Unity is now more important than ever

May peace, safety, order, and civility be restored in our beloved country.

Zahir Mannan

This Ahmadi Muslim American is heartbroken to witness the shameless sedition and condemnable insurrection displayed at my country’s Capitol by enabled domestic terrorists. We desperately need to unite in the name of absolute justice against all forms of disorder, corruption, and senselessness before civil war erupts as warned by the worldwide head of my Ahmadiyya Muslim Community, Caliph Mirza Masroor Ahmad, four years ago in a CBC national news interview.

Seeing outright attacks on the United States’ democratic system, where I’m afforded more freedom and fairness than in my mother country, is especially disappointing. Yet still, I call on my neighbors near and far to remain peaceful and to remember that whatever injustices you or your loved one’s have braved please keep “bearing witnesses in equity, and let not a people’s enmity incite you to act otherwise than with justice” (Qur’an 5:9). Only with goodness can we can turn enemies into friends.

Let’s pray that the destructive divisions in our nation can be healed so that we can focus on serving rights to others rather than ourselves particularly amid this debilitating pandemic. Let’s enact this ageless guidance championed by Prophet Muhammad and his followers fourteen centuries ago; “And O my people, give full measure and full weight with equity, and defraud not people of their things and commit not iniquity in the earth, causing disorder” (Qur’an 11:86). With “love for all, hatred for none.”

Zahir Muhammad Mannan serves as the elected Outreach Secretary for the statewide Ahmadiyya Muslim Community, Baitul Aman “House of Peace” Mosque.