 Assalamu alaikum warahmatullahi wabarakatuh My beloved MCC East Bay community I want to begin by saying an advanced Ramadan Mubarak To all of you, your families, your children, your parents Once again, this is going to be a slightly different Ramadan for all of us But Ramadan is Ramadan and it's always a beautiful time of the year Regardless of our circumstances And so, you know, I pray to Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala That may this month be one filled with blessings for us and our families Wherever we are and however we are And may Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala continue to keep us all safe And in His protection at all times Ameen Ya Rabbi Alameen With that said, I just want to take a moment To share a few reminders This Ramadan is definitely going to be different Although we've made some amazing progress in the last year But the reality is that this disease is still with us It has not gone away And in fact, it's actually coming back harder than ever In some other parts of the world And we ask for Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala's Shifa and protection For all of humanity in this difficult time So with that said, you know The Masjid are still only allowing a limited number of people At the Masjid, of course We must abide by the law We must abide by the regulations that the county has set forth for us Whether we agree or even disagree with them So basically this means that for those of us And many of us for whom we are diligent In going to the Masjid every single day Or diligent in praying Salat al-Isha And the entire tarawih Listening to the entire Quran May not be possible once again for us this year But look at the bright side It's still better than last year Last year we were not able to go at all This year we inshallah will be able to go Maybe not on all days, but on some days And while we may not be able to listen to the entire Quran In Salat al-Tarawih We will be able to listen to as much Quran as we can As it is, you know, tarawih The prayer of tarawih in and of itself While it's highly recommended, it's a sunnah It's not a requirement Listening to the entire Quran in tarawih While again, once again, highly recommended A sunnah of the Nabi alayhi salatu wa salam But yet at the same time, it's not a requirement What is required is that we keep ourselves safe What is required is that we keep our communities safe So inshallah, you know, if we are unable to be there Every day or for some reason, you know We are there every day, but we will be missing out On portions of the Quran Our intention is with Allah And our reward is also with Allah Now, this doesn't mean that we cannot recite the Quran We still have the ability to recite the Quran If we have a little bit of extra time Because we're spending a half an hour Or 45 minutes less at the Masjid Let us utilize that time to come back home To recite the Quran If for some reason we haven't been able to Register on that given day Then spend the time at home with your family And, you know, pray salat in congregation You can even pray salatu tarawih in congregation With whatever amount of Quran we have And just imagine the barakah of the salat The congregation, the family in our homes Right, so there's always a bright side to everything And if you haven't registered I'm going to remind myself first and everyone else Don't simply show up just because you show up every day Do the right thing with Allah And Allah knows our intentions, inshallah You know, some people have said that there should be A separate arrangement for people who are vaccinated You know, logistically, honestly I can tell you That it could be, you know, a nightmare So, you know, please, please do respect You know, the ability on behalf of the Masjid volunteers To do as much as they can Prayer still will be outdoors in many cases If that happens to be the case Then let us be grateful that we are still able to gather For prayer I want to be inside the Masjid We all want to be indoors, you know We don't want to be standing this far away from each other We want to pray all 20 rakahs We want to listen to the entire Quran But, you know, with all that's going on around us We're trying to do all of us Individually and collectively Must try to do the right thing And also go above and beyond A lot of times people will say that Oh, these people are gathering Or they're gathering We want to go above and beyond In order to make sure that we protect life Right? We protect life That's all we're trying to do here We're trying to protect people's lives Because the moment an individual May be affected by this You know, the greatest fear Is not that they will, you know, get very sick Or this, while that is the case The greatest fear is that they may actually end up dying And so we're trying to protect life Which is one of the Maqasid of Sharia So please, let us be gentle with ourselves Let us be gentle with everyone around us And of course, I'm being, you know I'm thinking a little far ahead And I'm thinking that maybe Salat al-A'id Will be something similar to this as well I know many elders Very pious elders Ulama, in fact Scholars who are older Who have never missed praying at the Masjid Who for decades, not one decade or two decades Who for the last four, five decades Have prayed 20 rak'as of tarawih in Ramadan Listen to an entire khatam During the month of Ramadan They, because of the pandemic And because of their own situation And the situation of those around them Have chosen to not be at the Masjid Not go to the Masjid and wanting to do the right thing So let us be conscious Let us be aware Allah is aware of our intentions You know, we don't have to be harsh on ourselves Or unto others Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala is kareem And we ask for Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala's Karam, his generosity His barakah, his blessings His reward For all of us and our families And we hope and pray, insha'Allah That all of us continue to have A beautiful Ramadan So once again, I take this moment To say Ramadan Mubarak To all of you, your families, your children And you know, we Keep me in your du'as I will keep all of you in mind And we pray to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala For a blessed month One filled with lots and lots of blessings For us and our families We pray that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala Forgive us our shortcomings And grant us the blessings