Perhaps it is time to reflect on our achievements during Ramadhan, now that the holy month has just begun. Do we care enough to reach for the needy or we just go through the ritual of staying hungry and thirsty just because it is a religious obligation. Are we cleaning our souls with goodness of knowing that we lived another year and enjoyed the bounty of God in the last twelve months?
Are we reflecting on our achievements and learning something from our mistakes so we can improve our failings by becoming good husbands, wives, children and responsible members of society? The lines of people sitting on the mats outside the mosques waiting for the iftar across the world is not getting shorter. Which means, more people every year are in need of food, that some of us, in the comfort of our own homes, take it for granted.
The good Samaritans who are sitting all day in the shopping malls waiting for you to drop in money for the poor are wondering whether the faith of Muslims is only limited to prayers, reading the Quran and not eating all day. Perhaps there is a misconception that if you do all that then you would win the grace of God and you do not need to part with your money to help the orphans and those in rags.
These charity boxes come in everyday empty and hardly gain any weight when the malls are closing. It is the culture of shoppers which takes precedence and the cash ends up in the till instead, as people leave shops with bags of items, half of them they don’t need. The charity people say that people take pain of avoiding the donation stations and look sideways pretending they are not there.
I was joking with my wife that people who actually devote their time raising funds for the poor as they feel the pangs of hunger will be on the first line on the Gate of Heaven than those who closed their wallets and slept in the mosques asking for repentance. What a better way of repenting your sins than to put a smile on hungry mouths by generously donating to the good cause.
Spending excessive time on asking God’s favour or forgiveness is like staying too long in the office than you need, just to earn more money for yourself. The extra money will not do any good and in a way, there is a question of selfishness if you consider that you could have divided that time to raise funds for the needy.
Am I speaking out of context here? I am not sure but since we share the world with other people, then the best way to please God is to work for all. Let’s look at it this way, the showers of blessings need to sprinkle to your neighbours and community and what better way than to use your effort and cash to make sure it happens. I am forever amazed that some people would buy new cars and furniture during Ramadhan when their relatives cannot even afford a decent iftar.
More amazed when such people say that “I work so hard that I need to reward myself” as if God is only favouring them and not their hungry neighbours. When the imams of mosques say in their sermons to worshippers that you “are meant to share God’s blessings with others,” they would perhaps answer “others need to work hard, too, to get what we have.”
Yes, they are right but they would have been more right if they make sure that people around them are properly looked after before they go on a spending spree to celebrate the coming Eid.
By Saleh al Shaibany
saleh_shaibany@yahoo.com
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