:salam2:
i'm not sure as to how many embrace islam each year. here in the US it ie estimated that the numbers are between 25-30 thousand a year, alhamdulillah. those numbers are pretty good, but there are many reverts that leave the deen too. not because they stopped believing in islam per se, but because they didn't feel welcomed into the muslim community. sadly many reverts aren't welcomed by many at the masjids. that in turn discourages the reverts and they think that muslims are no different than anyone else. i believe that we are a special group, we are the group of the Prophet
, which means that we are obligated to be better men and better women.
if muslims here in america really want to be successful, there has to be a marriage between the native born american muslims and the immigrant muslim community. that way people can see that not only arab muslims are united, but all muslims are united be they black, asian, white etc.
i always get bothered, when the media only show muslims as arabs or people from the indo-pak region, because it implies that all muslims are from this area and that these people have the monopoly on islam. they never ever take black/african muslims seriously. they never have black sheiks and scholars of islam to ever talk about or defend islam. it's funny because africans have had a part very early in islamic history, in ethiopia. there have been great african islamic empires that lasted hundreds of years in west africa. it's just frustrating to me a bit. it's very hurtful to attend a masjid and feel unwelcomed because of your skin color. it's hard being black, and muslim on top of that. still, many black muslims defend our immigrant muslim brothers and their causes, and we wonder when will they stick up for us? it hurts a lot of us because we're being ignored at the masjids in many ways, and looked down upon because of our color, yet we have been defending those same people looking down on us, when others speak about them, we know something that many of the immigrant muslim community doesn't know or just want to deny; which is that the majority of the american people see them as the N-WORD like they look at black people. that we're no different. for that very reason, we as muslims cannot afford to have racism in the masjids.
if i didn't know that islam was perfect, but muslims aren't; i would've stopped practicing all together. we know this stuff exists, so can you imagine how many people we lost to this? or how many shahadahs could've been made but weren't due to the lack of hospitality in many masjids?
i'm sorry if i veered off topic or offended anyone. it's just that this has been my experience and i get a bit frustrated. i just hate it when i see or hear people talking about the brotherhood at hajj; but when going to the masjid i see totally different things taking place.
again i'm sorry if i may have offended, but this is a very serious issue. i have yet to attend a masjid where a khutbah was delivered about this issue of racism.
