A Matter of Faith: Islam is Fastest-Growing Religion in the U.S.
Abdullah Yusuf, center, prays at the Masjid As-Salam in Sacramento
on Friday. Yusuf says he was raised Catholic but converted to Islam
because he liked the teachings of the Qur'an.Latino Muslims
In April, California State University, Sacramento, hosted a forum on the "Islamic Presence in Latin America" before and after Columbus. One of the speakers, Salvadoran-born AbdulHadi Bazurto (President of Latin American Muslim Unity), said the more he examined his roots, the more he questioned the validity of Catholicism in his life. "Since the day the Spanish arrived, we as people have suffered a lot," he said. "Christianity's 'white God' concept was harmful to our people, who were definitely not white."
Another speaker, Daniel Denton, a Stockton elementary school teacher who was born in Mexico, said he was a hard-drinking veteran of the Gulf War when he began to explore Islam in 1994. At the invitation of Muslims at Delta College, he went to a mosque. "There was a carpet on the floor, and the walls were bare. I wondered, 'Where is everything?' and then I realized that was everything. If you go to a Catholic church, every few feet they have an image or a statue, but in Islam, there is no association between God and any image."
Denton also was impressed by the Islamic belief that each individual will be judged by their deeds on Judgment Day. That night, he took the shahada, the Muslim vow that says "There is only one God, Allah, and Muhammad is his messenger."
When he started fasting for Ramadan, "I heard my relatives in Stockton were calling my mom in San Diego and telling her I had become a terrorist and was doing drugs," Denton said. "When I went down to San Diego toward the end of Ramadan, I had lost 15 pounds and was starting to grow my beard. My mom was just in tears for days."
But, Denton said, his mother soon realized that instead of partying, he was staying home and talking to her as he had never done before.
"As she began to see the change, she came to accept it, and now she's happy. There's a saying in Islam that goes, 'Heaven lies at the feet of the mother. You have to treat her well at all times, take care of her.' "
Denton, 29, sees similarities between Islamic and Latino culture. "I've noticed that if you take away the crosses, the alcohol and the pork, the smells in my house are similar to Muslim homes. So is the behavior -- the respect for family."
Link to article HERE.
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California State University, Sacramento, hosted a forum on the "Islamic Presence in Latin America" before and after Columbus. One of the speakers, Salvadoran-born AbdulHadi Bazurto (President of Latin American Muslim Unity), said the more he examined his roots, the more he questioned the validity of Catholicism in his life. "Since the day the Spanish arrived, we as people have suffered a lot," he said. "Christianity's 'white God' concept was harmful to our people, who were definitely not white."
Our tax dollars at work.
