Today, I’m grateful for recycling, for our recognition that Allah’s creation (here on Earth, anyway) is finite and worth reusing, for the understanding that old things can be given new life.What does Burger Box have to do with Recycling? Well, if you look close, and know what you’re looking at, this Burger Box was obviously a Dairy Queen once upon a time. DQ built perhaps dozens of these buildings back in its heyday, and they’re instantly recognizable, to those in the know.
Some call this “urban renewal,” and I suppose that’s accurate enough. But it’s also recycling, on a rather grand-ish scale, and quite far from the blue bag we leave out on the curb every few weeks.
May Allah guide us to take better care of this planet. He made us vicegerents over it, after all, and yet we abuse it so.
وَإِذْ قَالَ رَبُّكَ لِلْمَلَائِكَةِ إِنِّي جَاعِلٌ فِي الْأَرْضِ خَلِيفَةً ۖ قَالُوا أَتَجْعَلُ فِيهَا مَن يُفْسِدُ فِيهَا وَيَسْفِكُ الدِّمَاءَ وَنَحْنُ نُسَبِّحُ بِحَمْدِكَ وَنُقَدِّسُ لَكَ ۖ قَالَ إِنِّي أَعْلَمُ مَا لَا تَعْلَمُونَ
And [mention, O Muhammad], when your Lord said to the angels, “Indeed, I will make upon the earth a successive authority.” They said, “Will You place upon it one who causes corruption therein and sheds blood, while we declare Your praise and sanctify You?” Allah said, “Indeed, I know that which you do not know.”
Our president pulled out of the non-binding Paris Climate Accords a couple of days ago. People worldwide, and here in the US too, are in an uproar, and rightly so. The only comfort, for me, is in knowing that Allah knows that which we do not know. He knows, and He will provide for us in this life, and judge us in the next. Our job is to worship, here, now, while we can, and one of the ways we can do that, is by taking better care of the planet, in whatever ways we can.
So let’s get to it, InshaAllah.
