Ramadan 2025 Day One: The Straight Path

“Guide us onto the straight path,
the path of those upon whom You have shown favor,
and not of those who have gone astray.”
- Sura Al-Fatiha

On this first day of Ramadan, observed in a range of ways by Muslims around the world, I reflect on what it means to be “guided unto the straight path.”

In a world that has so much potential for beauty, reverence, care, and abundance, why is it so hard to find and stay on a path that supports their creation? With everything we need to steward thriving communities and ecosystems available to us, why are we in a spiral of destructive survival?

Staying on the path of what is possible, what is sacred, what is life-giving, what is Love, is not something we can do on our own. And it’s not something we will be able to do 100% of the time. But it’s easier to remember the path is there, how to return to it, and how to be welcomed back onto it if there is compassion accompanying us. Beings and Being that know our own potential for beauty, reverence, care, abundance, love - and how we deserve to experience them - isn’t diminished by the moments when we slip off the path. That sometimes those slips teach us even more about what love looks like when we do the work to return. When we’re supported in our commitments to repair whatever harm our going astray has caused.

Some of us have…A LOT of work to do to repair the harms we have caused. Some of us are long overdue to be welcomed back onto the path. And all of us need each other if we are to keep ourselves from staying astray. 

God’s favor,” “Love’s favor,” the “Holy’s favor” is available to and deserved by all - if we commit to making it so.