The Muslim News

Your Eminence, Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor, Home Secretary, Jacqui Smith, Communities Secretary Hazel Blears, Shadow Justice Secretary Dominic Grieve, Liberal Democrats Leader Nick Clegg, Ministers, ambassadors, distinguished guests, and friends,

Assalamu 'alaykum (peace be with you).
It is our ninth anniversary of The Muslim News Awards for Excellence and more importantly twentieth anniversary of The Muslim News newspaper.
It has been a challenging twenty years for us at The Muslim News. To have managed to survive and not miss even one issue, on a shoe string budget, is a miracle.
The reason for its success is because of the devotion of its journalists and other staff and
freelance contributors, its independence, its inclusiveness, its objectivity, and being able
to reflect community concerns.
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The last one year has been a difficult one. The Muslim community continues to be seen through the lens of extremism.
It is the right of Muslims to be treated as equal citizens.
Terrorist attacks are carried out by a minute number of people and a whole community
should not be criminalised because of this.
By doing so young Muslims feel marginalised and feel they are treated different from the rest of the citizens.
This will increase their alienation and the danger is, that violent extremists will use this to lure them in.
Our place and our role as Muslim citizens of Britain is neither contentious nor contradictory in standing up for just causes.
It is as Muslim citizens that we engage with our society, our institutions, and our fellow citizens as we all work to shape a Britain of which we are all proud and to which we all stake a claim.
Religion in Britain is passing through strange and challenging times. We might be amused at adverts on our city buses urging us to ignore God and enjoy our lives.
And while surveys reveal that religious practice in Britain is declining, religion continues to hold sway over the lives of many in our society.
The importance of faith in guiding private and public morality is a message that has frequently and eloquently been made by our chief guest this evening, Cardinal Cormac Murphy O’Connor.
His remarks that, ‘Our life together in Britain cannot be a God-free zone and we must not allow Britain to become a world devoid of religious faith and its powerful contribution to the common good’, is one that will find much resonance among British Muslims.

The current crisis experienced in our financial markets and the on-going global recession will have its wider consequences in the form of rising unemployment and austerity

This is a time for worthy reminder that the teachings of religion are not only intended for private consumption, but are also of apposite public reference.

Our Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s recent comments urging a ‘moral framework’ in
business and the markets, reverberates in the pioneering work done by the financial sector
in the UK to enhance and expand Islamic finance and the availability of Shari’ah compliant financial products in the UK.

This month’s Vatican’s suggestion to western banks and financial institutions to learn from the ethics of Islamic economics is welcome and positive.

The Vatican’s creation of a Catholic-Muslim Forum to debate important issues of our time, ecumenical and otherwise, is a fitting reminder of the common cause made
between all the monotheistic religions.

In reaching out to one another, in recognising the common objectives we share, by bearing testimony to our religious faith through the manner in which we lead our lives – making faith accessible and comprehensible to those around us – are aims we all share as adherents of revealed religions.

As Muslims grapple with multifarious pressures questioning the degree to which they are integrated into British society, the experiences of British Catholics serves to remind us that hostility and prejudice can be successfully overcome and that minority religious groups have always found a welcome and hospitable home in Britain.

The challenge of our times is not simply about maintaining an Islamic identity in
Britain, but of struggling to uphold religion as a benign influence on our society.

In this, I know, Christians and Muslims, have much work to do together.

It is with some regret that we face in the near future the retirement of Cardinal
Murphy O’Connor, but news that he will proceed to take up a peerage in the House of
Lords, the first Catholic peer since the Reformation to do so, will be universally
welcomed.

We hope, from his station in the Upper House, that he will continue to speak out
and give voice to the views of the faithful.

Ladies and Gentlemen, on the 10th anniversary of The Muslim News, we launched the Awards of Excellence to mark and celebrate the many successful achievements of British Muslims.

As we now mark the 20th anniversary of The Muslim News, it pleases me to inform you
that we are launching the Muslim Businesses Professional Network to complement the ethos of the awards and highlight a further area of successful Muslim endeavours.

It is my hope that the Muslim Businesses Professional Network will serve to bring Muslim entrepreneurs and businessmen and women together so that through co-operation and consolidation, the immense contribution of Muslim businesses to British society might be duly recognised.

It has always been my firm belief that Islam engenders in the life of a Muslim the desire
to do well, to succeed and to persevere patiently and with faith. Not just for the sake
of oneself, though this is important, but to do well for the sake of others so that through
one’s own example one might motivate and inspire others.

This Awards ceremony is about recognising those individuals who aspire to attain their
very best as members of our society.

It is those British Muslims and non-Muslims that have proven themselves worthy of recognition for their contribution to Britain that we are here to honour this evening.

I extend to you all a very warm welcome and wish you a very enjoyable evening.

And to all the nominees of the Awards for Excellence 2009, I sincerely wish you the
very best of luck.

I am deeply grateful to Faezeh Hashemi, President of the international Islamic Women’s Sport, who has traveled especially for this event from Iran to join us in celebrating British Muslim contribution to society.
And now I would like to invite Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor.

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