Last Sunday I wrapped up my time at Nur-Allah. I am so thankful to have served here, and I will take what I have learned with me into my future. The people that I met were so kind to all of us, and understanding when we asked simple or silly questions. Going in, I had …
Author Archives: apetr
Chinese Concentration Camps
Something that I have seen in the news and all over my various social media feeds has been the concentration camps in China. Located in the Xinjang region, these “re-education” camps are aimed solely at Uighurs and are aimed at “stripping Uighurs of their identity and [indoctrinating] them into being secular and loyal party supporters” …
Nur Allah Service 11/17
At the Weekend School on Sunday we had a pretty short class. There was only one student for each group, so instead of doing any real assisting, I got to sit down and learn with our only student. We read Surah 86, “The Night-Visitant” which talks about how to treat non-believers, and how to guide …
The Power of Prayer
At the parent’s appreciation banquet I attended this weekend, several couples were honored for overcoming hardships as they parent. The first of these couples talked about how their child was born early, and that it was especially challenging for them. They spoke about how the event tested their faith in ways that they didn’t know …
Parents Appreciation Banquet
Usually for our ICR Lauren, Shelby and I go to Nur Allah and help with their weekend school. However, this past week things looked a bit different. On Sunday was the 27th annual Parents Appreciation Banquet, which is sponsored by Nur Allah. Instead of helping with the weekend school we went to this event and …
ICR – Nur Allah
This past Sunday I was working at my ICR, which is the Nur Allah Islamic Center. They have a weekend school there, which is what I usually help out with. It is very similar to sunday school in the Christian church. At the school they teach about Islam and all the prayers, as well as …
Women in the Quran
In the process of doing this reading I was really struck bu Sura 4, about women. My own perception of women in Islam before reading this was very limited, just coming from media stories and the like. I thought that women were very restricted in their roles, and that this role came from Islam. But …
Censorship in China: Patriot Act
As I was scrolling through Netflix looking for something to watch, I stumbled upon the show “Patriot Act with Hasan Minhaj.” This show is very reminiscent of “Last Week Tonight with John Oliver” or “The Daily Show with Trevor Noah.” I decided to take a look at the episodes to see if there was anything …
Use of Metaphor in Language
Throughout this reading, as well as past ones, I have been surprised at the amount of metaphors that these ancient philosophers used. All of their teachings seem to be up for interpretation by the reader. This was interesting to me, because in some other more convoluted speculative texts I have had to read for other …
Government in the Tao Te Ching
When reading the poems from the Tao Te Ching, I thought it was especially interesting that that poems 57-60 focused on government since that was a new theme for the poems, and one fairly distant from the other themes discussed in the poems. I thought the ways that the poems shaped the ‘ideal government’ was …