin small-town newspapers) ran an editorial saying that Li should be jailed once the treatment for his schizophrenia is complete. First of all, what guarantee is there that Li will ever recover sufficiently to be released? Secondly, what Tara Seel of the Herald-Leader doesn't seem to appreciate is that Li clearly wasn't sane when he committed this horrible act. You can't blame someone for doing something unless he knew what he was doing. It's simple logic. It's also simple justice. Punishing a sick man is no solution to the pain of McLean's family, which must be deep indeed. I think the Manitoba justice system took exactly the right course of action in this case.

Ontario conservatives for Lord's Prayer in legislature

The Ontario Progressive Conservative Party (a Canadian party name if there ever was one) is calling for a free vote in the Legislative Assembly of Ontario on whether the assembly should abandon the current practice of starting each day with a recitation of the Lord's Prayer. An all-party committee in the legislature has been considering other ways to begin the day's business.

However, Ontario's PC Opposition Leader, Bob Runciman, says that 100 petitions totalling 23,000 signatures have been submitted calling for the daily recitation of the Lord's Prayer in the legislature to be preserved (Toronto Star).

Five Anglican parishes in Canada plan to break away

Three Anglican parishes in British Columbia and two in Ontario are planning to separate from the Anglican Church of Canada over the issue of the blessing of same-sex marriages. The General Synod of the Church decided last June that blessing same-sex marriages was not against basic church doctrine, promting anger among more conservative congregations.

The five break-away parishes may join conservative Anglican Churches in other parts of the world. It seems, however, that the Anglican Church of Canada may not let them leave quietly, and disputes over church property may be brewing (National Post).

Volunteers look for tampered Santa Claus letters

After 15 children in Ottawa recieved letters from Santa Claus containing vulgarities, 12 volunteers got together at the Canada Post headquarters in the Canadian capital to inspect 1,500 letters written by other volunteers and due to be sent to children in response to the letters they write to Santa Claus. No new letters containing unfriendly messages or swear-words were found.

A million Canadian children get letters from Santa Claus, written by volunteers across Canada, each year (Ottawa Citizen).

Secret funeral held for Aqsa Parvez

The family of Aqsa Parvez, the 16-year-old Muslim Canadian girl who was allegedly strangled recently by her father, moved her funeral on 15 December without informing other mourners of the fact. As a result, when Aqsa's friends and teachers gathered at the Islamic Centre of Canada in Mississauga in the afternoon, they were told that the funeral had already taken place, and that Aqsa had already been buried.

According to an employee of the mosque bookstore, "this was all just set up as a decoy for the media". The bookstore worker said this an hour and a half before the funeral was scheduled to begin, which lends credence to this version of events. Many mourners were left frustrated by the sudden move.

The Canadian Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-CAN) later held a vigil in honour of Aqsa. According to CAIR-CAN spokeswoman Maryam Dadabhoy,

We're not here to talk about religion or culture – it has nothing to do with it – we're just here based on the fact that she lost her life and we just want to work towards stopping this from happening in the future

Farheen Khan, president of the Toronto chapter of the Council for the Advancement of Muslim Professionals (CAMP), said that "there's a certain stigma attached to reaching out" to victims of domestic abuse within the Muslim community in Canada, and that more needs to be done "to build that awareness that there are services – that this doesn't have to be the way it has to end" (Globe and Mail).

Hiding from mourners certainly doesn't make Aqsa's family look good. May justice prevail in this case.

Catholic schools in Calgary drop anti-Catholic novel

The Catholic school network of Calgary has decided to remove copies of the fantasy novel The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman from library shelves pending a review of the book's suitability for young Catholics. Earlier, some Catholic schools in Ontario decided to remove the book from their stacks as well.

Pullman is reportedly anti-Christian, and the book contains themes deemed by some Catholics to be offensive. As a result, a US organisation called the Catholic League has called for a boycott of the recent film based on the novel (National Post).

While for some this decision on the part of Catholic schools in Calgary will no doubt smack of the old days, when the Index Librorum Prohibitorum told good Catholics what they could not read, I think any school has the right to decided what reading matter is appropriate for its students. Any parents who disagree with the schools' policies can, of course, buy copies of the book or borrow them from a public library.

Muslims pray for Ontario hospital

The Brampton Civic Hospital, which officially opened on 28 September, was blessed by the Muslim community of the north-western Greater Toronto Area (GTA) in a ceremony held on 21 October (see p. 15 of this PDF).

In an event organised by the Muslim Friends of the William Osler Health Centre, over 500 people gathered to perform the Islamic noon (zuhr) prayer at the hospital, and to pray for the success of the establishment. Contributions worth $5,800 were collected for the hospital from those assembled (Canadian Asian News).

This is a perfect illustration of where the superiority of the Canadian model of immigrant integration lies as compared to, say, the French model. Whereas in France any attempt to hold a public prayer at a public hospital would have very possibly led to an outcry in society, in Canada (though not in Quebec), this sort of thing fits in quite well with the majority population's understanding of their own country. What better way to make the users of a hospital feel that they have a stake in it than to have them pray for it, in their own way? What better way to make public institutions truly public, rather than off-putting manifestations of a faceless state?

Muslim charity donates 5 tonnes of chicken in Toronto

Muslimserv, and Islamic charity based in the Greater Toronto Area, donated 5,000 kg of chicken to several food banks in the GTA last Ramadan (September-October) (see p. 28 of this PDF). It purchased the meat from Maple Lodge Farms using money donated by contributors, and donated it to the Daily Bread Food Bank, which caters to the community at large. The food bank then distributed the meat to those in need.

According to the head of Muslimserv, Shah Nawaz Hussain, food banks were used by almost 323,000 people in the GTA at last count. Of this number, 40 percent were children.

The Daily Bread Food Bank now considers Muslimserv among the GTA's top five anti-hunger fundraisers. As a matter of principle, the Muslim charity has the meat donated to anyone in need, regardless of religion, race or gender. It focuses its activities on Canada, and sends money overseas only in extraordinary conditions (Canadian Asian News).

What a wonderful initiative, ma sha' Allah. Apart from directly helping people who need food, I hope that Muslimserv's actions will help non-Muslims (and Muslims themselves) understand the teachings of Islam regarding sharing with one's neighbour.