Post by Islamic Revival on Mar 23, 2004 4:45:50 GMT -5
The new face of Islam
Copyright: www.iviews.com
Published Wednesday March 20, 2002
By Nick Compton
At first she tried to resist. She did not want this to
happen. She was not that sort of person. After all,
there were no gaps in her life, no spiritual ache; she
did not need support or direction. But she kept
reading and it kept making sense.
'I had absolutely no expectation or desire to end up
where I am,' she says. 'It was almost with trepidation
that I kept turning the pages and the trepidation just
increased. I kept thinking: "OK, where's the flaw?
Where's the bit that doesn't make sense?" But it never
came. And then it was like: "Oh no, I can see where
this is leading. This is disastrous. I don't want to
be a Muslim!"
Caroline Bate is 30 years old, blonde, blue-eyed and
pretty, with a soft Home Counties accent. She has a
degree from Cambridge (she studied Russian and German
before switching to management studies) and works for
an investment bank in the City. She is Middle
England's dream daughter or daughter-in-law. And
though she has yet to make her formal declaration of
faith in Allah and the prophet Mohammed - a two-line
pledge called the Shahada - she considers herself
Muslim. She ticked the box on a form recently. It felt
good, she says.
Caroline is not alone. Though data is hard to come by,
several London mosques have been reporting an increase
in the number of converts to Islam, especially since
11 September. Like Caroline, many of these converts
are from solid middle-class backgrounds, have
successful careers, enjoy active social lives and are
fundamentally happy with their lot.
This is not a new trend, however. Matthew Wilkinson, a
former head boy of Eton, became Tariq, when he
converted to Islam in 1993. Jonathan Birt, son of Lord
Birt, late of the BBC and now the government's
transport guru, converted in 1997. The son and
daughter of Lord Justice Scott also converted and Joe
Ahmed Dobson, the 26-year-old son of the former Health
Secretary Frank Dobson, has recently and, somewhat
reluctantly, emerged as the voice of new Muslim
converts in Britain. But it is a trend that has been
pushed along by recent events. So far it has gone
largely unnoticed, as the press concentrates on some
of the more colorful characters that 11 September has
thrown up.
Since 11 September, the luridly painted poster boys of
British Islam have been radical clerics such as Abu
Hamza al-Masri, the steel-clawed, milky-eyed so-called
'mad mullah' of Finsbury Park mosque. Here are
Victorian villains, fiendish emissaries of some
ancient and foreign evil, straight out of an Indiana
Jones movie.
Their followers are blank-eyed drones like Richard
Reid, packing his high-tops with high explosives. Or
James McLintock, the 'Tartan Taliban'. There are lost
boys, dislocated and dysfunctional, petty thieves
preyed on in South London prisons and young offenders'
institutions by fakir f*gins who forge an untempered
anger into a righteous ire and provide it with a
target. (Three imams working in British prisons have
been suspended since 11 September for making
'inappropriate remarks' about the terrorist attacks.)
But that is a sideshow, a compelling melodrama played
out beyond the fringes of Islamic culture in this
country. And while it might be stretching a point -
and answering caricature with caricature - to insist
that a demure English rose is the exemplar of the
modern British convert to Islam, Caroline Bate is
certainly more representative than Richard Reid.
Talking to recent Muslim converts; it is striking how
similar the descriptions of their embrace of Islam
are. Most were introduced to Islam, and Islamic
history and teaching, by friends. And, given that
Islam is not generally a missionary faith, these were
gentle introductions. For most, conversion was born of
curiosity, an attempt to better understand the people
around them.
Caroline first started reading about Islam last April.
A school friend she has known since she was 11 was
marrying a Tunisian, a Muslim. 'My best friend was
marrying into a different culture so I wanted to know
more about it,' she explains. 'I came at it from more
of a cultural perspective than a religious one. But
the literature that I picked up just stimulated me.
And Islamic teaching made perfect, logical sense. You
can approach it intellectually and there are no gaps,
no great leaps of faith that you have to make.'
Roger (not his real name) is a doctor in his
mid-thirties. About a year and a half ago, he started
talking about Islam to Muslim colleagues at work. 'All
I had ever heard about Islam in the media was
Hezbollah and guerrillas and all of that. And here
were these really decent people whom I was beginning
to get to know. So I started to ask a few questions
and I was amazed at my own ignorance.' He became a
Muslim a couple of months ago.
For these new converts, embracing Islam is usually a
covert operation. They quietly read, talk, listen, and
learn. The hard part is coming out, declaring your
newly acquired faith to friends and family, and, in
some cases at least, facing up to fear, skepticism and
even loathing. Caroline insists that the coming-out
process has not been too painful. 'The reaction has
been pretty much what I expected. I've had everything
from "o you know how they treat women?" to "Wow,
great timing!" But your friends are your friends and I
expect them to deal with it.'
Others have had a harder time. Eleanor Martin, now
Asya Ali (or some other combination of these names,
depending on the circumstance), was a 24-year-old TV
actress when she met Mo Sesay. She had a regular role,
as WPC Georgie Cudworth in BBC's Dangerfield during
the mid-Nineties and Sesay, who later starred in Bhaji
on the Beach, was also a Dangerfield regular. Sesay is
a Muslim.
'Mo was such a kind man, just a good person. He wanted
to know me as a person, there was nothing else going
on. And I thought, well, here is this really decent
guy and he is a Muslim. And the image I had of Islam
was of men beating up women and going round in tanks
killing people. 'The thing is we both had regular
parts on the show, but they weren't very big parts, so
we had a lot of time to sit in the caravan and talk.
He really opened my eyes.'
Eleanor finally converted in 1996. 'I wasn't sure I
was going to until the last minute and then it just
felt as if everything had fallen into place and there
was no other option.' At first she kept her conversion
secret. 'I was afraid of an adverse reaction from
friends and family. I was really worried about what my
father would say.' Her father was a devout Christian.
A former radiotherapist, he had taken early retirement
to go into the priesthood. But circumstances forced
Eleanor's hand. A few months after she converted she
met a Muslim African-American actor, Luqman Ali, and
they decided to get married. 'I went home and said:
"I've got some news. I'm getting married and I'm a
Muslim." My mum was great. My dad said: "I think I'm
going to get a drink now." 'It took Dad time. He went
to see his spiritual adviser, a nun, whose brother
happened to be a convert to Islam, and that helped.
And he's great now, too. He's just happy that I'm
following a path to God.'
Copyright: www.iviews.com
Published Wednesday March 20, 2002
By Nick Compton
At first she tried to resist. She did not want this to
happen. She was not that sort of person. After all,
there were no gaps in her life, no spiritual ache; she
did not need support or direction. But she kept
reading and it kept making sense.
'I had absolutely no expectation or desire to end up
where I am,' she says. 'It was almost with trepidation
that I kept turning the pages and the trepidation just
increased. I kept thinking: "OK, where's the flaw?
Where's the bit that doesn't make sense?" But it never
came. And then it was like: "Oh no, I can see where
this is leading. This is disastrous. I don't want to
be a Muslim!"
Caroline Bate is 30 years old, blonde, blue-eyed and
pretty, with a soft Home Counties accent. She has a
degree from Cambridge (she studied Russian and German
before switching to management studies) and works for
an investment bank in the City. She is Middle
England's dream daughter or daughter-in-law. And
though she has yet to make her formal declaration of
faith in Allah and the prophet Mohammed - a two-line
pledge called the Shahada - she considers herself
Muslim. She ticked the box on a form recently. It felt
good, she says.
Caroline is not alone. Though data is hard to come by,
several London mosques have been reporting an increase
in the number of converts to Islam, especially since
11 September. Like Caroline, many of these converts
are from solid middle-class backgrounds, have
successful careers, enjoy active social lives and are
fundamentally happy with their lot.
This is not a new trend, however. Matthew Wilkinson, a
former head boy of Eton, became Tariq, when he
converted to Islam in 1993. Jonathan Birt, son of Lord
Birt, late of the BBC and now the government's
transport guru, converted in 1997. The son and
daughter of Lord Justice Scott also converted and Joe
Ahmed Dobson, the 26-year-old son of the former Health
Secretary Frank Dobson, has recently and, somewhat
reluctantly, emerged as the voice of new Muslim
converts in Britain. But it is a trend that has been
pushed along by recent events. So far it has gone
largely unnoticed, as the press concentrates on some
of the more colorful characters that 11 September has
thrown up.
Since 11 September, the luridly painted poster boys of
British Islam have been radical clerics such as Abu
Hamza al-Masri, the steel-clawed, milky-eyed so-called
'mad mullah' of Finsbury Park mosque. Here are
Victorian villains, fiendish emissaries of some
ancient and foreign evil, straight out of an Indiana
Jones movie.
Their followers are blank-eyed drones like Richard
Reid, packing his high-tops with high explosives. Or
James McLintock, the 'Tartan Taliban'. There are lost
boys, dislocated and dysfunctional, petty thieves
preyed on in South London prisons and young offenders'
institutions by fakir f*gins who forge an untempered
anger into a righteous ire and provide it with a
target. (Three imams working in British prisons have
been suspended since 11 September for making
'inappropriate remarks' about the terrorist attacks.)
But that is a sideshow, a compelling melodrama played
out beyond the fringes of Islamic culture in this
country. And while it might be stretching a point -
and answering caricature with caricature - to insist
that a demure English rose is the exemplar of the
modern British convert to Islam, Caroline Bate is
certainly more representative than Richard Reid.
Talking to recent Muslim converts; it is striking how
similar the descriptions of their embrace of Islam
are. Most were introduced to Islam, and Islamic
history and teaching, by friends. And, given that
Islam is not generally a missionary faith, these were
gentle introductions. For most, conversion was born of
curiosity, an attempt to better understand the people
around them.
Caroline first started reading about Islam last April.
A school friend she has known since she was 11 was
marrying a Tunisian, a Muslim. 'My best friend was
marrying into a different culture so I wanted to know
more about it,' she explains. 'I came at it from more
of a cultural perspective than a religious one. But
the literature that I picked up just stimulated me.
And Islamic teaching made perfect, logical sense. You
can approach it intellectually and there are no gaps,
no great leaps of faith that you have to make.'
Roger (not his real name) is a doctor in his
mid-thirties. About a year and a half ago, he started
talking about Islam to Muslim colleagues at work. 'All
I had ever heard about Islam in the media was
Hezbollah and guerrillas and all of that. And here
were these really decent people whom I was beginning
to get to know. So I started to ask a few questions
and I was amazed at my own ignorance.' He became a
Muslim a couple of months ago.
For these new converts, embracing Islam is usually a
covert operation. They quietly read, talk, listen, and
learn. The hard part is coming out, declaring your
newly acquired faith to friends and family, and, in
some cases at least, facing up to fear, skepticism and
even loathing. Caroline insists that the coming-out
process has not been too painful. 'The reaction has
been pretty much what I expected. I've had everything
from "o you know how they treat women?" to "Wow,
great timing!" But your friends are your friends and I
expect them to deal with it.'
Others have had a harder time. Eleanor Martin, now
Asya Ali (or some other combination of these names,
depending on the circumstance), was a 24-year-old TV
actress when she met Mo Sesay. She had a regular role,
as WPC Georgie Cudworth in BBC's Dangerfield during
the mid-Nineties and Sesay, who later starred in Bhaji
on the Beach, was also a Dangerfield regular. Sesay is
a Muslim.
'Mo was such a kind man, just a good person. He wanted
to know me as a person, there was nothing else going
on. And I thought, well, here is this really decent
guy and he is a Muslim. And the image I had of Islam
was of men beating up women and going round in tanks
killing people. 'The thing is we both had regular
parts on the show, but they weren't very big parts, so
we had a lot of time to sit in the caravan and talk.
He really opened my eyes.'
Eleanor finally converted in 1996. 'I wasn't sure I
was going to until the last minute and then it just
felt as if everything had fallen into place and there
was no other option.' At first she kept her conversion
secret. 'I was afraid of an adverse reaction from
friends and family. I was really worried about what my
father would say.' Her father was a devout Christian.
A former radiotherapist, he had taken early retirement
to go into the priesthood. But circumstances forced
Eleanor's hand. A few months after she converted she
met a Muslim African-American actor, Luqman Ali, and
they decided to get married. 'I went home and said:
"I've got some news. I'm getting married and I'm a
Muslim." My mum was great. My dad said: "I think I'm
going to get a drink now." 'It took Dad time. He went
to see his spiritual adviser, a nun, whose brother
happened to be a convert to Islam, and that helped.
And he's great now, too. He's just happy that I'm
following a path to God.'