Turkey's Religious Affairs Directorate declared the New Year celebrations as “illicit” in Friday sermon given in all mosques across the country

In the Friday sermon (khutbah) prepared by the Religious Affairs Directorate, or Diyanet, New Year celebrations are declared to be “illicit”. The directorate has served as the principal agent of the social engineering project devised by the ruling AKP party.

The sermon by the Directorate, declared that “it is never suitable to a believer [Muslim], forgetting himself and his aim of creation [...], to exhibit illicit manners and behaviours that don’t comply with our values and don’t contribute to human life”.

The khutbah, inviting the followers of Islam to ask themselves the questions in a quote from Muhammad the prophet, continued as follows:

“We shall not forget that it is never suitable to a believer [Muslim], forgetting himself and his aim of creation after a year passed from the stock of life, to exhibit illicit manners and behaviours that don’t comply with our values and don’t contribute to human life. Such thought-provoking is that the early hours of the New Year is being converted into prodigality along with New Year entertainments belonging to other cultures and other worlds.

Such saddening is that the hours when one should account for the subjects of sawab [good deed] vs sin and good vs evil are being wasted with chance games such as gamble and lottery for the desire of becoming rich without endeavouring. May the Holy Lord grant us a better and more blessed time for the rest of our lives than our past days. May Him protect us from living a life that we wouldn’t give an account of.”

CONSTITUENTS ELEMENT OF AKP GOVERNMENT

The Religious Affairs Directorate operates under the Office of the Prime Minister. Financial and human capital of the Directorate has grown exponentially over the last decade. In recent years, Turkey has acquired a Directorate that comments on political affairs, advises citizens on religiously acceptable conduct, and is embarking on a major effort to spread Qur’anic education to the earliest ages, and to all corners of society. The Directorate is one of the constituents elements of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his AKP party.

The Directorate, not only acts in tune with the ruling party but also fulfills its chief objectives.