Muslim Link is proud to be a Silver Sponsor of this year's I.LEAD Conference which is taking place Saturday, April 16 at the EY Centre in Ottawa.

Born and raised in Montreal, Indo-Pakistani Canadian Navaid Aziz, 33, stumbled upon a vocation as an Islamic scholar when he was accepted to the Islamic University of Madinah in Saudi Arabia at 17. Now an imam in Calgary, Aziz will be coming to Ottawa’s I.LEAD Conference to discuss youth empowerment, countering radicalization in Muslim communities, and creating a balanced and just Muslim community.

Born and raised in British Columbia, Islamic Studies teacher Hafsa Dean Thompson will be participating in this year’s I.LEAD Conference. She will be leading a women’s only session addressing the challenges Muslim women face in finding balance in their daily lives.

Muslim Link had the chance to interview her about her pursuit of Islamic scholarship, her community work with Muslim women in crisis and in prison, and why she prefers to focus her educational efforts on women only.

On May 17th, thousands of Muslims attended the second annual I.LEAD Conference. Muslim Link chose to interview a father and daughter to get an intergenerational perspective on the conference whose theme this year was “Muslim Youth Identity”.

“Praise belongs to Allah, the Lord of all the worlds. The All-Merciful, the Very-Merciful…You alone do we worship, and from You alone do we seek help...”

(Holy Qur’an, 1, 1:6)

A rainy day in May – it’s cold and grey, the perfect day to stay in with a good book and a cup of coffee. Not so for the ILEAD team of youth volunteers who are responsible of making promo videos for the conference.

The recent I.LEAD Conference held on March 16 was a great success!  It was a very social way to end the March Break with youth from all over the Ottawa-Gatineau region coming together to make a difference. For a first-time event, I think everyone was amazed by the turnout, with more than 2,500 people attending!  We heard speeches by well known scholars and Imams, including Sheikh Yassir Fazaga, Imam Tahir Anwar and Sheikh Navaid Aziz.

Like most great ideas, this one started modestly enough.A few eager Ottawa residents thought it would be neat to invite a popular Canadian Muslim scholar to launch a new book on Islam in the nation's capital.

So they got together with a formal group of Muslim organizations to plan a conference which would bring Dr. Jamal Badawi to Ottawa, as well as other scholars to discuss important faith issues.

That was in 2011. Two years later, that modest idea has grown into a major youth conference scheduled for March 16, 2013 which aims to support young Muslims in every facet of their lives. Organizers are also thrilled that the conference also marks one of the most significant collaborations between Muslim organizations and youth groups ever to happen in Ottawa.