so as they won't feel this lonelyness. But even like this we are almost never invited and people won't come to our house. So, generally after Salat aîd we're alone at home. Not very festive?
Salaam aleikum
ASalaamu Alaikum
I just found this and this is exaclty how I feel...just wanted to share.
http://montrealmuslims.ca/index.php?module=pagesetter&func=viewpub&tid=7&pid=1962
WA Salaamu Alaikum
D4E
Salaam aleikum
True, I seen the same. My husband was actually the first revert I ever meet. I mean, male revert... I knew one only online.
And OumYaqine, I see that in Eid too, we are alone... But Alhamdulillah, we sisters use to have party the day after Eid or something, and thats enough for me alhamdulillah. I was married to an Algerian man before, for 7 yrs, and it was basically the same then. But ofcourse, he did not want to celebrate Eid, because he had to work, and he did not care about it, so it was same then too.
But sometimes now, as I am married to a revert, that I am more lonely... And an outcast. Women talking behind my back in the masjid in arabic, saying "poor her, she is married to a norwegian man, she should not do that, she should have married an Arab, now she can not learn islam good".. Well... Lo and behold, I learned more about islam after my divorce from a so called born muslim, than I did during the seven years I was married to him...
And the worst is when they start telling me that I should have married this and that man, and I say, why, because he dont have papers or nationality... They tell me it was better if i married someone without papers to stay here, because I could help a brother for 3-4 yrs until he got permanent visa, so he could bring a wife from his country...
THAT attitude makes me sick, actually....
that is horrible, subhanallah I was actually told the opposite on SO MANY different occasions it is reverts who care more about religion and less about culture and try to strive for teh sake of ISLAM not have any cultural baggage mashallah!
Assalam-o-alikum my brothers and sisters in Islam.
I really feel sad as well as ashamed that this kind of thing happens in our community.
If this is of some consolence to you then allow me to state the reason I think is behind this behavior.
Most of the Muslims in the west are immigrants, and among them majority are first generation immigrants. The first generation immigrants have to do a lot of struggle. First they have to establish themselves, they don't have anyone to fall to if something happens to them so they work hard to make a living, plus they also have to learn the local language and culture etc which is quite difficult. So because of language and cultural issues they become shy of the local people. They also start missing their country and culture and food etc. and this leads them to seek refuge among the people of their own country/culture. That is why you will notice that Pakistanis stay with Pakistanis and Egyptians stay with Egyptians etc. I am not defending this wrong behavior but trying to explain it.
Also when these Muslims were living in their own country, they had Muslims living all around them so they never developed any habit of getting closer to strangers or even saying Salam to strangers, which is very bad according to Islam, but when everyone around you is a Muslim then it becomes hard to keep up with this tradition. And so they bring this thing here and do not say Salam to anyone they don't know. I think the second generation of Muslims will be different because they don't have any language and cultural issue and they don't care where you are from, so they will be able to integrate with reverts and all other Muslims more easily and thoroughly.
In the mean time we have this issue about which I have thought a lot, and I have come to a conclusion that this group of first generation immigrant will not change their behavior. I have no hope with them. They have built Mosques and established the basic infrastructure for the future generation but have done nothing to integrate the Muslim community. This will be the task of the next generation. But what should we do about the Muslims who converted to Islam and are now left alone to defend themselves against loneliness and frustration.
Since I have no hope that the current generation of Muslims immigrants will change their behavior, the reverts should take the matter in their own hands, take charge and do somethings to address this issue like:
1. Print this article and post it in the bulletin board of Mosques you go to. Maybe it will put some Muslims to shame and they start doing something to address this issue.
2. Arrange meeting (Halaqa) in your home on regular basis (e.g. on every Thursday evening or Sunday afternoon etc.) in which you invite people from your local Masjid. It may cost some money initially if you also provide some snacks like chips and coke etc. But it will help you in making yourself introduced to the community and get familiar with them too. Eventually people will know you and start inviting you to their homes too. Why this is important? because in a close community people go to each others homes, it promotes love and affection among people.
3. If you find reverts in your area then have a Halaqa (group meeting) of those reverts too on regular basis.
Brother and sisters human being is a social creature, you cannot live alone for a long time. I know it is hard to mingle among people who feel no desire to mingle, but you have to do it. I would do it if I am in your situation. May be not all be friendly, but some will definetly respond. You can see where I live and if there is any brother or sister live around here then send me a PM, Me and/or my wife will be happy to do whatever we could to help.
accompanied by a handshake.
:salam2:
You're not alone Brothers and Sisters. Countess Muslims in the west face the same reality, whether they are reverts or not. I live in a part of London near Heathrow called Southall, where you'll probably pass hundreds of Muslims just by walking down the broadway yet my relationship with Brothers barely extends beyond :salam2:,
If anyone thinks that's all Brotherhood in Islam is about, then they have to go a lot deeper than that.This was nothing new to me as I've spent most of my life here, but during my time in Cairo and Jeddah I felt something different, something which I never truly experienced until then; the Beauty of Brotherhood and sadly everything I see here is just pale in comparison. Of course, situations and experiences differ, this is just my reality.
It is not just your reality, it is a real problem in the Umma I think . And since the number of reverted people is increasing this problem will increase too if we do nothing. When someone is sick you need to heel him. I really can understand that you've found brotherhood in Jeddah ,I 've been there and i love this city but you know, I hope soon we will be thousand of reverted people and there's no place for all of us in Jeddah or Maccah or Dubai...;The Ummah must grow and we have to accept that we're all brothers and sisters, doesn't matter if we're reverted one year, one month ago or if we 've been raised as a muslim. Please ,don't think that i'm rude with my words(as i'm pleasedto tell every time english is my fourthlanguage so I make big mistakes sometimes)but our community has to grow up really!
Our Umma must grow up , really. The last time that we had to choose the members Muslim Council that represent us towards the belgian government you had a turkish candidate, a reverted one and an arabic one and each community voted for his origin. I mean, something is going wrong i think. Well that is only my opinion and may Allah forgive if I said something wrong.
