The American Muslim Community Centers will observe the Eid Celebrations from 7 a.m.-1 p.m., Saturday, Oct. 4, by donating food to needy families and offering a free festival, open to the public, at Fort Mellon Park in Sanford.

"On behalf of the American Muslim Community Centers, I want to extend best wishes for Eid,” said AMCC Chairman Atif Fareed.  “I hope this spiritual celebration will bring peace, blessings and joy to everyone in Central Florida and the United States. We look forward to serving our neighbors during this religious holiday.”

Eid al-Adha commemorates the willingness of Abraham to sacrifice his son Ishmael as an act of obedience to God and rejection of Satan. Central Florida Muslims will start this day with a prayer service, followed by sacrificing a goat, lamb, camel or a cow to mark the symbolic significance of the day.  Some of that food will be donated to less fortunate families in our area.

A Haitian orphanage founded by an Orlando woman has graduated its first two children from a school located on the campus of the home. Francia Dervilus and Robenson Talabert, two of the first children to live in the Danita’s Children/Hope For Haiti Children’s Center, received their degrees on the campus located in Ouanaminthe, Haiti.

“You were rescued so you can rescue others,” said Danita
Estrella-Watts, who founded the orphanage in 1999. “Today marks the end of a
chapter of your lives and a new one is beginning.”

Danita’s Children orphanage provides a home for more than
100 children. More than 230 children from the home and surrounding areas are
enrolled in the K-12 school, which started classes this fall.

Dervilus and Talabert received their diplomas on Sept 7. Talabert hopes to attend college, but, lacking the funds to do so, can only dream: “One day I want to be a diplomat, to come back and help my people. I want to change my country and my people’s way of living and, one day, to bring...

On Sunday, October 5, at 6:00 pm, the Negro Spiritual Scholarship Foundation will present its annual Suitable Airs concert at 6 p.m., on Sunday, Oct. 5, at Macedonia Missionary Baptist Church, 412 East Kennedy Blvd., Eatonville. 

The concert will focus on the 50th anniversary of the passage of the Civil Rights Act. Winning vocalists of the foundation's Grady-Rayam Prize will present a recital of arranged Negro spirituals for the first half of the concert. The second half of the program will be a set of narrations and Negro spirituals appropriate to the civil-rights era. 

Composer, singer and pianist Gale Jones Murphy will be the featured musical artist.

For more information, click here: Learn more.

Orlando Catholic Bishop John Noonan will honor Central Florida's law enforcement, public safety and fire fighting personnel in a Blue Mass today, 12:10 p.m., at St. James Cathedral, 215 N. Orange Ave., Orlando.

The public is invited to pray for the safety of the first responders, men and women, who risk their lives for the good of the community.

The Blue Mass is celebrated on the Feast of St. Michael, patron saint of police and
other first responders.

“We honor you, the members of the police force, the fire departments, the first responders and emergency personnel," Noonan said at last year's Blue Mass. "We are grateful for your dedicated service. We owe each of you a tremendous debt of gratitude. We can only repay you and do repay you daily in remembrance in our prayers.”

The opening procession of the Blue Mass includes the Orlando Firefighters Pipes and Drums and Orange County Sheriff's Office Pipes and Drums and Presentation of the Colors will be offered by a multi-agency Honor Guard...

More than 120 Muslim scholars have denounced the Islamic extremism of the Islamic State terrorists as being unfaithful to the Quaran.

The scholars, from around the world, issued an 18-page letter debunking the extremist ideology using passages of the Quaran as evidence.

The point-by-point rebuttal was the work of well-known Muslim scholars and religious leaders, including Sheikh  Shawqi Allam, the grand mufti of Egypt, and Sheikh Muhammad Ahmad Hussein, the mufti of Jerusalem and All Palestine.

It includes: “It is forbidden in Islam to torture”; “It is forbidden in Islam to
attribute evil acts to God”; and “It is forbidden in Islam to declare
people non-Muslims until he (or she) openly declares disbelief.”

Muslim leaders called the letter, released Wednesday, an unprecedented refutation of the Islamic State ideology and addressed to Islamic State's self-anointed leader, Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi, and “the fighters and followers of the self-declared ‘Islamic State.’”

“The letter is...

In preparation for Rosh Hashana, which begins at sunset tonight, the Chabad-Lubvitch of North Orlando held a "shofar factory" event for about 50 Jewish children who make their own shofars out of ram's horns.

Among those was Lindsay Rosichan, a 10-year-old Lake Mary girl who learned at an early age how to make the ram's horn sing. 

Read the whole story here: http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/os-shofar-factory-rosh-hashanah-20140924-story.html