Praise be to God. There is no other God except God. As you guys might be able to notice from the background, I’m speaking from a different place. I came, I mean we came to meet with my family in one of my sister’s villas in Montenegro. For those who don’t know where it is, it’s southeast Europe. And it’s actually kind of a special place for me because this is where I was struggling once to—by the way I don’t really believe in special places in the world but it’s just a personal special place—because this is when I was struggling to, let’s say decode if I can call it like that, to decode the Quranic initials. When I was having a busy life in work and stuff like that, I, after I discovered the HM initials, what the meaning is, then I thought, yeah, actually it’s possible to do the others as well. But then I was struggling. It was really it’s a story for another time. I was struggling like what do the others mean? And then only when I came here in a quiet place did I, like God tell me the meaning of the other Quranic initials. So yeah, for those reasons it’s kind of like when I come here I feel more quiet.

But yeah speaking of vacation places, the topic of today is the the submitter retreat and as we conclude it, maybe before I talk about the conclusion, as I’m quite sure probably most of you know that Rashad also organized what he called conferences and this is not exactly the same, probably not the same at all. The difference is that Rashad saw the conferences as a subcategory of fighting or struggling in the cause of God, while I see the submitter retreat as a subcategory of immigration in the cause of God and those are different. The reason why it’s different now is because we do the fighting, we do the striving online. We already do that like we go online, we preach, the Quran is online, the materials, your videos are online, materials are online. So we already do that. So whatever Rashad did with conferences, we do with just having a website. So our website is a replacement of his conferences.

The retreat, what I’m calling retreats, are actually a replacement, a subcategory of immigration. And to boil it down to the basics, actually almost pretty much maybe all, but I’m not sure if it’s all but maybe all the differences between what Rashad did and what we are doing, they all boil down to the fact that we have internet. Because we have internet, things are a little bit different. And all the differences between Rashad and Muhammad when it comes to how they executed religion, how they practiced religion, they all boil down to the fact that Rashad lived in a democracy, Muhammad lived in a non-democratic place. And you can all boil it down to that. Why did Muhammad do it differently? No democracy. Why Rashad did it differently? He has democracy. Why Al is doing it differently? Yes, democracy and online. Yes, democracy and internet. So these are the slight differences. In the end times it might be different. Democracy might vanish again even if they call it democracy. The world is going that way as you guys know with some starting to go that way. But towards the end of the world, democracy is going to, let’s say, vanish. But let’s not trust to kind of claim that it has vanished. It’s still there’s still democracy in the world. Most of the world is democracy and because of democracy there’s freedom of religion for the most part. Because democracies don’t guarantee full freedom of religion. They guarantee freedom of religion for the most part. And because of that we don’t have to immigrate because we have almost completely freedom of religion. We don’t have to immigrate in the cause of God fully.

But as we concluded in the last Friday sermon, there is something which even though we have freedom of religion mostly, the a part which is let’s say missing is the opportunities which are being denied to us by the Sunnis and the Shia to enjoy the benefits of the group prayer. And a submitter retreat is just that kind of like compensating for the fact that we have been denied opportunities for the group prayer. So this is just a summary of what we spoke last time.

So then God willing let’s talk about the submitter retreat. When do I plan to organize it? So time, 2027 next year God willing. The reason for that is because it’s 2 years after our Hajj. So that would be a nice time to meet, likely very likely in spring. If we don’t do it in spring, potentially in autumn or fall, but very likely in spring God willing. What about the location? Okay, so as I’m saying, I don’t believe in the really special locations even including Mecca and all of that. I just believe I mean they have each location has a specific role, but I don’t believe in, let’s say, I’ve seen memes and videos online of light emanating from Mecca and things like that trying to prove how this location is better than that. Or Christians saying how Rome is special or the Jews thinking that Jerusalem. Yeah, they had the roles. They had the important roles but God can organize people even outside of those so-called sanctimonious locations if we can call them like that but I don’t believe that anyway. So but they do have a special role during history and that’s why by the way God changed Qibla, like first it was Jerusalem then Mecca then Mecca again.

Yeah, so I wanted to figure out where should we meet, in which location should we meet? So I decided let me, because when you guys submitted the zakat, you also reported in which city you live, city and country. So I live in this city and this is the country and that enabled me to just take the cities and put it in AI and that came up with the coordinates of each city latitude and longitude. So I found the averages for the latitude and the averages for longitude, I mean the average, and that gives you the center, the center of where the submitters are. There’s no, we don’t have to have a center. It’s more like how can we minimize the cost. That’s what I mean when I say center. Basically the idea is to spend the least amount of money we can spend to be able to meet with one another. For example, if we can organize a retreat in Hawaii, but it’s going to be so far from everyone because that’s too far from everyone. Anyone who would travel there is going to be too far. So that’s why I wanted to see where the center is approximately so that we don’t spend as much money. We can go to the retreat with less money.

So I did that, found the center and it came up to here, the center of all the submitters who live today. By the way, if we find the center of all the people who live today in the world, it’s actually in Turkey, south of Turkey. It’s not in Mecca, it’s not in Jerusalem. It’s south of Turkey, unlike what the religious people want to tell you. Jerusalem has a specific role, Mecca has a specific role. I think it’s the edge of the center. And that has a good reason. There’s a good reason for that which I explained partly in the video clarification in the end times. There I tell how Mecca is the edge of the center. But the center came in this place for us for our group, which is the Ionian Sea, that place there, that red dot is called the Ionian Sea. It’s part of the Mediterranean and it’s south of Italy. But the problem with Italy is that most of the people, especially those who live outside of Europe, wouldn’t be able to get a visa to travel there. The next closest city is Greece, the same, because Italy and Greece are part of what’s called Schengen area. Schengen area means it’s a common area within Europe where people can travel without visas. But that means that those countries have much bigger restrictions for people outside of Europe. So Greece is part of that Schengen area as well, both Greece and Italy. And the next country there is Albania and Albania is not part of Schengen area, at least not yet. So that means that people from around the world can travel there much easier.

So the next closest place is Albania. If we look at it geography, just purely from the geography, so let’s say one potential very good place to meet is Albania because we would spend less like that. It doesn’t have visa limitations for most people. I think probably for no people if we justify it correctly. And it also has electronic visa. So people don’t have to go somewhere to get a visa. They can just do it online. So let’s say it’s a very suitable spot. And it also has a very nice Riviera in south of Albania, it’s like a beautiful nature sea and all of that, and it’s not very expensive. So those are the advantages. But then I said, ‘Wait a minute, what if I ask AI if I put the coordinates and see, like is there another way to travel even if it’s not the center exactly the center, where we would minimize the costs?’ And because lots of flight connections, a lot of people who travel to Albania actually travel through Istanbul, and because lots of flight connections, Istanbul is here by the way, this yellow dot here, and here is the south of Albania. So because lots of flight connections that actually came up also as one of the locations which would be equally cheap as Albania. So we have let’s say these two potential places where we can meet, which I think are the best contenders for now, either Albania or Istanbul, and it’s going to depend on how things change until then, either where people join from, which locations join more, whether the center will shift a little bit, or what we might prefer. The idea of Istanbul is that we would have a cultural experience in the sense that it’s a city, it’s a big city, some people like to visit cities, it’s a much different experience. Maybe it’s a little bit too crowded for a retreat. Hotels might be a little bit more expensive, but it has its advantages. Flights are slightly, there’s more connections for flights and there’s the experience would be like, I don’t know if anyone likes baklava, Turkish delights and stuff like that. So it does have its advantages. So right now in my mind they are kind of equal in whether we might organize the retreat here or there.

And the third contender is Montenegro where I’m right now, which is here just north of Albania. The benefit of Montenegro is that we sort of have a sort of, let’s call it a base here and it’s much easier to organize and all of that. But for right now it’s not actually a serious contender because it doesn’t have electronic visas. So for a lot of people they would have to travel to get a visa. They would have to go to an embassy or something. But in the meantime, if Montenegro creates an e-visa system, which they are about to do, if they do it in time, well that would also be a serious contender, a serious place where we could meet. So these are the three locations. If any of these don’t work for whatever reason, God willing, the fourth location is Umrah, meaning in Mecca. By the way, why did I go for these locations this time at least? It’s because it’s much more expensive actually to go to Mecca. It was like 40 to 50% depending on how I calculated it. So about 40 or 50% more expensive to meet in Mecca because the hotels are more expensive, flights are more expensive. And for some of you who know, the weather is not the best. It’s not easy, especially if we go in Arafat and stuff like that. So for those reasons, God willing, because here we’re not trying to do Hajj, we’re just trying to do group prayer with other submitters. By the way, still we will once in a while we’ll meet in Mecca so so people can do Hajj. Maybe we’ll meet once in another location and then once in Mecca or twice in another location then once in Mecca or three times in another location then once in Mecca. It’s going to depend on how well these retreats go in another location. We might just decide that oh wait a minute, we went to Albania or we went to Istanbul or we went to Montenegro or whatever but it was a little bit of a waste of time because it wasn’t, we didn’t feel very spiritually fulfilled or whatever. So it’s all subject to change depending on how much, or maybe I think yeah people were not behaving very well and in Mecca they behave better. So maybe that could be a reason why we might stop this, but let’s try it. I think it’s worth trying. God willing next year it’s cheaper than Mecca. So it’s worth trying. By the way, and this is for as long as we have a small number of submitters and it only makes sense to meet in one place of the world. Eventually when we reach a sufficient number of submitters, I don’t know 200, 300, something like that, then we can split into, like we can have people in the east, people in the west, then the center would be somewhere else, it might be south of France for the western people and it might be, I don’t know where could the center of the eastern people be like, I don’t know like Armenia, Kazakhstan, I have no idea. It could be somewhere there. Then we might split it again into different regions, maybe Europe, Middle East, Asia, Africa, US. That would be a nice split so that people can meet only within those regions. And then in that during that time, let’s say if Americans can meet within in a nice place in America, I don’t know like Mexico for example or something like that. So these are not permanent locations. We’re just trying it, figuring it out as we go and trying to do our best. And that’s pretty much it.

Praise be to God. There is no other God except God. For this second sermon, I just want to see if anyone has anything to say, maybe either about this topic or some other topic. Something constructive, not destructive.

By the way, just so I can explain, there’s about 51 submitters online right now, but there’s definitely more submitters than that. Some of them might share the group chat or a couple of them notified me that it doesn’t work in their computer or something for whatever reason. Jad is saying Lebanon requires a visa for Albania but not for Turkey. I don’t understand exactly what you mean. Do you mean that to travel to Lebanon or to travel from Lebanon to Albania or Turkey?

Yeah, you be saying, ‘How about Morocco?’ Yeah, Morocco would be a good location, but I think after we split into two groups, I would like to go to Morocco one day. It looks like a nice country to go to. It’s let’s say one in my bucket list to go to Morocco. Adnan is saying Turkey is visa free for Morocco. Yeah, okay. Turkey is a good option because visas are easy, but also Albania visas are easy. So, I don’t think anyone will have problems to get a visa in Turkey or in Albania. Lebanon, we might do one in Lebanon eventually. Either when we split in two groups, but even within a group, I think it’s a place with good weather. J is saying we need a visa going to, yeah, but it’s an e-visa. It’s easy visa. You just go online. You just apply kind of like Umrah. It’s probably even easier by e-visa. I mean like you don’t have to go to embassy. You just go online. We have, God willing I’ll inform people about the information. So yeah, I’m just kind of getting a feeling of what some people seem to prefer Turkey more, but I know a couple of people who cannot travel to Turkey actually.

Medi is saying the Middle East is unstable. Europe is better. Yeah, for now the Middle East is a little bit unstable. Yeah, I agree. Lebanon right now might not be the best option. Plus it’s not at the very center. In the future probably it might shift a little bit towards the east if people from Bangladesh join or from India, more people from India join, the center might shift east and then if it’s safer we can do it in Lebanon. Someone said Indonesia, Indonesia is just too far. This is not about desires, it’s about the centers. So it would be too expensive. We are thinking of a location where it would be the cheapest for the whole group. Turkey is nice. I like Turkey. I like because it’s such a metropolitan city like you get lots of cultures there. I wouldn’t say it’s necessary to be near the city only for flight connections. In Albania actually the idea is not to do near a city, to do it like in a sea, close to a sea or mountains.

Okay, I’m going to have to think about the location because I can see how some people prefer something more than others, but they are thinking it from their perspective. What about people from US? What about people from Bangladesh? What about people from Africa?

Fal is saying both are good choices. Is saying, ‘Yes, I pray we all have it easily accessible. Let’s pick the choice best for everyone as much as possible.’ Yeah, I agree. I think the best what we should try to do even though it’s helping to know your preferences. What we should try to do is to find the choice which is as a total the best for everyone and not focus on just what’s best for someone. By the way, even Indonesia might be someday when we split into many groups might be a good choice but maybe for East Asia for countries like Malaysia, Australia, things like that. But that’s far in the future. And then eventually, God willing, we might have just specific countries, let’s say Spain, France, Italy, things like that. Each will when we have many submitters they can just meet each within their country.

Okay. I can see preferences. People are leaning a little bit more towards Turkey. Some actually are writing about Albania and Montenegro as a better choices. I’ll have to think about it definitely. I’m going to try to be I’m not going to be biased. Honestly, I don’t care about Albania or Turkey as states. I’m just going to try to find a place which is, these are the three criteria. One, travel restrictions. Which country has the least travel restrictions? So easier way to get visas. Two, cheapest flights. Three, cheapest accommodation, cheapest hotels. If we combine those three, which one in which one can we go in the easiest way as a group?

Yeah. So, Fal is saying that that’s something I considered as well. Fasal is saying if both are same prices, why not see which one is easier to do group contact prayers? The easier to do the group contact prayer together would be Albania because we can find a hotel and book a conference room which is nice because in Istanbul that would be much more expensive. However, the advantage in Istanbul is that we can do a few of those prayers in one of the let’s say the mosques which are occupied by Sunnis and that would be also an interesting experience just to try it. So they both have advantages. Istanbul would probably give us some cultural advantages. We would be able to see some mosques. They really have beautiful mosques there. But in Albania we’d have a better conference room and we would definitely pray together all the time because in Istanbul I checked in hotels, the hotels which have conference rooms which we can use for prayer, are much more expensive. Plus, I would probably have to tell someone to organize it, like to go and ask the hotel, oh we want to use the conference room, but we want to book it for prayer and we will have to move these chairs and these tables in. That’s not going to be easy for me to organize. In Albania, much easier for me. Someone can help maybe there. We’ll see.

Yeah, we’ll see. We’ll see. God willing. I’m aware of a lot of people’s let’s say restrictions and preferences. Thanks for also sharing more. Yeah, some people are preferring for the mosque. By the way, even if we go to Istanbul, I don’t think we’re going to pray at those mosques often. I would prefer that we do pray the prayer more often together, but we can do that as an additional experience.

Jad is saying, wouldn’t there be a religious clash in when it comes to doing the group contact prayer? We’ll pretty much do it similar just similar how we did it in Mecca. We just join the prayer and then leave. And in big mosques people they really don’t care who you are or what you’re doing because there’s so many groups of people who go there and there’s even actually Christians are allowed in those mosques. They just go as visitors and visit those mosques. So it’s very let’s say liberal when it comes to that. People just go in and go out.

Okay. So I’ll probably finish the contact prayer soon just to see if there’s any other chats. Okay. So, whichever it is, God willing, the important thing is that we meet and I hope. Okay, I’m someone is saying I think the subject is from Bangladesh. I’m guessing would prefer the visa where the visa restrictions are the least and the travel and the accommodation is the least. I agree with that which is what I’m going to try to maximize that God willing to meaning to minimize, like so that it’s as easy as possible for travel both financially and when it comes to restrictions.

Is saying we can take it over. I’m guessing he’s saying mosque, we can take over the mosque with presents and maybe we will get some converts. Lol. Um, I guess I’m old. I’m saying lol instead of LOL. Okay. Okay, no, we’re not going to try by the way to convert people in the mosques. Like the in one of the video clarifications, I one of the rules of the mosques is I say that one of the rules of the mosque is not to try to convert people in there. If you go to worship God, fine. If you want to convert people, just do it outside of the mosque. Trevor was just joking. I don’t think he was being serious.

Muhammad is saying we can’t pray in Haka Sophia because it was built as a church. Actually, that’s not true. In the video clarification where I talk about and good that you brought this up, where I talk about the places of worship. I say that we are allowed to pray in any church which was built before Muhammad because before Muhammad there was no real distinction between mosques and churches. It was just places of worship and so Haka Sophia was built before Muhammad which means that they had not rejected Muhammad. They were not people who had rejected Muhammad. They were early Christians. They might have not been perfect but it was a legal place of worship which was built by let’s say believers. So it it is allowed to pray in Haka Sophia, whatever the pronunciation is. It is not allowed to pray in churches which were built after Muhammad.

Fazal is saying, ‘Are all the Turkish submitters here in Istanbul?’ Yeah, most the people from Turkey are in Istanbul. The submitters, but a few of them are actually from more south. So, not all of them. I think it’s a little bit more than half.

Yeah, that’s it. Okay. I can see the preferences. God willing, I’ll try to do what’s best for everyone. And I hope no one takes it personally. I know people from Morocco might want to go to Morocco. The issue is we have to find a common solution. It’s about preferences. I also want to go to Morocco someday. It’s a nice place. Okay. So let’s, and by the way, it might really matter whether we do it in Albania versus on the ideas which I have what to do, like what can we do there, which mosques can we visit? What activities can we do? Of course everything is voluntary, optional, but once I think of some ideas, what can we do here? What can we do there? Which is more preferable and things like that. Anyway, so let’s finish it at this point. Yeah, someone is saying 17 people in Istanbul. Yeah, I’ve counted everyone from every region. That’s how I came up with the center. Let’s finish the contact prayer now.

For those who have to do the contact prayer, salat, and the rest of you peace be upon you.
 

Friday Sermon by: Alban Fejza, Online Congregation Director