Sister Natalie who was raised in Church reverts to Islam

Amazing journey of sister Natalie (now Khadija) reverts to Islam. She is 36 years old based out of Phoenix, US and was literally born and raised in a church campus. She had to struggle in conveying her father and family that she has reverted to Islam  as she was baptized and raised by her father

My name is Natalie L. Avalos(birth name),,,,Khadijah M. Al-Raheem(new name)

Christian(southern baptist)reverted on Aug. 13,2012

I am 36 yrs., home maker/ student from Phoenix, USA

I was raised and baptized by my father in church. I am the only girl and the oldest out of three siblings. I am African American, Native American Indian(Navajo), and part Mexican also. I am a divorced mother with three children and the only Muslim in my family.

In middle school I had a teacher who was Muslim and and also many Muslim friends with Arabic names. I always felt very comfortable around them and could always feel a difference with them. As a child, I was always scared to express my interest  about Islam to anybody. I remember always reading books about the middle east and trying to learn Arabic. This was my little secret I  carried in my my heart. The biggest fear I had about converting was, I was scared to break my father's heart because he baptized me and raised me in church.

One day, as they say, "my world stood still", I thought to myself, I don't want to die as a non-Muslim. I remember being so scared and shaking as I took my Shahadah. When I finished, I panicked and thought I did something wrong. After calming down, I was so proud to be a new Muslimah in hijaab.

Surprisingly I have no problems except, where I live, there is no Muslim community, no masjid, no Islamic centers, no other Muslims. I am completely alone in my community. My only source and connection is through the internet.

Unfortunately I didn't receive much help from the Muslim community. I remember a lot of times I would cry because i felt so lost and alone. At one point, i thought of converting back but my heart didn't feel this. I started praying and praying to Allah for guidance.  Allah answered me and I started finding new websites, making new friends, joining groups and also blogging. Today, everything is much better, thanks to Allah.

I LOVE ISLAM AND WILL STAY WALKING FORWARD, INSYA'ALLAAH


(today sister Khadija is well connected and integrated with the Muslim community and  will soon be married with a muslim man...........In Sha Allah)

Catholic brother Sam reverts to Islam

My name is Sam Guarino (now Abdurrahman). I accepted Islam august 10, 2002. This is my story.

I was raised as roman catholic my family wasn't really practicing .I went to Sunday school and catholic school for two years. Growing up I was confused I became atheist and during the time I go into wicca (witchcraft) after 9/11 I was so angry like most of Americans I was 14 when it happened.

 The summer of 2002 I started thinking I wanted a religion, so one evening at home I start thinking about Muslims. The middle east, the music, the clothes, it seemed pretty cool. (Remember I was 15 years with a 15 years old mentality) I went on yahoo messenger and went to an Islam chat room. Told the people I wanted to learn about Islam and with in seconds I have people sending me messages.

 After talking for a couple hours with these people I saw they had the same basic belief of the prophets . So I decides this was for me . A brother I was talking to on a webcam from Saudi gave me shahadah. And within a week he had sent me some really good books on quran and its science and understanding the Qur'an may Allah reward him ameen.

 Alhamdulillah this is my story

Author Naima Roberts revert to Islam

Once she was a party-loving student; then Na'ima B Robert converted to Islam. But how did she become so convinced of the benefits of wearing Islamic dress that she now covers herself from head to foot and has written a book extolling its virtues?

Na'ima B Robert likes to see her devotion to Islam as similar to eating in a fresh, organic restaurant, while we non-believers make do with the greasy-spoon cafe. "It's something I want to share. You are free to eat where you like, but I would like to offer an invitation to the restaurant."

The trouble, though, is that to many people in multi-cultural Britain today, Islam is seen as the greasy-spoon cafe in terms of religious restaurants. To some, it represents suicide bombers and honour killings and the oppression of women.

How to change this perception of Islam? Na'ima is a pretty good start. Until six years ago, the 27-year-old married mother of two ate in greasy-spoon cafes. She was born in England, to non-believing parents, before moving to Zimbabwe with them, where she had a typical adolescence, partying hard, listening to pop music and reading fashion magazines.

When she returned to Britain to study at the University of London, she had hopes of becoming a successful career woman who perhaps married and had children sometime in her thirties. But then she went to Egypt and everything changed.

While she was there, she couldn't stop noticing the women in hijab (headscarves) and she was appalled. She could not understand why they allowed themselves to be so dominated by men; couldn't fathom why they wouldn't want to show themselves off. When she eventually asked a woman in hijab why she wore it, she was told simply: "Because I want to be judged for what I say and what I do, not for what I look like."

It struck a chord with Na'ima, and she began reading about Islam. While many of her contemporaries were partying and meeting men, Na'ima made the decision to convert - or rather "revert" as it is known in the religion - to Islam. She has just completed writing From my Sisters' Lips, an extremely thought-provoking book about her experience that challenges Western preconceptions of Islamic women.

Her devotion to her religion is such that she wears a full jilbab and a niqab, meaning she is completely covered. Mentally, however, she is completely uncovered, bubbly and extremely bright, holding forth articulately on her subject. "I am not downtrodden or submissive. I'm not a desexualised being. Just because we don't display ourselves outside, people presume we don't do it at all and, in a lot of cases, that couldn't be further from the truth." She lets out a huge, infectious laugh.

The problem is that nobody ever dares to ask her what it is like to be a Muslim woman. "I can't bear political correctness. It's so insidious, all this 'oh I completely understand, but it's just not for me'. No, you don't understand; you haven't asked me anything about being a Muslim. I prefer people to be up-front and ask me why I'm covering up. But nobody ever does because they think I'll be offended."

A good example of the misconceptions we have about Muslim women is believing that they are all helpless, potential victims of an honour killing. But as Na'ima points out, "honour killings are a pre-Islamic thing, a cultural thing that is filtered down through the generations. But for those of us who have learnt pure Islam from the Koran and the scholars, it's appalling."

The crux of From my Sisters' Lips is that, rather than making Na'ima feel oppressed, the Islamic dress makes her feel liberated. Indeed, she wonders if it is we non-Muslims who have the problem. "There is an arrogance in the West, a belief that you're on top of the world and everyone wants to be like you. But how do you know that the Muslim woman walking down the street is not happier than you? We tend to attach our happiness to material things but we're just fooling ourselves.

"The other day I saw a billboard showing a woman in a bra, and the ad was selling a mobile phone. The mind boggles. That woman is not being seen as an intellectual or an emotional being, but a sexual object selling a phone. And obviously the girl will say that's my right, and that's fair enough.

"But when I look at men's magazines it's all about sex and women," she pauses to correct herself. "Sorry, girls. Girls, girls, girls. It's just infantile. It breeds irresponsibility.

"I mean, why does someone need to wear a tiny top that barely covers their over-inflated breasts?" she laughs again. "For me, that's a self-esteem issue. Do you need other people to validate you and say 'honey, you look wonderful'? People may see me as being self-righteous and old-fashioned, but I just like to think that my self-esteem comes from somewhere deeper. I want to be valued the same way whether I've got a face full of spots or a completely clear complexion."

I admire Na'ima's reasons for wearing the jilbab, but I wonder if her faith dresses women in these garments for the same reasons. She says that Islam teaches equality between the sexes - why then do men not have to cover?

"I think that equality should not be equated with sameness. Islamically we are equal but we are not the same. We have qualities that men don't have and men..." She pauses. "I'm not going to say this next bit." Why not, if it is what she believes in?

"Because I don't want the feminists on my back. But basically men have things that women don't. They have physical strength and are the father of the children and these types of things. Men and women have different qualities and Islam recognises that and again everything has its context."

Na'ima concedes that reverting to Islam has not always been easy. She is an educated women from a liberal background; when I ask about her views on matters such as abortion and homosexuality she says that "my views on every issue are guided by what Islam says. Some issues are hard, because I wasn't raised that way. Sometimes I see the wisdom, sometimes I don't understand everything to the very core. But I submit to Allah. If He says that these things are obligatory then I submit to them.

"There are certain things that maybe you can't see a benefit to, but it doesn't mean that there's no benefit to them. As Muslims we believe that Allah knows us better than we know ourselves. The way I see it, it's like when you go to the doctor with an ailment and he gives you a foul-tasting medicine. I don't know how it will make me better and I'd like to make it taste nicer but that is not my place. The doctor knows why it is like that and I trust in him.

"If people have issues with that kind of belief, that really is their problem. I can't get into debates with them about it. It is not my place to do that."

(as published in Telegraph, UK)

Puerto Rican-American Rapper Hamza Pérez’s Journey to Islam

Jason Perez dreamed he would die before he turned 21. His dream came true. A former drug dealer on the streets on New York, Perez says “Jason” died when he became Muslim. Now known as Hamza, the Nuyorican rapper and family man spreads the message of Islam through his music.

The movie New Muslim Cool documents Hamza’s journey: moving from New York to Pittsburgh, educating his family about his new-found faith and raising his children Muslim in post-9/11 America

I personally went to see “The New Muslim Cool” screening in San Francisco, CA. Although I did not meet Brother Hamza Perez at this screening, I was honored to have met him previously at Latino Day in a San Francisco masjid – Masjid Al- Sabeel on Golden Gate Avenue. So naturally, I was very much looking forward to this awesome screening. I believe “The New Muslim Cool” is a first of its kind. Not only are we inspired by Brother Hamza’s spiritual journey to Islam, but with his life, his mission, and his music to reach Muslims and non-Muslims alike.

My personal favorite quote from the trailer of “The New Muslim Cool”, “You are a single dad, now you’re married, so you’re a married man, you’re Muslim, you’re American, you’re Puerto Rican, you’re from the hood, you’re an artist, you’re a rapper… sounds like America’s worst nightmare!” For many American Muslims around the country, he is the exact opposite – Brother Hamza is on a mission for our future. 

Q: Could you tell us a little bit about yourself – where you were born and your background.

A: I was born in Brooklyn, NY. I grew up in a housing project across the street from a Masjid. My mother began to raise me there. After I got a little bit older, we moved to Puerto Rico, and thereafter we moved back and forth between Massachusetts and Puerto Rico.

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Q: Can you tell us a little bit about your religious upbringing.

A: Yeah, my mom was Catholic. But, my grandmother in Puerto Rico was Baptist. During my 1st and 2nd grades, I was in Catholic school.

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Q: Can you tell us about your conversion to Islam.

A: I had an Ecuadorian friend named Louie. We grew up together, and then we got involved in selling drugs together. I kept searching for happiness as a young person but I couldn’t find it. I tried the life of the streets and drugs but that just made me more depressed. Even though we made money, it did not give us the taste or satisfaction of happiness. So, you know, we came real like down. One day, he walked by the masjid, and he was sitting on the steps and began rolling up a joint, and a Muslim brother approached him and asked him what he was doing there and started talking to him about Islam. And he ended up becoming a Muslim. We knew this mosque because we grew up down the street, but, like I said, the Muslims never came out to our community, so the only thing we knew about them is that they killed goats. So, in the community, they were known as that’s the place where goats are killed. So we were familiar with the building but not really with what goes on inside. Louise ended up becoming Muslim and was missing for 40 days. He went with Tabligh Jama’a (the community of teachers of Islam). We were from the streets, you know. We were Latinos; we didn’t know anything about Tabligh Jama’a. All we heard was that some Pakistanis and Arabs had kidnapped him. What the heck was he doing with them anyways? We are all Latinos.

Sometime later, I saw this Muslim brother I went to school with. He was African-American. I saw him in the store, and it was like, “Yo Yo man, you know my friend Louie?” He said, “No man, I don’t know any Louie. I know a Luqman.” I started laughing at him. I thought he was talking about some Jamaican stuff. So I told him to tell Luqman that I’m looking for him. So one day, I was smoking and I was with the people sell drugs with, and Luqman came dressed all in white with a sheikh named Iqbal. We were playing dices, drinking, smoking. He was with a Pakistani brother from Tabligh Jama’a. And I saw that both of them had nur (light). They had like this spiritual light. I could see the transformation in him. I knew that something seriously had happened in his life. So I left the other people who were drinking and smoking and walked towards them. So, right there, the sheikh asked me if I believed that there was only one God. I said, “Yes.” And then he asked me if I believed in the Prophet Mohammad (Salla Lahu ‘alaihi Wa-Salaam – Peace on him) was His Messenger. I had heard of the Prophet Mohammad (Salla Lahu ‘alaihi Wa-Salaam), but I saw the light in the character and face of my friend Luqman, so I believed it. So I took Shahada (testament to faith/conversion to Islam) right there in the middle of the street. My brother then took the Shahada.

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Q: How did your parents react to you accepting Islam?

A: My family was initially upset. But it has been tempered by gratitude that my brother and my new faith has gotten us off drugs and away from other dangerous pursuits. They loved it – I mean, my family loved it. My mom loved it. She thought it was very positive. I immediately begin to take care of her. I would help her out in the house. I would go out and do stuff for her. I wasn’t like that when I wasn’t a Muslim. And then, after I became Muslim, my brother became Muslim. Then one of my friends became Muslim. Over 55 people that we knew became Muslim. We went back to the same places we used to sell drugs and put up a sign that says, “Heroin kills you and Allah saves you!” So, you know, a lot of them were impacted by Luqman’s Shahada and the wave of Shahadas that took place.

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Q: Did you ever encounter any problems with your acceptance of Islam?

A: At first, since I was a brand new Muslim, I thought I should listen to any Muslim and what they told me. I really had no direction. Some people taught me to look at other Muslims and to criticize other Muslims by the length of their beards and by the length of their pants. And then my criticizing of people became long, and my remembrance of God became short. I started to lose the sweetness that I had when I first became Muslim and a year of listening to certain Muslims examining the faults of other Muslims, and I had to go through, like, a big transformation. And it wasn’t ’til I started sitting with traditional scholars that I began to spiritually heal myself from the disease of looking at people’s faults.

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Q: Do you see any similarities between Islam and the other religions in your background?

A: Yeah, of course. It’s all connected. The thing about my religion before is that it was really blind following. I knew who Jesus was, I saw images that were attributed to him, but I didn’t really know about Jesus besides Christmas, and the verses that we read were directed to us by the priests and the pastors. I became a way better follower of Christ when I became Muslim.

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Q: What impact has Islam had on your life?

A: Islam has opened up my eyes to my own faults. Before, I had this thing called nafs. I didn’t know about nafs. Islam made me realize that, in the streets, you’re always looking for enemies who are out to get you. And Islam taught me that, in order to find my enemy, all I had to do was look in the mirror. I also began to reach out to prisoners, using my faith and struggles to inspire them. My work also leads me into surprising alliances with ministries of other religions that, like my own, seek to build a road to redemption from the nation’s jails.

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Q: What was the most difficult thing to change and how long did it take you?

A: The most difficult thing to change… I think it would have been the whole woman issue. Yeah, because I went straight cold turkey – women, you know, marijuana, everything right overnight. Right after the Shahada, I went and took a shower, everything was cold turkey. I had a lot of girlfriends, and the next thing you know my girlfriends saw me walking down the street in a white dress. I was a good guy to them before becoming Muslim, and they just could not understand why they couldn’t touch me, why I could not talk to them anymore. I wish I could have been more educated back so that I could have maybe explained stuff better. But, Allah is The Best of Planners, you know. A lot of them respect it. The people I went to school with, I stay in contact with them on Facebook. I have like this daily class that I do with all of my non-Muslim acquaintances that I grew up with.

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Q: Did any of your friends or family members become Muslim?

A: Over 55 people that we know became Muslim. My grandmother and my aunt took Shahada. My brother took Shahada. My cousin took Shahada. Then my aunt took Shahada on a Sunday and then she died on a Tuesday. My whole street crew that I rode with became Muslim, except for one person.

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Q: How did your mother react to your acceptance of Islam?

A: My mother brought us up in Catholic schools. She worked two jobs to do that. …It was kind of confusing for her, but she accepted it. They would ask her, why is your son wearing that dress? She would say, “I don’t know, but just leave him alone. My kids are all drug free now, they don’t drink and they don’t smoke!” They changed their life and they are doing good.

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Q: How are your holidays with your non-Muslim family?

A: Of course, I don’t celebrate them. Certain holidays I choose to stay away, like Christmas. I give my family their respect for their holidays, and they really respect my holidays. So, my mother does not get my kids gifts for Christmas, she gets them gifts for ‘Eid. On holidays like Mother’s Day and Thanksgiving, I know they are not from the Sunna, but I look at it as … for my family, so I go to their houses, but I don’t get too caught up in the moment. I make sure I treat my mother good all year round. So, every day I see her, I treat her like it is Mother’s Day. My brother and I have learned to make traditional Puerto Rican halal food like arroz con pollo (chicken with rice) with halal chicken. There is a store in Pittsburg where we can get halal meat. I think we’ve figured out to make lots of traditional boricua dishes halal-style, even mofongo (fried green plantain mashed in a mortar and shaped into a ball. Traditionally it was seasoned with fresh garlic and pork cracklings. New versions are stuffed with seafood, chicken, or vegetables).

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Q: Has she seen a change in your way of dealing with her and your life?

A: Yeah, big time. Before I did not have patience with her. I read a book about the rights mothers have over their children and I became really scared that Allah might Punish me if I don’t treat my mother right. There is a story of a Sahaba that he was dying and he could not take his Shahada and the Prophet Mohammad (Salla Lahu ‘alaihi Wa-Salaam) asked him, you know, say it, say it. Then the Prophet Mohammad (Salla Lahu ‘alaihi Wa-Salaam) said, is there a problem between you and your mother. So, the Prophet Mohammad (Salla Lahu ‘alaihi Wa-Salaam) called for his mom, and they reconciled and then he was able to say the Shahada. So I fear that if I don’t treat my mother good and my grandmother good, and the woman in my family good, that Allah might block my tongue from saying the Shahada.

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Q: What do you think is the most important aspect Islam has to offer Americans and Latinos.

A: The most important aspect Islam has to offer is the true connection with Jesus Christ and the conquest of self. Once you begin to recognize spiritual diseases, there are ways Islam provides for you to fix yourself. You can become a better father, and become a better person. And that is really big in Latino culture…family.

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Q: Exactly. Could you tell us a few things about your new movie and your plans for the future?

A: “The New Muslim Cool” is a documentary about my life, after I made hijra from Massachusetts to Pittsburg. I learned to have a lot more respect and understanding for people who choose to follow organized religion, whether it’s Islam or Christianity or Judaism (or another path). And we all definitely changed by working so closely together for three years, learning to accept more and more that we can all be so different and yet have so much in common. All of us on the crew and production team – Muslim, Jewish, Christian, atheist, Latino, black, white, South Asian – gained new friendships and deep new levels of trust for each other. Maybe that can be on some microcosmic level what we could do as a society or even a world, if we could just be able to see each other as fully and completely human despite coming from different religions or cultures or economic classes.

It is about the work that I do in the community with the young members and the work that I do in the jails. Our mosque was raided by the FBI. They never really gave an excuse why they raided it. Since we had given lots of Dawa in our neighborhood and treated our non-Muslim neighbors, good we did not even have to speak. Our neighbors came outside and spoke to the media on our behalf. So, it was very positive. We feel like the raid from the FBI was really from Allah.

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Q: And your visits here in California, I heard that you had a great success on your visit to the school in Pacifica, could you talk about that?

A: Oh, yeah, that was amazing. I have never experienced youth so open to change and so open to Islam. We just connected on a humanity level. That’s something that Islam has broken me out of the chains of. Latinos – we give lots of labels…If someone’s fat, we call them gordso, if someone is skinny, we call them flaco; if they’re black, we call them negro. We always have these titles and labels for people. Islam has allowed me to look past people’s skin and the physical and look at them as souls and opportunities to get closer to God. So we just connected on a humanity tip, on a young people level…from one young person to another young person, and it was an excellent vibe.

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Q: How about singing your music, how about your music career…could you tell us a little bit about it?

A: Yeah, we got two new albums about to come out and one just came out in February. It’s available on iTunes. And, you know, we have nice non-Muslim fan base and a Muslim fan base. We try to do the music to address certain issues that we face as people, so our music has a positive message to it. I am trying to take my message of faith to other young people through hard-hitting hip-hop music. In Islam there are diseases of the heart like conceit, jealousy, envy, arrogance, hate, our pride. So, I wanted to explain this to the people who I grew up with in the streets. I knew these people in the streets, so instead of me saying their names, I put it in a poem; I said the diseases of their hearts. So, this is a story about them without saying their names but saying their diseases. So, it goes:

There was this kid named Jealousy 
Who had gun weaponry 
Whoever lived life better than him, He was his enemy
He walked the street like a centipede. 
Frustrated with his destiny
Living life like a dark legacy 
He had a brother named Envy 
Whose pockets were empty 
He had a forty caliber with a clip that hold twenty 
They made a plan to rob a drug slanger 
They ran into a drug dealer named Anger 
Known for his short temper by gangbangers 
And new cars and new clothes on the hangers 
They shot anger and left him dead in the street 
They left a witness Anger’s girlfriend conceit 
Conceit picked up the phone and talked as she cried 
She called up a big drug dealer named Pride 
She told him that Anger had died 
And that she had seen Jealousy and Envy with her own 2 eyes 
Pride picked up the phone and called his main man Hate
They looked for Jealousy and Envy ‘Til the night got late 
The found Jealousy and Envy coming out the liquor store 
They shot ‘em dead and left them bleeding on the floor 
These are the diseases of the spiritual poor 
And the Deen of Allah be the only true cure

Q: Jaka-lahu Khair, Brother. Thank you for your time. May Allah Reward you. As-Salaamu ‘Alaikum.

A: Wa ‘alaikum Salaam.

 

US Professor Dr. Jeffrey Lang – How I embraced Islam?

Quran wins the heart of US Professor Dr. Jeffrey Lang

Dr. Jeffrey Lang is a  Professor of Mathematics at the University of Kansas, one of the biggest universities in the United States. He started his religious journey on Jan 30, 1954, when he was born in a Roman Catholic family in Bridgeport, Connecticut.


The first 18 years of his life were spent in Catholic schools, which left him with many unanswered questions about God and the Christian religion, Lang said, as he narrated his story of Islam.

“Like most kids back in the late 60s and early 70s, I started questioning all the values that we had at those times, political, social and religious,” Lang said. “I rebelled against all the institutions that society held sacred including the Catholic Church,” he said.

By the time he reached the age of 18, Lang had become a full-fledged atheist. “If there is a God, and he is all merciful and all loving, then why is there suffering on this earth? Why does not He just take us to heaven? Why create all these people to suffer?” Such were the questions that came up in his mind in those days.

As a young lecturer in mathematics at San Francisco University, Lang found his religion where God is finally a reality. That was shown to him by a few of the Muslim friends he had met at the university. “We talked about religion. I asked them my questions, and I was really surprised by how carefully they had thought out their answers,” Lang said.

Dr. Lang met Mahmoud Qandeel, a regal looking Saudi student who attracted the attention of the entire class the moment he walked in. When Lang asked a question about medical research, Qandeel answered the question in perfect English and with great self assurance.

Everyone knew Qandeel-the mayor, the police chief and the common people. Together the professor and the student went to all the glittering places where “there was no joy or happiness, only laughter.”

Yet at the end Qandeel surprisingly gave him a copy of the Qur’an and some books on Islam. Lang read the Qur’an on his own, found his way to the student-run prayer hall at the university, and basically surrendered without much struggle.

He was conquered by the Qur’an. The first two chapters are an account of that encounter and it is a fascinating one.

“Painters can make the eyes of a portrait appear to be following you from one place to another, but which author can write a scripture that anticipates your daily vicissitudes? Each night I would formulate questions and objections and somehow discover the answer the next day. It seemed that the author was reading my ideas and writing in the appropriate lines in time for my next reading. I have met myself in its pages”

Lang performs the daily five-time prayers regularly and finds much spiritual satisfaction. He finds the Fajr (pre-dawn) prayer as one of the most beautiful and moving rituals in Islam. “It is as if you temporarily leave this world and communicate with the angels in singing God’s praises before dawn.”

To the question how he finds it so captivating when the recitation of the Qur’an is in Arabic, which is totally foreign to him, he responds; “Why is a baby comforted by his mother’s voice?” He said reading the Qur’an gave him a great deal of comfort and strength in difficult times. From there on, faith was a matter of practice for Lang’s spiritual growth.

On the other hand, Lang pursued a career in mathematics. He received his master’s and doctoral degrees from Purdue University. Lang said that he had always been fascinated by mathematics. “Maths is logical. It consists of using facts and figures to find concrete answers,” Lang said. “That is the way my mind works, and it is frustrating when I deal with things that do not have concrete answerers.”

Having a mind that accepts ideas on their factual merit makes believing in a religion difficult because most religions require acceptance by faith, he said. Islam appeals to man’s reasoning, he said.

As faculty advisor for the Muslim Student Association, Lang said he viewed himself as the liaison between the student and their universities. He gets approval from university authorities to hold Islamic lectures. “The object of being their faculty advisor is to help them get their needs met as far as adjusting to the American culture and to procedures of the university. They appreciate the opportunity to have misconceptions corrected,” he said.

Lang married a Saudi Muslim woman, Raika, 14 years ago. Lang has written several Islamic books which are best sellers among the Muslim community in the US. One of his important books is “Even Angels ask; A journey to Islam in America”. In this book, Dr. Lang shares with his readers the many insights that have unfolded for him through his self discovery and progress within the religion of Islam.

■ Story: First Salah of Jeffery Laing ■

I would like to read out an extract from Jeffery Laing’s book, “Even Angels Ask” in which he describes his first prayer.

On the day I converted to Islam the Imam of the Masjid gave me a manual on how to perform Salah. How hard could it be pray I wondered?

That night I decided to start perfroming the 5 prayers at their appointed time. Much of what I was saying was in Arabic so I had to memorize the Arabic transliteration and English interpretations. I poured over the manual of salah for a couple of hours before I felt confident enough to attempt my first prayer. I walked into the bathroom and opened to the section describing how to perform Wudhu, Like a cook trying a recipe for the first time, I followed the step-by-step instructions slowly and meticulously.

Standing in the center of the room I aimed myself in what I hoped was the direction of Makkah. I glanced back over my shoulder to make sure that I had locked the door to my apartment. Finding that it was locked, I looked straight ahead straightened my stance, took a deep breath and in a hushed voice I pronounced “Allah-o-Akbar” I felt a little anxious, I couldn’t rid myself of the feeling that someone might be spying on me so I stopped what I was doing and went to the window, I glanced around outside to make sure no one was there.

Then, I carefully pulled the curtains closed and returned to the middle of the room. Once again, I stood straight and whispered “Allah-u-Akbar” in a barely audible tone I slowly and clumsily recited the first surah of Quran and another short surah in Arabic. I then bowed with my back perpendicular to my legs. I had never bowed to anyone before and I felt embarrassed I was glad that I was alone. I stood up and recited “Sami’Allaahu liman Hamidah” and then I felt my heart pounding and anxiety mounting as I called out another “Allah-u-Akbar”.

I had arrived at the moment when I had to perfrom Sajdah. Petrified I stared at the area of the floor, I could not do it, I could not lower myself to the floor like a slave dropping before his Master. It was as if my legs had braces on them that would not let me bend. I felt too ashamed and humiliated. I could imagine my friends laughing & watching me make a fool of myself. Poor Jeff! I could hear them saying. ’Please, please help me do this’, I prayed. I took a deep breath and forced myself to the floor.Now on my hands and knees,I hesitated for a brief moment and then I pushed my face to the carpet, ridding my mind of all other thoughts. I mechanically pronounced three times “Subhaana Rabbi Al A’laa’,”ALLAH-U-AKBAR” I called and sat back on my heels and put my face again to the carpet. I was determined to finish this no matter what.”Allah-u-Akbar” I called and lifted myself from the floor and stood up straight, three cycles to go I told myself. I had to wrestle with my emotions and pride the rest of the prayer but this got easier with each cycle.

Finally, I recited the Tashahud and then I ended the prayer. Spent, I remained on the floor and reviewed the battle I had just been through. I felt embarassed for I had to struggle so hard to go through the prayer. With my head lowered in shame I prayed ‘Please forgive me my arrogance and stupidity, I have come from very far and have so very far to go’. At that moment I experienced something I had never felt before. A wave of coldness swept through me, which seemed to radiate from some point within my chest. It was much more than a physical sensation. It was as if mercy had taken on an objective form and it was now penetrating and enveloping me, I cannot say why but I began to cry. Tears began to run down my face and I found myself weeping uncontrollably. The harder I cried the more I felt the embrace of a powerful kindness and compassion. I remained on my knees crouched on the floor with my head on my hands, Sobbing for sometime.

When I finally stopped crying I was completely exhausted but one thing I realised I needed Allah and prayer desperately. Before getting up from my knees I made one last dua, ‘O God If I ever gravitate towards disbelief again then please kill me first,rid me of this life, it is hard enough living with my imperfections and weaknesses but I cannot live another day denying YOU’ Prophet Muhammad PBUH’s last exhortation was for Salah (Prayer). The last moments of his life when he was so ill, 3 times he got up and asked Ayesha(raa), ’Have the muslims prayed?’ Ayesha(raa) said, ‘No, they are waiting for you’. He kept trying, he would bathe and then faint, finally he (saw) appointed Abu Bakr (raa) to lead the prayer. He (pbuh) didn’t give up,with the support of two men he reached for his Zuhr prayer. When Abu Bakr (raa) saw him he started to move back but the Prophet (pbuh) indicated to him that he should not move. And he said to he two men, ‘make me sit at his side’. They sat him down beside Abu Bakr (raa) and Abu Bakr (raa) prayed standing and the people prayed following the prayer of Abu Bakr (raa) and amongst the last words of RasoolAllah (pbuh) were ‘As-Salah! As-Salah!’ The prayer, The prayer!’ He added, “Fear Allah with regards to the slaves what your right hands possess”.

This is Islam-Huquq-ullah and Huquq-ul-ibaad.

I would like to end this discussion with a Hadith Qudsi in which Allah (swt) said, “I accept the Salah of one who humbles himself during it to My Greatness and who does not perform the Salah just for show and who does not spend the night in disobdience to Me and who spends the day remembering Me and who is merciful to the poor, The traveller and the widows and who is merciful to one who is suffering from a disease. He has a light like the light of the sun. I protect him by My Glory and the Angels guard over him. I give him light in darkness and dignity in the presence of ignorance and his example in My creation is like Firdous in Jannah”.