Happy Father's Day! Fathers are great. They buy you candy. They buy you toys, all kinds of toys. They throw you in the air. They take your hand when you walk. They bear all kinds of hardship just to make you feel comfortable. They take all risks just to let you feel safe. You love your father. I love my father. I am a father, actually; and it is just a miracle of God that makes a father so passionate. You as a boy, so selfish and ignorant, never imagine that one day you can become so generous and loving as a father. It is said that when God created humans, He put one percent of his passion and love towards the creation in moms. We, dads, are almost as passionate and loving, I guess. So that must be pretty amazing – to have some miracles in you. And I believe every parent deserves respect for that. Some might wonder why there is a post about Father’s Day in April. Should it not come out on June, they ask. The truth is that we as Muslims and particularly as Shia, honor the birthday anniversary of Imam Ali (peace be upon him) as the father’s day. (Those of you who do not know him can google him. He is pretty googlable!) It is, possibly, because he is the father of our Imams. But I think that the real reason is what the holy prophet of Islam (pbuh) said about him. Ali and I are the two fathers of this nation. He is a person who took all the risks to keep the path of guidance safe from wrong-doer’s offense. He is a person who underwent countless hardships to safeguard the truth when ignorant people jeopardized it by their mistakes. He is a person who kept saying, “I will not be the one who starts the war.” He is a person who dug wells and planted trees in extreme numbers, and just handed them to the poor at the end of the day. He is the one who always ate a hard loaf of bread with a little salt, while he anonymously fed the orphans of his town with milk and date. He is the one who blames his soldiers for not defending a non-Muslim woman in Muslim territories. He’s the one who paused a heavy war, just to answer a truth-seeker in the enemy army. And the list goes on and on! It is never going to stop. But it is going to make humanity proud. If you want to feel proud that you are a human, just read his biography. Just look at what a human is capable of. Just see how beautiful you can become in your heart. This is the father of whom I am proud. Happy father’s day!