Hosai Mojaddidi – Heather’s Shahadah (Declaration of Faith)
AI: Summary ©
The speaker summarizes their journey as a Christian faith inquiry and discusses their desire to pray a Christian prayer. They emphasize the importance of practice with the "verbal" approach to their spiritual path and offer advice on how to do it. They also discuss the importance of bringing animals as a means of remorse and express gratitude for the presence of Inshallah. They invite viewers to visit the MCC community and receive virtual hugs. The speaker also mentions a woman named Heather who was saying that people should forget that the first generation were converted. They invite viewers to visit the MCC community and receive virtual hugs.
AI: Summary ©
You are here for this momentous event, this incredible moment in
your life that I hope you will cherish, forever. And remember
forever, and I just am so humbled to be a part of it with you, you
know, you've met one year and Madeleine. Aisha, as well. And
Michelle, they're amazing people, and I'm sure they've already maybe
even laid out the process for you. But just for the sake of, you
know, making this as efficient as possible. I'll just quickly
summarize, I'm sure you know, as well, the shahada process is
really easy, like commercial law to come into Islam. It's so it
just takes a sincere heart, and a few words, and that's it. I mean,
and we believe honestly, though, that by the fact that you're here,
you're already part of this family of Muslims, you are already our
sister. This is just a formal process to officiate it, but I
feel bad just piano lessons, I came into the room and I saw your
beaming smile, I felt that from you. So the actual process that we
do is, basically, I'll just be reciting the shahada in Arabic.
And I will go at a very slow pace so that you can repeat with me,
and then we'll say it in English.
Did Are you familiar with with that? I'm sorry, because I usually
get like all of this back sort of knowledge or context beforehand,
but this was a little bit done a little differently, which is fine.
But are you familiar with the Shahada? Do you do are you do you
know how the phrase or the declaration is stated? Do you
know?
Okay, Alhamdulillah Alhamdulillah? Beautiful. Okay. And if you don't
mind just for,
for us, just to have, again, total transparency here. Would you mind
if I asked what your previous religious background, if any, what
it is or what it was? I appreciate the question. Um, mine is one of
those
journeys that I can summarize fairly easily, but was basically
born of a situation where I was not planned my, I never knew my
biological father and my mother, not having a whole lot of insight
as to how the world works, was without religion, and was
basically just thumbing her way through life to the best of her
ability made a lot of mistakes. And so in short, fast forward to
20 years, she gave birth to my youngest sister, I was nearly 20
years older than and
when my sister was just one month shy of her 16th birthday, she died
from an epileptic seizure that,
oh, did I lose you? Oh, no, I am hearing
all of this, all of a sudden, I was just seeing myself. So in
short, that moment caused a real imbalance in my life. And I was on
the quest to find answers, because she was the dearest person to me,
I had never been so close or
really been able to measure what love was until she was born and
came into my life. So I ended up finding Buddhist monastery,
studied Buddhism, learned from some wonderful nuns and monks, how
to be more mentally disciplined and physically disciplined. And so
really, the first if I could call it religion
that came into my life was Buddhism. And then sometime, maybe
nearly a year later, my relative who
was also affected by my sister's passing, had suggested I pray a
Christian prayer. And so she gave me a book and I began to read and
then I was inquisitive enough and read the bible cover to cover and
started attending Christian churches and eventually was
baptized. But
further on down the road, I was really just sort of baffled how so
many of the pieces didn't really fit and I was still searching and
I had kind of stumbled upon some
some verbiage about the Holy Quran, and I was curious, but I
didn't really aspire to learn because I knew it was a different
language and I just thought I hadn't yet been fully inspired.
Until September this year, when I had been really just kind of had
the lowest point in my life for a very long while. I'm just empty,
really depleted and feeling very defeated and this bright light
came
into my life that just illuminated the beauty of all things that I
think that were pressing in my heart but that I hadn't really
quite been able to piece together in terms of who Allah is and what
Allah
what Allah does for us, and I was inspired to read the Quran. So I
bought my first Quran read from cover to cover. And I know now
that this was the definitive intention for me, it just kind of
took me a little longer road maybe.
And a whole lot of bumps and bruises along the way, but I see
how I've arrived.
At least hole enough to really recognize what is true, and I am
so genuinely grateful. Oh my goodness. Oh, my goodness, Aisha,
that was such a beautiful testimony. i Wow, you've left me
really speechless. Thank you for, for sharing that. I'm sorry.
Because you probably are going to get this question so much. As more
and more people learn to view coming into the faith and I have
to just prepare you for that this will be the question that
everybody wants to know, like, what's your journey? Tell us your
story. But what a beautiful, beautiful story. Thank you so much
Allah. I mean, first of all, may God you know, bring you peace over
your sister's passing, I pray that you are reunited with her in the
best of places. She sounds like a lovely person.
So I'm sorry that you went through that but the fact that you know,
she's her passing led you to this path is it's just it's such an
incredible, you know, gift that she left you with right even
though she really she left she also left you this gift. So
Hamdulillah you know, we always say that we all have different
paths. But the fact that we get here is what matters are the fact
that you're here. Even if you stumbled along the path we've all
stumbled here some of us were born into the faith we've certainly
stumbled a lot but 100 a lab for God's mercy and the fact that he
awakens us as you said so beautifully, you know, that just
felt felt illuminated and that really is what I think many of us
who embrace this faith whether we're again born into it or we
come into it is coming out from a darkness right that we just
suddenly realized this is what I need to hold on to because
otherwise we're just floundering trying to find our way in this
very, very complex world so and hamdulillah thank you so much for
sharing really beautiful i i don't know if you're in local or you
local in the in the Bay Area, San Francisco Bay area. I think calm
Concord Oh my God, that's where I was raised. Like, oh, my mom lives
there. I was just there the other day. Oh, okay. You I would love to
meet you. I would love to, you know, sit with you and spend some
time with you your clothes. That's wonderful news.
Yeah, I would love to get to know you more and hear more about your
journey. You're so well spoken such a great storyteller.
MashAllah brother Minear I'm sure you took note of the situation we
may have to bring her on to the to the speaker circuit at MCC at some
point
but no you really are you're very very captivating storyteller You
had me gripping you know right from the beginning so mashallah,
it's just such a such an honor. But thank you for all of that and
just again, I feel like mashallah, you know, you're already here, but
let's, you know, if you're ready, we can proceed and we can, we can
go ahead and officiate this beautiful moment, inshallah. So,
the shahada, as you know, you know, that it's very short. And
typically some speakers or some people who officiate will do it
one time or three times, based on the preference, are you
comfortable with either or? Or would you like to the prophesy,
someone who would emphasize something, he would repeat it
three times, and that's where that practice comes from. So I do
prefer to do it three times just to kind of, you know, inline
ourselves with him. And also for us who are witnessing, I think
it's just really, it's always beautiful to say the shahada with
someone who's coming to the faith because we reaffirm our own faith
in that moment, as well. So if you're comfortable with that, we
can do three but if you want to just keep it simple, short and
sweet. We can do one, two, as well. Whatever you prefer. I love
the idea of three.
Okay, I am so again, honored and excited to be here. Bismillah.
So we'll begin and I'll repeat it in Arabic and then we'll do the
definition after the three full statements in Arabic. We'll do the
English definition. And then that will be it. So Smilla rahmanir
rahim. We first begin and say, Ash hadoo.
Yes, I'm sorry, I forgot to give you the instruction. So I will
repeat
I will say it and then you repeat immediately after me. So we'll
start again.
I had do, I shall do and and let e la ha la ilaha IL Allah, Allah
Allah, wa wa I shall do, I shall do And now and now. We're Hamedan
Muhammadan rasul Allah, rasool Allah beautiful Mashallah. So
that's one down two more ash How do I shall do an en la ilaha La
ilaha IL Allah, Allah Allah, wa wa ash hadoo ash hadoo Anna Anna will
hammer Muhammadan Muhammadan rasul Allah rasool Allah, so I heard
you, I shall do an en la isla La ilaha IL Allah, Allah, what ash
hadoo Shantou Anna, anna muhammadan Muhammadan rasul Allah,
rasool Allah, Allahu Akbar, God is great. Welcome to the faith sister
Aisha, you are now a Muslim although you were one seconds ago
but your it is official you are from the lab part of this
incredible OMO welcome your sister and faith
that you're here is of course, the shahada, which simply states that
I bear witness that there is no god but the one and only God God
and I bear witness that Muhammad is the Messenger of God and that
is all it takes for someone to come into the faith of course to
feel it in the heart to testify in the heart and on the tongue so on
hamdulillah welcome welcome I wish I could hug you
did it and that's usually what we do there's usually a line and we
just everybody crowds around and
I have to kind of get through that but really special moment exactly
lock it in for allowing us to be a part of it. Do you have any
questions? Or sister Edelen or brother money or do you have any
any announcements anything let's I think it'd be good to bring them
back into the conversation inshallah. Anything to share Aisha
How do you feel Shala though is really really beautiful.
Mashallah, thank you, sister, Aisha for you know, sharing your
story with us it was really
moving and you know, it's, you've been through so much, much on May
Allah continue to open doors and beautiful, bring beautiful
blessings into your life. I mean, and also sister hosts I saw the
whole site if you want to talk to her about like the her slate being
clean and do as being accepted Inshallah, yes.
But anyway, thank you so much and Inshallah, like a brother one year
will be or has already added you to my mailing the mailing list
that I send out, so inshallah I'll follow up with you about that.
Because we have some stuff coming up in sha Allah.
Thank you, Aisha. Thank you, Elena.
I love it. Brother. Munir, did you have any? Anything to first
istration? Anything? Any announcements? Yeah. Well, you
said it all started up. But just you just honored us sister,
Heather, by allowing us to be part of this special day, it was just a
special privilege to be part of your spiritual journey. And you'll
hear this again and again from us because we live this.
This saying that this is a this is not a sprint, this is a marathon
and we're going to slowly and we are here for you. We're running
this with you. And and we're there to make it beautiful for you as
you are for us. We'll give you water to give you Gatorade to give
me whatever you need to run this run this marathon with you. So
that's that's what it's all about. And so thank you for the thing and
we'll start there we'll say we'll say that you know, your slate is
clean it's like the day you came out of your your mother's womb you
got to keep your good deeds and because of your wonderful presence
I can tell you have a lot of that
and and thank you for sharing your story by the way very touching
just reminded me of the old saying that God reserves his hardest test
for his strongest soldiers and
amazing so humbler and and before please pray for us because you
know, we are all weighed down for what by by baggage by things that
we have to answer for and the sins that we do. But your your your
prayers are very direct, very go direct to God
right now and so that's why we have to selfishly ask for
ourselves right now which is it's
so although it's not the same thing so forgive me it's not the
first no no not at all. Thank you so much thank you both for the
those reminders you know we do so
I don't know where that's coming from. But
that was like, you know, like a drum roll like
is that for one of you? I don't know where it's going
I have no idea where that's coming from. Do you know where it's
coming from? Brotherman here. I'm checking all my tabs. I have a
million tabs open around the southern house. I think it's
yours. Because when we were on mute, it was still coming. My
gosh, really? Yeah.
Oh, sorry.
Very beautiful. Yeah, we what it is, is part of the
video up for the kalam Institute. I'm so sorry. I had no idea it
was.
But the timing was so perfect.
Oh my goodness. Hamdulillah. There's no better words, of
course, numbers of Allah. But since raesha, as my dear sister
Aisha and Brotherman you reminded when you've come into Islam, we
believe that you are, as they said, like a newborn baby, you're
sinless, all of your past good deeds accrue, I mean, they join
you and also your any sins or any mistakes, any misdeeds, you've
made, also get converted into Hassan that are good deeds for
you. So you basically have, you know, abundance and a surplus of
good deeds to, then that's why we seek your dogs because you are not
only in that beautiful pure state, but you're also your dogs are
considered when we say Mr. Jab, which is, there's a lot of power
right now. Because you've come into this faith, you've made the
ultimate sacrifice and to come into Islam. And as an adult, of
course, I was reminded earlier listening to our teachers show
Hamza Yusuf, who's also a convert, he was saying that sometimes
people forget that the all of the first generation were converts,
the Sahaba, the wives of the Prophet, they're all convert. So
comrades have an immense role in our faith. And they have such a
weightiness because they make the ultimate sacrifice. And so you
join the ranks of all of those amazing, incredible people, of
course, and here, even with US, Australia, who's also a convert,
and who, who leads to convert care. And so many of our members
of our community, our converts, our teachers, you know, the
teacher that I just mentioned, I don't know if you're familiar with
his work to Hamza Yusuf, but I think you would really appreciate
he has a book on Islam and Buddhism. He wrote a section on,
you know, comparing the two faiths and also, I don't know if you're
familiar with Dr. Thomas Clary, who was he wrote many books on
Buddhism. He's actually one of the great translators of the Buddhist
tradition, he passed away, actually, I believe in August or
July of this past year, unfortunately. But he, he was also
a Muslim people don't know that about him. So there are so many
people that you're going to meet, who have had very similar paths
and Buddhism. Subhanallah is one of those traditions, similar to
Christianity, where people it's like a doorway, it's a stepping
stone that they will just with a little bit more study, find their
way to Islam. So I really was thinking of that, as you were
speaking, like, somehow I'm not surprised, especially because you
said you were a seeker and seekers, you know, a lot like
Subhan, Allah pulls you because you're seeking the truth. And
until you get to that truth, you're not satisfied. And that's
why your journey is so beautiful, because it shows the sincerity of
your heart you went through last year and you started you know that
inquiry and that inquiry took you to these beautiful other
traditions which there are beauties, beautiful truths in and
universal truths and all of these beautiful faiths, but hamdulillah
you're here, you're here with Islam, and
that of course, is such a gift. Islam really is a gift and I would
love to again, speak to you further Inshallah, when you're,
you know, ready to come and join us in person. I have Halal cars
that I do, or like gatherings for women, the last Friday of every
Thursday, you are always welcome. And if you ever come to MCC, I'm
five minutes away, I would be honored to meet you to give you a
tour to just spend some time with you. And maybe, Inshallah, when we
are able to do that we can provide some resources for you, I'm sure.
Actually, Sister Aisha already has that process already because
mashallah they're so good at helping you know, with a convert
care program to make sure you have the resources you need, but I will
happily share my information with you if you want to be in touch
with me any point
Shouldn't you have or any, just to feel like, you know, I'm I'm now
part of something much bigger and it is it's a family and I, I'm
sorry, I'm going on so long but I love this community so much like
MCC Brotherman here knows, this, I made I came from Southern
California and I made specific dua that Allah grant me the ability to
move close to MCC, because I love these people so much. And you will
feel the love in on this. And I've been a part of many communities.
But what you get from the MCC community is really, really
special. So that's why I'm so happy you took your shahada with
us, and that we will be honored with, with seeing you and having
you part of our community. So thank you, forgive me for going on
so long, but any, any thing to share any final remarks from you?
I genuinely feel so incredibly blessed as
as I realized that with the guidance of Allah, He is drawing
me near to some extraordinarily wonderful people, all three of you
have definitely a very special place in my heart.
Not only because you have gone out of your way to be so accommodating
to a very
on the spot, request, but I, I will tell you that I have really
been praying to a lot or
opportunity to
experience more of the Muslim community. And I feel like he has
brought me closer to some wonderful. So I'm just so
grateful. Thank you.
That's so sweet. I can tell you that the feeling is very, very,
very mutual. I'm so touched thank you for again, requesting this
last minute. shahada, I felt like it was like the lottery really, to
have this Subhan Allah on this blessed night. So thank you in
this blessed sacred month of Rajab. I mean, there's just so
many wonderful gifts that you've given all of us, and to reaffirm
our own testimony of faith is always as I said, such a blessing.
So thank you. I look forward to being in touch with you. And I
think Brother Munir for making that contact. He knows he knows
he's got that VIP, he could text me anytime he wants, especially
with these requests. I jumped on the opportunity, but I'm so
grateful to you, thank you, thank you so much. And may Allah make it
easy for you know, as Brother Munir said this is a marathon and
there's gonna be a lot it's such a beautiful time and I don't want to
you know, say any more than that. Just just cherish it, relish it,
enjoy it. Take your time and just really grow in your love of your
creator who's basically pulling you towards him inch by inch, inch
by inch every day. And in sha Allah may Allah surround you with
beautiful people who hold you who give you space who, who really
support you during this time. And and we're just we're excited to
have you so thank you. Thank you so much. giving you lots of hugs,
Virtual hugs. I know hundreds. I hope you're okay with that.
Because I will tell you at some point
definitely Virtual hugs, lots of Virtual hugs from our site to my
side.
I can do a quick closing door before we head out. Okay, this
Bismillah R Rahman r Rahim Al Asad Inconel in Santa Fe hacer el La
Vina M N O ye middle slightly had you at the vessel will help me
with the vessel be southern Subhanak Hola, como Handicare
shadow en la ilaha IL antenna software koala to buoy Lake
Allahumma salli wa salam, O Allah say that our Mowlana Where have
you been on the fundamental Allahu alayhi wa sallam? By that he will
serve as an embassy when Kathira Subhan Allah because Allah is it
yeah, my phone was salam ala l Mursaleen. When hamdulillahi
rabbil Alameen wa Allah we ask that you bless our dear sister
Aisha, increase her draw her closer to you provide for her from
every which direction Yeah, I'll surround her and and envelop her
in your mercy in in your care and bring her guidance every single
day so that she can again benefit our community and we can benefit
her home to do that. Thank you for bringing us together please bless
MCC and MCC community will Munir sister Aisha their families all of
their loved ones everyone's loved ones yellow Please protect and
preserve them all. Thank you for this wonderful gift and
hamdulillah sister Aisha joining our faith Thank you just
thank you yeah come back over you can take us you have a wonderful
evening both of you. I shall
have a wonderful evening brother Muneer as well inshallah we will
see you soon. Challenge follicle
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