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Madinat al-Muslimeen Islamic Message Board
| Are we getting materialistic? |
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| Anonymous |
| 10/30/05 at 10:24:58 |
| Salaam, I have to say, I always worry about the issue of raising kids in the US. And I was born and raised here! And I don't even have kids yet! Just yesterday, I told my husband that this society will "eat Muslim children alive." We had just run into the local Dunkin Donuts to get something hot before Taraweeh. In just a span of 5 minutes, the music playing in the store raised my blood pressure at least 10 notches. The first song was, "We don't need no education" (or whatever), and the second song was "Roxanne." So just to date myself, I grew up on these cheesy 80 songs. AstaghfirAllah. The first song is anti-education, anti-parents, pro-anarchy. The second song is apparently about a prostitute named Roxanne! Subhan'Allah, and I grew up with that??? Somehow, someway, Allah saved me from completely losing myself in this culture, alhamdulillah, and I'm lucky enough to barely remember those days (and back then, the worst we did was listen to cheesy 80's music and watch cheesy 80's movies). I don't know if it was a tight-knit Muslim family and Muslim friends all my life (as underedcuated about Islam as we were), or later living in a pretty active community where the youth were the most active. But I do know just how easy it would have been for me to become a statistic, and I can't thank Allah enough, walhamdulillah. It still stuns me when I see today's youth (I feel I'm at least a generation older than some kids today). Materialistic is an understatement. I mean, we're talking regular dating, boyfriends/girlfriends, tight clothes, drugs, alcohol, gangs, no identity, religion is a joke, aaahhh! The other Sunday, I came into a Sunday School classroom to find that the kids had left their junk all over the place. I found a piece of paper on the floor with the lyrics of a song about being a celebrity (ok, so now I'm on the other end of the spectrum, where I now know very little about pop culture). This Muslim child knew all of the lyrics, and apparently, *liked* it enough to write it all down, *during* a class about Islam (ok, what does that tell us about our teaching methods?). SubhanAllah. A week later, taraweeh prayer had to be cut short for some reason, and some teenagers starting high-fiving each other outside of the musallah, saying, "Yes! No taraweeh!" (and even worse, boys and girls high-fiving each other!). SubhanAllah. It makes a huge difference what parents teach their kids about their identity early on. And the more true Islamic education and upbringing (from Day 1 at home, not Sunday School), the better. I mean, I honestly feel the parents of some of these kids force them to go, without teaching them much about Islam beforehand. What kind if impression does that leave on kids? It's astounding how true Allah's Messenger (s) was when he said that there will be a time when the Muslims will "tread the same path as was trodden by those before inch by inch and step by step so much so that if they had entered into the hole of the lizard, you would follow them into it, too." *Btw, this is not to say that American Muslims should not adopt any Western customs. It's impossible not possible. We just have to be much more selective.* May Allah (swt) strengthen this ummah and make us steadfast, aameen. |
| Re: Are we getting materialistic? |
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| BrKhalid |
| 11/01/05 at 05:57:47 |
| Asalaamu Aalikum ;-) I'm sure all the thirty somethings on the board can relate to this. But to answer the question....yes. As we in England would say 'it's just not cricket'. The meaning signifying the 'true spirit of Islam' seems to be somewhat lost nowadays in the midst of rituals and culture. It's a universal problem unfortunately and not just a local one. |
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