This was not what I was going to write.

I had a whole different post in mind for the first night of Ramadan.

I don't know exactly what I was going to say, but it was going to be a happy post. 

I've married to the person I love the most in this world. Alhamdulilah. We've learned that we're going to be parents to a daughter come October of this year, insh'Allah. Alhamdulilah. We've been blessed  with jobs that, even when they cause us stress, allow us to live a comfortable lifestyle, above and beyond our basic needs of food and shelter. Alhamdulilah. Our families are whole, healthy, and happy. Alhamdulilah. I have never felt closer to God in my entire life. Alhamdulilah.

I enter this Ramadan extremely, extremely blessed and I know it. And even though I won't be fasting due to my pregnancy, I plan to make the most of what I can do to show my gratitude and love for God.

The post would have gone something like that.

But it won't.

I only heard the news this morning after I got to work, sat down with my morning - decaf - coffee and absent-mindedly scrolled through Facebook while my computer logged on.

I saw one, two, three posts before I knew something had happened, so I quickly closed Facebook and went to the news. Wall Street Journal, then NPR.

A shooting in a church.

My stomach lurched. Please, don't let him be Muslim.

It was my first thought. It has been lately when there is bad news, especially so publicized. My heartbreaks to admit it.

Not again. Not another slander to God, to our Prophet. Not during Ramadan.

But I didn't feel any better when I learned, hours later, that the murderer was not Muslim. In fact, I felt worse.

I became angry.

So angry in fact, as the reports came spilling in, as the water cooler talk at work grew in intensity, I was shaking. 

It's Ramadan, and what you're thinking right now is neither peaceful nor forgiving.

So I prayed. I shot an e-mail to a coworker that I was going to be late to our 1:15 meeting and I prayed Zuhur in a conference room with the blinds pulled, no prayer rug, in a business suit.

I quieted my blood, my brain, everything. I had to, or I felt like I would explode. 

In anger. In frustration. In despair.

At the end of the prayer I cupped my hands to make Dua. I started by listing everyone I could think of, everyone I usually pray for in these types of situations.

Please God, be with the victims and guide them to Heaven.

Please God, be with the families as they grieve, and keep hatred from their hearts.

Please God, be with the perpetrator, and guide his lost soul from the darkness.

I paused. It was more than that.

Please God, be with the people of this country, and make the truth shine through the lies and propaganda that the media will tell them.

Please God, be with the government of this country, and make them turn from their greed and make decisions that will protect the people.

Please God, be with all of the lost souls out there who hate without understanding, without knowing, and act violently without care.

Please God, be with people who want to worship you safely, who want to live their lives without fear, but cannot.

Please God. Be with us all.

You know the world is in a dark place when you have to make Dua for everyone or else you'll be sitting there all day.

We are infected with violence in this country, and refuse to admit it. We refuse to admit there is a festering infection of hate, of disregard for human life, and of violence, and that we created it. We created it. From Timothy McVeigh to Dylann Roof and the many that came between, and the many that will come after today. We created them. We cultivated them. The blood of so many is on our hands.

But we will make excuses for them. We will excuse them.

We will capture them peacefully, without a shot fired or a bruise inflicted. We will escort them un-handcuffed in a bulletproof vest to and from court.

We will say they were mentally ill, thus nailing the stigma to an entire community of people who suffer from mental illness and are in no way violent or hateful.

We will not say that they were radicals, because that term is saved for murderers who are Muslim.

We will not say that they were thugs, because white boys (especially from nice families/who serve in the military/who are Christian) can't really be thugs.

We will interview their families, allow them a platform to talk about how sweet these men once were, until someone corrupted their pristine little minds or some terrible tragedy befell them. They will not be discredited or stigmatized, as the families of Eric Garner, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, and Michael Brown were.

We will personify them. We will use their names. We will show pictures of them as small children.

We will forget them as time goes on. Their memories will fade like an old polaroid because they will purposely not be captured on anything more permanent.

And we will not say that 9 people died last night because they were black in America.

And that is the bottom line. Don't. Say. Another. Word.

9 people died last night because they were black in America.

Full stop.

That should repulse you to your very core.

Please, God, be with us all.

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