'Judge us by our actions not by the actions of other Muslims'

Mourad Badirou's mom told him to stay home and not go to the mosque after six Muslims were shot at the Islamic Cultural Centre in Quebec City last week.

He agreed to stay away from the mosque for now, he said, but he also helped organize a vigil at the University of Moncton.

It was one of several events in honour of the Quebec City victims held across New Brunswick and throughout Canada this week.

• Hundreds gather across province for Quebec shooting vigils
• Donations continue to pour in for new Fredericton mosque

On Saturday, a March Against Islamophobia and Deportations, is planned for Fredericton at 12:30 p.m. starting at City Hall. The local mosque will also open its doors to the public Sunday, starting at 10 a.m.

If anything, these events show how much people care, Badirou said.

"I don't think people here, or people in the world want something like that again," he said.

"In this time, we don't really need a leader, we need people who promote love, show love, because everything is going really wrong now."

Fighting racism with kindness

Badirou moved to Canada from Benin, in Africa, and now studies chemistry and biology at the Moncton university.

He has experienced racism before, he said, when another student did not want to work with him because of his skin colour.

But racists are everywhere, and while he's afraid to go to the mosque now, he also wants to be a leader in the fight against terrorism and hatred against others.

The only way to do that, is to spread your love for others, he said.

"You can go anywhere in the world and you will have some people who have this reaction," he said.

"You have to stay best to bring the worst people to become best."

Terrorism 'very imaginable

Mohammad Ali Mhalla felt the same way when he helped organize a vigil in front of Moncton City Hall this week. Three-hundred people of different faiths and backgrounds attended.

Mhalla said it was a good opportunity to show solidarity and faith against violence, and he was touched by the outpouring of love and compassion he saw.

"I want to do it for the people who live tomorrow, not for the people who died yesterday," he told Information Morning Moncton.

"Because what happened, maybe it's not a common thing but it's something very imaginable to kill people who pray in the mosque, in the church."

Many of the Muslims who moved to Canada suffered from terrorism, extremism and war in their native countries, and many thought they left all that behind, he said.

Mhalla said many in the Muslim community remain positive and are not worried about their future or security.

But they were disappointed with Sunday's act of terrorism and worried about the negative portrayal of Muslims by some politicians and radio hosts in the weeks leading up to the attack.

U.S. travel ban no help

He said it's time the federal government punished Islamophobia.

"We need to punish this kind of speech, hatred speech, violent speech, division speech," he said.

He added that the recent travel ban for Muslims in the United States only fuels the fire.

But Mhalla respects the Canadian government for continuing to welcome Muslim refugees and visitors and hopes they will keep supporting and protecting minorities.

"Yes, we have the problem with the Muslim war, yes, there are a lot of things there, yes, there are a lot of violence," he said.

"But we are not there, we are here. We are Muslim Canadian, and people have to learn to judge us by our action not by the actions of other Muslims."