Introduction to islam.. MSA.

Monday, March 19, 2007
Conversion Panel.
I would like to share the some interesting stories from the Conversion Panel that I attended this evening. First of all let me acknowledge my fellow MSA members who did a really great job. The panels for this program were Nuruddeen Lewis who converted to Islam 5 years ago, Coby Mayers, Meriam Ventura and Lana Lohaq Yazir from Louisiana.

The program started with Sister Maryam Ventura gave her speech. She was originally from Dominican Republic and was a Muslim since 14 years ago. She shared her experiences about how she was raised in a traditional Hispanic Catholic Conservative family. She was the only child of her family. So what turned her to Islam? She said that it was thru reading and questioning herself about religions. She read about many religions, from Buddha, Judaism, Hindu and etc. One day, she asked about herself, "I should read about the story of the Arab's Prophet too." Well, she bought a book written by a Muslim journalist and she found that the Arab's prophet who was the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) was so human. He was just an ordinary person. Unlike other religions who often had some paranormals and magic things, but the way of life of Prophet Muhammad was just simple. So from that she started to read the Quran, and then studied the Quran. She found many sentences in Quran that made her so fascinated and alhamdulillah, she accepted Islam.

Then, it was Sister Lana Lohaq Yazir's (please correct my spellings, anyone?) turn. She's from Louisiana and converted to Islam 19 years ago. She was raised in a Methodist family, and she said that when she went to Sunday School at Church, she always asked the Sunday school teachers about science questions but somehow her teachers did not want to answer. Then when she went to college, she was not interested to know about any other religions. Suddenly, her sister converted to Islam. She was so upset and hurt with her sister and would like to meet with the group or people who taught her sister about Islam. Her plan was to go in there and tell them how wrong their religion is. She did some readings to find questions about Islam and went to ask questions to them and they managed to answered those questions. Then she tried to find more and more questions by doing more and more readings and went to ask that people about Islam. They answered her questions and she felt so amazed. Then she read the Quran, found a lot of sentences related to science questions. From then she read and study more and more about Quran and Islam and finally she converted to Islam.





Next, brother Coby Meyers, how grew up in Kentucky. He was raised in Southern Baptist town. One day, he got a job with a Muslim employer. He observed about his employer's behavior as a Muslim, his employer prayed, fasting and etc. So he became attracted with this religion. He attended the Friday prayer and was amazed how united Muslims were when they wanted to pray. He never saw like that before. Then, he wanted to be more religious in his religion. He went to Church often and heard a lot of sermons. One day, a sermon by a Pastor made him changed forever. The pastor said in his sermon, "Buddhists worship Buddha, Muslims worship Muhammad and those suckers are dead." He did not understand why the pastor had to say that and start to learn more and more about Islam. He started to learn about Quran, and he knew that Islam is the truth. Alhamdulillah, then he turned to Islam.

Last one, my big-brother Nuruddeen Lewis. (Hey you improved a lot from the last presentation!) He started by asking the audiences "Why Islam?" He said that "Islam found me." When he pursued his study in college, he took a course about humanity and there was a topic about religions. There was a field trip to churches, synagogues, and mosques. When they visited the mosque, the imam told them briefly about Islam. He was amazed with a lot of similarities of Islam and Christianity. Then he decided to learn more about Islam because of these similarities. One day he asked directly to a group of Muslims of a question that made all the difference. He asked why Muslims don't believe about Jesus as a son of God? Then one of the Muslims answered his questions by referred to Bible and he was so surprised! He thought that he should have more understandings about Bible than the Muslim. So he went back and looked in the Bible and the answered from the Muslim was exactly true. Then he started to study about Quran and somehow he found that the Quran contains all but the true things and really convinced about the Quran as the word from God. Finally, he became a Muslim.

MasyaAllah what a journey from my fellow brothers and sisters! I really fascinated with their journey to Islam. Deep in my heart, I am so proud with my religion, with my akidah and I will not afraid to defend it!

23:05 Posted in Introduction to Islam
http://amarrazali.blogspirit.com/archive/2007/03/19/conversion-panel.html