As-salamu alaykum everyone!
Today I uploaded a video on my youtube channel about why I
decided to convert to Islam! I’ve been getting a lot of questions regarding
this matter so I thought I would just address it in a video! But if you are someone who would rather read, then I also typed up my story down below!
Just to give you some background information, I come from
the Philippines and for those who don’t know, Philippines is a predominantly
catholic and its not that multicultural – definitely not like new Zealand by
any means so growing up, Ive only known the catholic way and the Philippine
tradition. Every single one of my friends and family were catholic and I went
to catholic school – and we were just really catholic lol
I have always been a person that asked too many questions. I
just like to know everything about everything and if im not given a logical
answer, then im not convinced. As you can imagine, I was young and the biggest
fault of adults in my opinion is that they undermine the mind of a young child.
I went to a catholic school so we had Christian living education (CLE) as one of our
subjects. We would learn about the bible in one lesson and then science in the
other and the information was just so contradicting. Whenever I would ask my
teacher why the bible says one thing but science says another, I would just get
the standard “god works in mysterious ways” “trust in the lord” and just
statements that don’t answer my questions. It drove me nuts!! It made me feel
really different and out of place because here I was thirsting for answers but
everyone around me looked so content and happy with what they were told. It
made me feel angry in a lot of ways, like….why are these people blessed with
the feeling of having faith and how they can put their total trust in their
lord while I’m here questioning him. I kept asking questions and questions and
questions to the point where the nuns and my teachers over the years all did
this thing where they made me feel really bad “questioning the Lord”. So I
stopped….and just did what I was told to do but I always had this emptiness
inside of me.
When I was 12, we moved to New Zealand and it was a culture
shock. I felt different in the Philippines and I still felt different in New
Zealand but now, I also looked different. It was a time when we as a family were
struggling as well. Any migrant will understand – we were denied residency two
times, everyone was fighting at home, we…were struggling with money so
hard……..I don’t even want to get into it because I will literally cry if I even
get started on what we went through during those years but yea……..basically
life was crap and so I acted out and tried to fit in since I felt like I didn't belong anywhere. I gave up my morals and
my pride. I became a doormat and I did things I didn’t want to do….and that’s
not to excuse me for the stuff I did….I wish I stopped smoking and drinking
because of moral reasons…but the truth is, I just hated the smell and taste! I
don’t know how people can drink and smoke cigarettes!!! Its disgusting!! But
even with my distaste of these substances, I still did it – all for the sake of
fitting in. I was also an atheist at this point. The thought of a God did not even
run past my mind for years and I was just in this immensely destructive pattern and was spiraling out of control.
I had this epiphany one day and I literally told everyone
who stepped all over me to piss off. I stopped doing all the things I didn’t
want to do because I all of a sudden didn’t feel the need to impress anyone
anymore. Alhamdulillah, to this day I still believe it was Allah looking out
for me. My epiphany was so random - It was in the middle of the day and I just
sat there reflecting on all the wrong choices I made. Alhamdulillah, I simply
just decided that I didn’t want to make wrong choices anymore and so I stopped!
After my epiphany, I focused on my family. During my “time
of rebellion” where I acted out and did all my stupid crap, they were obviously
affected by that so I focused on repairing our relationship and making them
happy. My parents are very religious. They are roman born again catholics so to
make them happy, I would go to the prayer meetings and I’d always come to
church. It was actually fun! I loved seeing my parents happy however; I still
had that emptiness inside of me. I eventually became an agnostic – still boarding an atheist though – but Alhamdulilla, the concept of a God was slowly welcomed back into my life
through Catholicism. However, I had a big problem with priests because I never
liked the concept that I had to confess my sins to a priest and the thought
that people think they have the power to forgive people’s sins and make water
or bread holy – and that is not to bash Catholicism. I don’t want this post to
insult anyone's belief; that is not the intention of this post at all! – im just telling you MY story and the factors which motivated
me to question my religion and find Islam.
Fast forward, I found better friends when I went to
university and I was exposed to all sorts of knowledge and different viewpoints
during the three and a half years I was in university. I remember looking
around and seeing that majority of my friends were muslim. We surround
ourselves with like-minded people and it was just funny that majority of the
people I was surrounded with were muslim.
My curiosity with Islam began when saw a really big
inconsistency in the way muslims were portrayed in western media and how they
actually were in real life. Western media made them ALL look like extremists and violent
individuals who hated “infidels” yet, at the time I wasn’t a muslim and yet my
friends and their families welcomed me like I was one of their own. I felt an
extremely uncomfortable feeling of dissonance and because Im just a curious
individual, I started learning about Islam. I wanted to know what muslims were
really like, what they really believed in and what their religion is actually
all about. So I looked into their primary source which was the holy Quran. I was
astounded by what I discovered. Like I’ve stated before, I like facts, I need
factual evidence and the whole concept of following blindly in faith never
agreed with me – I never got it. That’s why I was so amazed in learning that the
Qur’an is 80% consistent with science and the rest was ambiguous. Science can
neither prove nor disprove the other 20% that’s written in the holy Quran. That
blew my mind because growing up as a Catholic, I never thought religion and
science could ever go hand in hand yet this book proved me wrong. In addition, Prophet
Muhammad (pbuh) could not even write – he didn’t know how to write yet 14
hundred years ago, he revealed advanced scientific knowledge that was only
recently discovered by man long after the prophet’s death. That drove my curiosity
to the moon and I knew I was onto something amazing. Mother Mary - who was my biggest role model growing up - was also mentioned in the Qur'an more than any other holy book including the bible! There is an entire Surah dedicated to Mary called "surah al maryam". Jesus (pbuh) is also well loved in Islam and any good muslim cannot even say his name without saying or writing "peace be upon him" after he is mention!
As I learned more and more about Islam, I learned more and more about myself. With each page I turned, I felt more and more at peace. Alhamdulillah, the emptiness inside of me was filled and I was overflowing with happiness. So basically, what convinced me to become a muslim was reading the Quran and learning about what it TRULY means to become a muslim. Allahu Akbar
As I learned more and more about Islam, I learned more and more about myself. With each page I turned, I felt more and more at peace. Alhamdulillah, the emptiness inside of me was filled and I was overflowing with happiness. So basically, what convinced me to become a muslim was reading the Quran and learning about what it TRULY means to become a muslim. Allahu Akbar
