The Role of Preachers, Students of Knowledge, and Mosque Imams in Protecting the Youth

Question:
What is the role of preachers, students of knowledge, mosque imams, and preachers in protecting Muslim youth from ideological and creedal deviations?

Answer:
Answer: Yes, it is obligatory for households to guide their sons and children toward the right path, raise them in goodness, and monitor them when they go out: who they accompany, with whom they sit, and where they go. They must watch over them. This is the duty of parents and those in charge of the household, for the children are their dependents and under their care. Then there is the school. The school is responsible for raising Muslim children in the correct creed, good character, and uprightness, and for forbidding them from bad ideas, preachers of misguidance, preachers of evil, and bad companions. Then it is the duty of mosque imams to alert the mosque congregation to what they observe in them and to forbid them from what harms their religion and their worldly affairs. For mosque imams, especially the preachers, bear responsibility for guidance and direction, and for warning people against these trials, these evils, and these imported ideas. If these efforts are combined in the home, the school, and the mosque, then Allah will make them beneficial, and this society will be protected from the invasion of bad ideas and from preachers of misguidance.