I saw a post on Facebook the other day that said that when we say “Merry Christmas” we are essentially agreeing that Jesus was born on December 25th and because that’s not actual fact, we are committing shirk when we say it.
Dec 272011
The Christmas season is a bittersweet time for me as an American Muslim convert. I cherish my memories of Christmases past. I haven’t forgotten the excitement about Santa’s yearly visit: the letters I mailed to him (usually without stamps), the pictures my mom had taken of me on Santa’s knee, the selection and decoration of the tree, the visits to Secret Santa’s Gift Shop at Lazarus (the forerunner to Macy’s) to buy gifts for my [...]
All-American Muslim” is an eight-part reality show on The Learning Channel (TLC) which premiered on November 13, 2011, and ends on January 8th, 2012. (If you don’t have cable or have missed the airings, the first episode is currently available here on YouTube.) To say that the show is controversial is an understatement. Lowe’s, the home improvement chain, recently pulled its ads from the show partly in response to Islamophobes like David Caton of the [...]
Oct 032011
I’ve been struggling lately with the question: Who am I exactly? I thought I had a pretty good handle on that before I converted to Islam. Now I’m not so sure. Becoming a Muslim has turned me into something “other.” Before my conversion I belonged to the majority group: I was a white Protestant American. Now some people seem confused about my ethnicity and question whether or not I’m still an American. I can’t count [...]
“Muslims in the West” is a blog which features photos and short bios of Muslims who, you guessed it, live in the West. These are just ordinary people like you and me who happen to love Allah and who are attempting to incorporate their faith into their everyday lives. Some of them are converts, others born Muslims, but the one thing they all have in common: they are proud to be Muslim. The blog was [...]
Some of you who are reading this have no idea what America was like before 9/11. This post is a reflection on how I think America has changed since then. I’ve heard people say that they think 9/11 brought us closer as Americans. They point to the way we responded to the crisis when the towers came down: all those who willingly risked (and sometimes lost) their lives in order to bring others to safety. [...]
While I can understand using Arabic terms and phrases if you speak Arabic, I don’t think Muslims who do this around American converts realize how alienating this can be. Not only do we not know what is being said, which makes us feel like outsiders, but we feel strange using the words ourselves, especially at first. I’m always torn between wanting to express myself in my own language and feeling like I should use the [...]
Recent Comments