The Premier prayed with us

Today I went to the first* Juma at my mosque. It was the same prayer that Premier Dalton McGuinty attended and it was humbling to see him visit our still-under-construction mosque. He spoke for only 10 minutes, but the message he gave was really important.
(Paraphrasing): Hold onto your faith. It's what makes our society unique. Historically, societies were built upon the idea of sameness; that if we're the same colour, share the same culture and tradition that we would get along. In Canada, we're inviting others to come here and be themselves. He cited the recent Christmas tree controversy as well as the Quran issue in the States and said we shouldn't have these debates. There shouldn't be a problem with celebrating Christmas, Hannukah, Eid or Diwali.

I feel this idea of being "open" to others is something that our Muslim community desperately needs. We complain (with good reason) of Islamophobia, but have we looked at the way we see other religious or ethnic groups? None of the dinner parties we go to are complete without cracking a joke about the Chinese, Sikhs or Jews. If we want others to respect us and our needs, we need to respect them as well. (This was also a theme that I'm glad was floating around at RIS... speaking of which, I haven't written about it but do have a load of pictures I'll be putting up on Flickr sooon.)

Then the Premier did what I'd like to see more politicians do. He prayed with us. He could have stepped out and back in when it was time to meet the public, but he read 2 raka'ahs of Juma in the first row right next to the imam.

*Because of the current lack of space at our mosque, we have two Juma congregations.