Regarding leaving recommended practices to win people over

Q: A person may leave some of the Sunnahs and recommended acts in front of certain people to win them over, so that faith may take hold of their hearts, or he may refrain from censuring them for some disliked acts to win them over. What is your opinion, Your Eminence?

A: The matter is not limited to disliked acts; rather, one may even leave some sins. For example, if a person is engaged in some things and not others, he should start with the most important, then the next most important. For instance, if a person does not pray and is undutiful to his parents, or is suspected of consuming intoxicants, or of some other sin, the advisor should start with prayer and explain to him the greatness of its status and that leaving it is disbelief. Once he prays, the advisor should then censure him for the other wrongs if he sees benefit in doing so. If he sees that censuring all of them at once will not have the desired effect, and he hopes that Allah will guide him in all matters, then there is no harm in that. This is based on the saying of Allah the Exalted: [Surat al-Taghabun: 16]. For this reason, the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) called people to Islam and to abandoning shirk (associating partners with Allah) before censuring the other wrongs they were committing that were less severe than shirk.