Summary:

In this live Friday sermon, Alban Fejza explains why he chose to speak about being humane rather than professionalism, and reminds us that there is a human being with a story behind everyone we meet online.

Video Transcript:

Praise be to God, there is no other god except God. Today my my plan was to actually talk about uh professionalism. But I changed my mind because I think I I could sort of either do it too early or get it wrong or be let’s say inhumane by pushing too much professionalism. let me just give you an example. professionalism is keeping the mosque clean. That’s professional. but I don’t want to go in a place and be like, “Oh, why do you guys not clean the mosque?” And the guys are, “You you know, we lost our arms in the battle.” So yeah, then that would be inhumane to say, “You know, why did you guys not clean the mosque?” when the guys don’t have arms. so yeah, I don’t want to get it wrong with human like with being humane. So I’m going to either postpone or never do it or I God willing I might do it because I think we need to be more more professional. I might do a Friday sermon about about it. But but I I want to focus on being humane first and then we can talk about professionalism. And that’s why actually people have, I think, part of the reason. There’s many reasons, of course. Part of the reason why people have two parents, a mom and a dad, a mother and a father. because first it like and that’s why they first get sort of connected with with their mom and then with their dad. It’s because first they the mom is humane towards them and then the dad teaches them how to be more more professional. the mom might teach them how to be kind, how not, you know, to people and stuff like that and the dad might teach how to hunt. We don’t hunt these days, but you know, things like that. how not how not to injure someone while you’re hunting, like be careful with your arrow. because you can hurt someone like that. So, yeah. just like God created people with a we Not everyone has that, but you know, typically, people have a a mother and a father, and yeah, that’s why it’s important to have both sides to to both be humane and to be professional. Yeah, so I just want to focus on the humanity first before I talk about professionalism, maybe another day. There’s a verse in the Quran which says and I’m going to try to keep it short, by the way. There’s a verse in the Quran which says “We have honored the children of Adam.” It’s Surah 17, verse 70. It says, “We have honored the children of Adam, and we provided them with rides on land and in the sea. We provided for them good provisions, and we gave them greater advantages than many of our creatures.” So, as you can see, children of Adam are honored, which means that we should respect that in others. Meaning that you have you They are created within a context. We are created within a context, which is that we are children of Adam, and there’s some honor in that. And then, when you see another human being, you should respect that he has been honored by God as well. So, you know it’s something of value. You know it’s something to be, let’s say, to be considerate towards. I don’t know why this came to my mind, even though I don’t like to to to I don’t like to bring up movies as as as good examples. I think there’s a movie called Kingdom of Heaven. I’m not sure if that’s the name, but it’s probably that that’s the name. And in the in that movie, the there’s a Muslim army and and a Christian army fighting for Jerusalem. I I think it’s set in the times of the Crusades when the Christians and Muslims are fighting against each other. And I think the Muslim, whatever, uh, leader or the Muslim commander, even though he’s fighting the Christians and one of them has some kind of disease in his face, so he wears a mask. A lot of guys probably might know this movie. Usually men watch this movie. and so the the leader of the Christians has a mask and because he has some kind of disease in his skin. So the Muslim guy, even though he’s fighting him, he sends his doctor to him and and to treat his his disease. which is a humane thing to do. It’s just at the end of the day what humans because we’re all children of Adam and seeing someone who you know is also a child of Adam. That’s actually the the the there should be some respect at the beginning at least in relation to that. and understanding that they all have stories. Everyone has a story. Like no one just dropped out of nowhere. Everyone has a story. Everyone has the has their struggles. Everyone grew up through struggles or good times, but both.

But especially the struggles. they create they shape our character. They shape so yeah, they everyone has that. So you have we have to respect that. And not just kind of try to to let’s say, forget about that and then try to achieve a goal which is not which is not taking into account the human story. Then in Surah 6 49 verse 13, it says, “Oh people, we created you from the same male and female and rendered so it’s all of us from the same male and female.” What does it mean? We’re all family. It’s just a one large family. Humans. and or means that how would you treat your family? So, it’s kind of like the we have it’s important to be humane. Of course, some people have betrayed us which are not submitters, non-believers, but that’s another issue. I’m just focusing on the fact that starting from a humane perspective it submission is also important, belief is also important. actually, they are more important, but this is the topic of today. So, yeah, it says in Surah 49 verse 13 it says, “All people, we created you from the same male and female and rendered you distinct peoples and tribes that you may may recognize one another.” Why did God create distinct peoples and tribe tribes? Meaning distinct also in in looks. Some people look different, some people look you know, someone is shorter, darker, lighter, taller, more weight, less weight, different nose shapes, different eyes, different It It’s a They are not that different by the way, but you know, there’s differences. Enough differences for us to recognize each other. Because like that we know that there’s a story there. There’s a There’s a There’s it helps you sort of understand. Most people, for example, would be able to tell uh even from the photos. You guys have just posted photos, but if we had to guess who Who among you do you think is a mother of of children? We can kind of probably imagine. Definitely, I’m not a mother. But you can see from like just like the There’s a story behind everyone. And Yeah, so unfortunately online, it’s really hard to to sort of know that there’s a human being behind whoever is talking. With today with AI we kind of like have almost personalize it. I I think I caught myself finally calling the AI he. I’m not sure if I did, but yeah. So, if AI can trick us into let’s say talking almost like a human, but if you ask AI, you know, what’s who’s your brother? Who’s your Where were you born? It’s It doesn’t have a story. It doesn’t have a human story. Like it doesn’t have brothers, it doesn’t have sisters, it doesn’t have a dad, it doesn’t have a even a dead dad. You know, some a lot of people have a story because their dad died. And that’s a story in itself. or you know, in what context are they did they grow grow up and things like that. So, AI at least it doesn’t want to replicate to to pretend to have that. So, yeah, let’s let’s repent. The two way in Allah.

Praise be to God there is no other god except God. Okay, so in this last in this second sermon what I want to do is actually I want you guys to sort of help me do the sermon by actually telling your story. Not a full story, just let By the way, this is kind of important also because recently there’s there’s been quite a few submitters, not quite a few, a lot. A lot of submitters who have joined us and we don’t pretty much know them. I we don’t know who they are. And a lot of people actually even the existing submitters from earlier, they don’t know each other as much. So, what we can do as a part of the Friday sermon is is um if everyone can tell us who they are. I’m going to start first just so you don’t get uncomfortable. I’d rather not do it, but because it’s public. And by the way, I’m not going to actually make it public. So, I’ll I’ll write on the the on the group chat. I’ll write sort of my who am I and in a human way, it’s the what the human side of me. And I want you guys I’ll I’ll end this I’ll end the video and then after that you guys can write on on group chat. So, I’m not going to make it public. And then as you know, the group the the chats on the group get deleted after 1 week anyway. So, let let me go to the group chat and and write my story, let’s say. So, peace. Do I say guys? Okay, guys. See, there’s a story there. Why do I say guys? Because that means I’ve been exposed, I guess, to US culture. Someone says peace, whatever. Peace, guys. By the way, guys, let me finish my story first before you write something. Okay, peace, guys. so, I am Alban. I live in Canada with my wife. I have I Okay, you guys might have heard the there’s a the dog barking. So, my wife has a dog. I have a let’s say a mini dog, a small dog, mini dog, mini dog. I have a brother it who lives in US. I have a sister who lives in Kosovo, who is not married. I have and lives with with her parents with my parents with our parents and lives with our parents. I have another sister who is married and lives in Kosovo and she has a husband and two children of teenage years. of course I have two parents. I have two parents. All my family members are submitters except for my dad. What else do I say? Yeah, once in a while once in a while me and my wife go back to Kosovo for vacation. Where where I also visit my family. Part part of my family. I actually don’t talk too much to my dad, but yeah, I guess it’s not very humane, but it is it is what it is. my wife go back to Kosovo for for vacation. Okay, let me just finish this writing.

Back to Kosovo for vacation and also meet my family. This is kind of This is just who I am. Like just the human side of me. What else? Yeah, I like to go on a walks, but there’s a lake by shore here close by. I like to go on walks by the lake shore sometimes. Pretty much that Yeah, you guys can say whatever you want. But focus on the family because you you you cannot start the story without a family. We’re not in a movie where the the main character just starts out of nowhere. He’s an astronaut like he’s like a pilot and there’s no story. He doesn’t eat, he doesn’t have a family, he doesn’t he’s nothing. He’s just a pilot. It doesn’t make sense. It’s not we’re not we don’t live in movies. We are real people, we have real stories. So yeah, you have to start with a family. Even if you don’t have a family. If you live alone, just say I live alone, my family, whatever. or my my children now live on their own, whatever the situation is. If you have 50 sisters, say you have 50 sisters sisters, it’s fine. It’s a human story. Yeah, that’s it. And I’m going to end the the sermon now and part as part of the next as part of the I’m not going to end the sermon actually. I’m going to end the video. As part of the continuation of the sermon, you guys write your story and read each other’s story and you get to know each other. I I hope you guys get to know each other. So peace be upon you and after you you read each other’s stories, you can go and do the contact prayer whoever whoever has to do the contact prayer. peace.