Quote from 'The Making of a Muslim' by Imam Zaid

One night as I was walking home after a party in the Mount Pleasant housing projects, which we used to call “Sparkle City” because it was littered with so much broken glass, a young Puerto Rican girl – she could not have been more than ten years old – ran out into the bitterly cold winter night screaming, “Why doesn’t anyone love me? Why doesn’t anyone love me?” Her cry echoed in my head and penetrated into my heart. I thought about the difficulties so many people were having in these seemingly God-forsaken places. The drugs, alcoholism, teen pregnancies, violence, and broken homes had wreaked havoc on so many innocent lives. Right then I made up my mind to work for a change.

-pg. 12 of Scattered Pictures: Reflections of an American Muslim by Imam Zaid Shakir