Monday, August 30, 2010
The R factor
As many of you know, Muslims are currently observing Ramadan, a month of fasting to commemorate the reception of the first verses of the Qur’an to Mohammed.
How our Muslim friends observe Ramadan is quite interesting; responses are diverse and often very personal.
I could use football as an example. As the programme takes place during daytime, I was unsure how the Muslim holiday would affect numbers. Can you imagine playing sport after not eating all day and then not being able to have a drink while playing? I figured that numbers would be low, due to the “R factor” (over the summer, low attendance could be blamed on the “World Cup factor”). A Palestinian friend phoned me to let me know that he would return to football after Ramadan was finished he told me “I’m so tired and hungry, I would probably collapse on the pitch.” Fair enough.
In contrast to this sensible and personally devout response to Ramamdan, an Egyptian man has continued to attend footie, for the purpose of making public statement about his piety as he can barely stagger off the pitch at the end. He chides the other Muslim guys for taking a drink of water; unfortunately, he is barely beyond reproach as was seen smoking on the way to the pitch (also forbidden during the fast, which the Afghans point out when his back is turned). The Afghan boys are clearly not fasting, and don’t seem to care that the Egyptian guy disapproves (part of me thinks they drink in front of him just to wind him up). Some of the Iranian say they are fasting, but stress that you need to be sensible and if you need to drink a bit of water to keep you going that's ok, it’s not out of the spirit of the fast (saying, "God doesn't want to do you harm.")
During Ramadan, there are many opportunities to talk about our faith. “Do Christians fast?” is a question I often receive that leads to other chances to speak about Christ. Many of our Muslim friends are very quiet about their observance of Ramadan. This is very different to our experience in Greece, where we would often be invited over to “break the fast” with our friends. Is this merely the British reserve rubbing off on them, or is it something else? I sometimes get the impression that our Muslim friends here feel that a public expression of their faith is unwelcome in Glasgow, or they think that their holiday might offend us as Christians. The irony being that many of the folk we work with are happy to wish us a “happy Easter” or “Merry Christmas”. I’ve tried to make a point of saying “Ramadan karim!” to our friends here. The response is usually surprise, but soon leads to an opportunity to relate over our respective religious holidays and why we observe them. If we’ve started to break down barriers these past two years, I wonder what opportunities God has in store for us next year?
The paranoia over public religious holidays stems from secularism, not religious minorities. If anything, most of our Muslim friends are puzzled why a major Christian holiday is not celebrated with more aplomb (in contrast to the overlty religious celebrations of Christ’s death and resurrection on the streets in Greece).
I’m aware that I’m a bit late with this, but the “30 Days of Prayer” website has some great resources as we pray for our Muslim friends during Ramadan. It also has great information for understanding Muslim beliefs.
How our Muslim friends observe Ramadan is quite interesting; responses are diverse and often very personal.
I could use football as an example. As the programme takes place during daytime, I was unsure how the Muslim holiday would affect numbers. Can you imagine playing sport after not eating all day and then not being able to have a drink while playing? I figured that numbers would be low, due to the “R factor” (over the summer, low attendance could be blamed on the “World Cup factor”). A Palestinian friend phoned me to let me know that he would return to football after Ramadan was finished he told me “I’m so tired and hungry, I would probably collapse on the pitch.” Fair enough.
In contrast to this sensible and personally devout response to Ramamdan, an Egyptian man has continued to attend footie, for the purpose of making public statement about his piety as he can barely stagger off the pitch at the end. He chides the other Muslim guys for taking a drink of water; unfortunately, he is barely beyond reproach as was seen smoking on the way to the pitch (also forbidden during the fast, which the Afghans point out when his back is turned). The Afghan boys are clearly not fasting, and don’t seem to care that the Egyptian guy disapproves (part of me thinks they drink in front of him just to wind him up). Some of the Iranian say they are fasting, but stress that you need to be sensible and if you need to drink a bit of water to keep you going that's ok, it’s not out of the spirit of the fast (saying, "God doesn't want to do you harm.")
During Ramadan, there are many opportunities to talk about our faith. “Do Christians fast?” is a question I often receive that leads to other chances to speak about Christ. Many of our Muslim friends are very quiet about their observance of Ramadan. This is very different to our experience in Greece, where we would often be invited over to “break the fast” with our friends. Is this merely the British reserve rubbing off on them, or is it something else? I sometimes get the impression that our Muslim friends here feel that a public expression of their faith is unwelcome in Glasgow, or they think that their holiday might offend us as Christians. The irony being that many of the folk we work with are happy to wish us a “happy Easter” or “Merry Christmas”. I’ve tried to make a point of saying “Ramadan karim!” to our friends here. The response is usually surprise, but soon leads to an opportunity to relate over our respective religious holidays and why we observe them. If we’ve started to break down barriers these past two years, I wonder what opportunities God has in store for us next year?
The paranoia over public religious holidays stems from secularism, not religious minorities. If anything, most of our Muslim friends are puzzled why a major Christian holiday is not celebrated with more aplomb (in contrast to the overlty religious celebrations of Christ’s death and resurrection on the streets in Greece).
I’m aware that I’m a bit late with this, but the “30 Days of Prayer” website has some great resources as we pray for our Muslim friends during Ramadan. It also has great information for understanding Muslim beliefs.
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