Vintage

Recently, Imam Khalid Latif, Executive Director and Chaplain of the Islamic Center, Cyrus McGoldrick, ICNYU intern, Megan Putney, class of '09, and two IC community members, Rika Prodhan and Saqib Hasan, were interviewed by Time.com as part of a larger article on Islamophobia in the United States that can be found here . 

Please share the videos below with your networks and friends.

Video #1

Video #2

The entire text can be found here and Khalid can be found listed on page 149 under the "Development" section, where development is defined as "These organizers have dedicated their lives to civic engagement, community work, activism and conflict resolution to influence communities through policy change, governance, and pushing for sustainable development." 

From the RISSC Website: "This publication is the second of an annual series that provides a window into the movers and shakers of the Muslim world. It highlights people who are influential as Muslims, that is, people whose influence is derived from their practice of Islam or from the fact that they are Muslim. It gives valuable insight into the different ways that Muslims impact the world, and also shows the diversity of how people are living as Muslims today."

As we approach the month of Ramadan, the Islamic Center will begin to post informational material and resources to the community to help get everyone ready for the blessed month.  

Below is a listing of khutbahs delivered at the IC during the last few years that deal with the month of Ramadan.   Please take the time to listen to them at your convenience and share with your friends and networks.

to listen to more of our khutbahs, please visit the Podcasts section of our website  

The following new khutbahs are available:

Khalid Latif - Getting Ready For Ramadan - 7/16/10
Raymond Brock Murray - Women in Islam - 7/09/10
ASM Hussain - The Distracted Muslim - 7/02/10
Haroon Moghul - What Muslims Should Sound Like - 6/25/10

Please visit our Podcasts section to subscribe to our podcast or download these and any of our other great khutbahs. 

Recently, Imam Khalid Latif, Executive Director and Chaplain of the Islamic Center, wrote an article published by CNN entitled "My Take: New York's schools should observe Muslim holidays."  To read the entire article in full, please click here. 

Please share with your contacts and leave a comment on the CNN site. 

Editor's note: Imam Khalid Latif is a chaplain for New York University and Executive Director of the school's Islamic Center.

By Khalid Latif, Special to CNN

I was recently eating dinner at a restaurant with a friend near Times Square when it became time for me to pray. Muslims pray five times a day and this particular prayer, called Maghrib, is performed at sunset.

Having lived in New York City for decades, I’ve become comfortable praying pretty much anywhere. It also doesn’t hurt that there are stranger things happening on the streets here than a young guy bowing and kneeling for a few minutes.

After I started to pray, a tour bus parked in front of me and a large group of people proceeded to spill out.

While I continued, a woman from the group came closer to where I was praying. She removed a scarf from her neck, placed it on the ground so that I would be praying on something clean, then walked away before I finished....

To continue reading, please click here.

When talking to those of my generation and younger from the Muslim American community, an oft-mentioned challenge is a disconnect from the Islam one knows and believes in and the messaging received in places of worship. 

This seems to be changing tremendously here in the U.S. due to one simple thing: time. 

The practice of Islam in America is practically as old as the country itself, however the institutionalization of it - in the form of community centers, places of worship and even organizations based on Islamic principles - is really only several decades young. 

In what can best be described as generational evolution, young American Muslims born and raised in the U.S. (unlike many of their immigrant parents) are searching for ways to bridge cultures they love equally: that of country and faith.

Those bridges are being found in the human capital of the generation itself, through men and women whose first language is English, who watch “Avatar” and “Lost” and study Quran, and who believe that vice and virtue can be explained in rap music, poetry or even through examples in the storyboards of Hollywood films. Many believe that these new “bridges” are the Muslim community’s best hope for combating extremism.

 A recent Salon.com article explains the challenge:

Some Muslims are voicing their opinions and calling for change. They would like imams, who tend to be older, male and "imported," to be able to connect with a generation of Muslims raised in America. They also want mosques, which have the potential to develop leadership and community-building skills among young Muslims, to make youth outreach a priority. Failing to address these issues, they fear, could sever the connection between a generation of American Muslims and their religion.