Spreading the spirit of the holy month through various initiatives, Windsor Muslims gathered Sunday at Devonshire Mall to hold a food and gift card drive for 17 Windsor food banks.
The 18th annual Share the Spirit of Ramadan food drive was organized by the Windsor Islamic Youth Council.
“We’re hoping to raise $17,000,” coordinator, Sousan Khaled told CTV News. “A thousand dollars for each charity.”
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Accepting donations online, Khaled said about 16,000 bags of food had been donated over the first 14 years of the food drive and more than $70,000 in PC gift cards raised over the past three years.
“We found the charities preferred the gift cards so they can procure what they need for their food banks,” Khaled said.
“We have just a few days left until our end of the month celebration. And so we are fasting and we feel the plight of those less fortunate. We’re actually fasting right now.
“Sunset, we’ll be breaking our fast on some food and not everybody’s that fortunate. So we feel that and we hope that the food banks could benefit from this.”
Ramadan is the 9th month of the Hijri Islamic calendar. It commemorates the first revelation of the Qur’an to Prophet Muhammad.
Generosity and charity are generally blessed in Islamic Shari`ah, however, it’s specially blessed during the month of Ramadan.
Many Muslims also believe that rewards are multiplied in the fasting month.
Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) said: “Ramadan is an honorable and blessed month, and the rewards for generosity are multiplied in it.”