Nahela Morales – Q & A for Non Muslim w
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Salam aleikum. We were having some technical difficulties but here we
are at hamdulillah
welcome back to another Live episode of about us. My name is
Mahela Morales and today I will be answering q&a For non Muslims in
sha Allah. So I'll give it a couple of minutes for some folks
to start hopping on and then we'll get started in sha Allah
we'll just give it a couple more minutes a couple more seconds and
we'll get started with Nila
thank you for joining. Again my name is Neva mirallas And today's
life talk we will be addressing a some of the most common questions
that I get asked as an idea and
and inshallah we will get started in a few seconds
if you have any other questions that you want me to answer please
feel free to drop them below and I will answer them in sha Allah
okay we're gonna get started
huh I think we'll get started
just trying to share it as well so others benefit
Shala
Okay,
so here we go. I will be lucky when a shaytan al rajim Bismillahi
Rahmani Raheem Subhan Allah he will be handy worshiping Allah
Ilaha illa Allah wa shadow anna Muhammad Rasul Allah. Again,
welcome to another episode of about Islam. My name is the halal
mirallas I am a convert I am Mexican American, and Hamdulillah.
I've been very blessed, very fortunate to travel the world and
convey the message of our beautiful faith. And so today I
will be answering questions that I have been approached with from non
Muslims. So let's get started.
The first question that I oftentimes gets asked about is, do
I feel opress? So this is this is one of the biggest misconceptions
that we Muslim women answer or are asked at least once in our Muslim
life,
per se, but I want to really tackle a little bit for those non
Muslims that are watching and that are listening. Islam as a matter
of fact, there's something that attracted me personally into this
faith was the fact that women have a lot of rights in Islam.
Around the 600 ce, ce, a women were actually given many of these
rights. So we're talking about
some centuries ago, about 1516 centuries ago. For those of you
that don't know, in the US the right to vote for women was in the
19th century around the 1920s. And is slam gave the women the right
to sit at the table and become part of the conversation. So that
puts us about 13 centuries back.
Not only that another write that us women have, that many of you
may not know is the right to own property. For those of you that
may not know in Europe, around 1870, there was a law passed where
women after getting married, they were asked to sign their
properties off to their husbands or their spouse. And so there's
nothing like this in a slam women have the right to own their own
property. Women have the right to work. We have the right to work.
And one of the most beautiful things is that we have the right
To contribute in our homes or keep it all to ourselves. So, once we
get married ladies, their money is our money is our money and our
spouses money is our money as well. So mashallah Alhamdulillah.
So I don't feel oppressed, on the contrary, upon embracing Islam, I
can tell you that I liberated I feel more liberated than ever.
The misconception of the hijab being, you know,
being imposed on us is a misconception. As a matter of
fact, many Muslim women, you know, the hijab is a journey of its own.
So many Muslim women are on that journey and have not have not
started wearing the headscarf doesn't mean that they're less
Muslim. It just means they're on their journey. And so that answers
my next question, which is, is hijab imposed on you? No hijab
actually is not imposed on us. It is. In Arabic, the word fun means
obligatory, so it is in the Quran. And Allah God Almighty instructs
us to cover. But again, this is a decision that each and every one
of us makes upon our journey, and throughout our journey. So I know
that there are sisters that struggle with the headscarf and
for me personally, it wasn't a huge deal because I saw my
grandmother wearing in Mexico, it's called a rebel soul. And so
prior to going into church, she would cover her head. And so it
wasn't so foreign for me Alhamdulillah I saw that within my
my grandmother, my maternal grandmother, but it's not imposed,
you do have a choice. It is obligatory Allah, God ordains it.
But again, this is your own journey. And so one of the things
that we hope is that we grow in our faith each and every day, and
one of the ways to see our growth is to see our obedience to our
Creator. So for those non Muslims watching, know the headscarf is
not something that is imposed on us. It is obviously required of us
but we take our time with it until we completely understand. And
actually, before I converted, I was very attracted to the
headscarf and I started playing with the headscarf right prior to
converting. I just found it very fascinating to look different. And
so
I remember the first time I went to Mexico with a headscarf they
thought I was foreign like from the Middle East or what have you.
So there is still alive in misconception about the headscarf
or Islam being foreign. It only belongs to the Middle East. I am
Mexican. And so there is Islam has been spreading Alhamdulillah
Our Praises be to guide
all over Latin America, Europe, you name it. There are Muslims.
Another question, as a matter of fact, last Friday, or last
Thursday, I'm sorry, last Thursday. I actually gave a
Shahada. There was somebody that contacted me, and one of her
biggest struggle with accepting Islam earlier was the next
question. Do we believe in Jesus? Yes, we believe respect and love
Jesus peace be upon him. But the only difference between us and
Christianity is that we do not worship Him. And so when I was
speaking to her name is Paloma, please keep her in your do us. She
took shahada with my son and I last Thursday, I explained to her
right in a Coliseum.
We are taught three and one. And we are taught that he is the Son
of God and so us we Muslims, we don't believe that God can have
children. He is a superior being and therefore that's the only
difference between us and Christians. And once I cleared up
that misconception that she didn't have to let go of Jesus isa in
Arabic, peace be upon him. On the contrary, I explained to her that
him and his mother Peace be upon both of them are very, very
special, dear and respected and our religion as a matter of fact,
chapter 19 is medium and it speaks
About his about the miracle birth, and it speaks about his his life.
And so that tells you alone that we believe him. We believe in Him,
we respect him, we love him, but we do not worship him. And he
actually said not to worship him as well. One fun fact perhaps that
non Muslims don't know Jesus peace be upon him, used to pray like us
Muslims, he actually used to prostrate, and put his forehead on
the floor like we do. And we call that St. Jude.
And so that's prostration. And so that's something a lot of people
don't know that we have more in common than a differences. And why
do I say that? Because
the the message that Jesus brought is the same message that all the
prophets brought to mankind, or to their, to their,
to their people. And so the seal of the prophets is Prophet
Muhammad, peace be upon him. And so that is the continuation of
what he said Jesus peace be upon him brought, which was to worship
one God. And that's really ultimately what attracted me to
Islam personally, the fact that I didn't need any, any I didn't need
to associate I didn't need intermediate, I didn't need to go
through any saint, I can have a one on one relationship with my
Creator. And that's really what attracted me personally to Islam.
The fact that I already had a relationship with an understanding
of Jesus just made it even more easy once I learned that there's a
whole chapter dedicated to his mother,
Mary, Mary PSB, upon her
next question, when is the right time to convert? As a matter of
fact, this question by Loma who embraced Islam with us, this past
Thursday, asked us we were preparing to end our two hour
conversation and she
you know, I answered all her questions and she was asking, you
know, now what now I believe in one God now what happens? And so I
told her, you will feel it. i In Islam, in the Quran, it says
there's no compulsion in religion. So Allah subhanaw taala wants us
to have full conviction when it comes to us seeking and asking for
guidance. And that's exactly what I told Palawan sister Paloma. I
said, you know, from here onwards, I want you to raise your hands,
supplicate and ask Allah, God Almighty to guide you. And that's
ultimately what I did. I started asking Allah to guide me to the
right path to guide me I needed
I needed to fulfill a void that nothing could fulfill but Him and
Him alone. And so
I told her, you know, you will know when it's the right time, you
will feel it. And as we were getting ready to close the the
conversation, she said, I'm ready. And I was so shocked. I said,
ready for what? And she goes for my Shahada. And I said now and so
she says, Now I feel that I am ready because I don't know if I
will wake up tomorrow. And so you mentioned that and the rest was
history. I called my son Hamdulillah. And she she
completely understood and obviously, we went through the
five pillars of Islam.
For those non Muslims watching, we do have five pillars that we abide
by, which is the first one the shahada number two is that we pray
five times a day and that is very important for anyone watching
Warren Muslim river convert. It's very important to make sure that
you establish your prayer your Salaat on time, it's five times a
day this is our oxygen This is our connection with our Creator on a
daily basis. And the third pillar is Sokak which is
charity we are we are asked to give 2.5 of our wealth. And so we
do that and we also fast during the month of Ramadan which
surprisingly we are about six months away already Ramadan is
around the corner Subhanallah and so we fast during the entire
month, this is the month where the Quran was revealed. And so it's a
very special month for us. No we don't start. It's we start praying
helps our stomach but we fulfil and feed our soul. And one way to
do that is by extra prayers by reading more Quran by connecting
with our Creator on a whole different level. And we hope that
we continue that throughout the year. And last but not least, we
the fifth pillar that I explained to the sister prior to embracing
Islam was the Hajj, which I was very blessed. After 12 years of
being Muslim, Allah finally invited me to his house, and this
is located in Mecca in Saudi Arabia. And so this is the large
pilgrimage this year before the pandemic hit, I was blessed again
to go for my first umara. And so humbled that it is a blessing and
it is an invitation from Allah from God.
So again, when is the right time, the right time, you will feel it,
for those of you that are seeking for something better, which is
what I was seeking for something better for myself, and for my
family, my son, I'm a single mom of one. And so Allah finally
guided me into this wonderful way of life. We believe that Islam is
not just a religion, it's a way of life. And so, the next question
that I got was,
Do I tell my family after I embraces slam, and it's a two part
question,
what if they reject me? So one of the things that we have to be very
cautious and Paloma, the sister that embrace Islam this past
Thursday, she ran to tell her mother after and have the last she
was not happy, but was content that she was able to do something
out of conviction versus something imposed on her. And so she
explained to me that prior to her searching, she was Catholic,
similar to me, I was born into Catholicism. And I went on a
spiritual quest, at a very young age, eventually came to Islam. For
her she was born into Catholicism, her parents converted to
Christianity. And she just never felt it. And then she was on a
spiritual quest and found Islam Alhamdulillah.
But, um, the ideal thing is for us to learn, you, you will know you
have to gauge your family, your relationship with your family, we
have to understand that in Islam, our family is extremely important.
You're not supposed to cut ties with your family. On the contrary,
this is a great opportunity for you to exercise your Islam and
your new way of life with your family, and perhaps through those
manners. And through that light, you know, and that excitement, you
will attract them for them to also get curious and eventually
embraces them in sha Allah, I ask Allah subhanaw taala to guide all
of our family. I know that that's one of the biggest thing was that
we as Congress revert to make on an everyday basis, we want our
family guided, as well. And so the second part of his question was,
what if they reject me? And so for those that are watching, that are
born into the faith, this is a biggie and also like non Muslim
family members, if you do have a, a person, a family member that has
embraced Islam or converted, you know, oftentimes we reject what we
don't know. So they're not rejecting you, per se, because
something that I remember when I first went to Mexico, and one of
my cousin's was very, very upset, too, when she saw me with the
headscarf and she, I believe I mentioned this last time, you
know, she said, I would never be Arab. And I explained to her that
I was not looking for another nationality or another culture. I
was actually trying to fulfill that void that only God himself
can can fill. And so
one of the My biggest recommendations is that both of
you learned this new faith together, both your family and
you. If you have any books or pamphlets, try to
show them obviously and if they're not receptive to that, then with
your manners, that's that's the best way to give Dawa to our
family members. And then for those non Muslims that are watching, and
that perhaps feel upset that they
Think they're losing someone or a loved one, or that this is a phase
and it will go away. Understand that we are all individuals and
our needs are all different. And one of the beautiful things about
any religion is to respect one another. And so if anything, we
need to learn to respect one another, we may not accept, you
know, our views, whether it's religion,
political views, whatever you you could think of. But at the end of
the day, that individual, if that's your daughter who embraces
slam, that's always going to be your daughter.
Right. And so
it's important to always remember that, that this individual never
stopped being your family member, and that at the end of the day,
they're really just looking to be a better person, a better
individual, a better neighbor, a better daughter, or son,
whatever member that has converted to this new way of life,
I highly encourage you to learn together to be open minded, open
your heart.
You know, I remember coming into the faith, you know, you are on
cloud nine, and you want to convey this message to absolutely
everyone. And so, you think that by conveying the message, people
will enter the faith and,
and you get frustrated when they don't, but everybody's spiritual
quest or journey is an individual one. And so we have to respect one
another. We are instructed as Muslims to just convey the message
and the message of Islam is to worship one guy, which for those
are non Muslims that don't know, it's actually our first
commandment of the 10 commandments, which is, Thou shalt
not worship anything, but me and I am a jealous God. So these 10
commandments were given to Moses, not Jesus, Moses. And so I often
joke around and I say, I'm a better Catholic as a Muslim than
when I was a Catholic because I practice the first commandment out
of the 10 commandments, or to the tee that that's the one
commandment that I
I don't follow. I don't fall short. Because that will take us
out of the fold of Islam the minute that we start worshiping
anything other than Allah. And so
let me see here.
Any other questions? I'm just gonna read this real quick.
A Salam aleikum. soludos is a Canada soludos.
I'm just gonna say salam and greet in Spanish. salat wa salam ala
Rosa. Gracias por esta Ki. A gracias por compartir estas Paseo
con con nosotros.
So we have people tuning in from Canada, Mashallah. Welcome,
welcome. If you have any questions, please, please feel
inshallah send them our way. And we will try to get to them.
Another question that I got was, I think we covered pretty much most
of them.
But another one that I get, and perhaps I'm going to be doing a
video on this, but holidays are around the corner. And so
you don't have to believe in a holiday in order to spend time
with your family. And that's very important also. So we were talking
about earlier about family ties and how we it's important in Islam
to make sure that you don't break those and that you are always in
contact with your family. And that's one of the best hours that
you can give to your family.
One of the things that I told Paloma the girl that just the
sister that just converted was that, you know, she wants to start
practicing those extra manners, those extra extra
Yeah, manners and love towards her family, for them to see the
difference. And I normally you know, what I what I did upon
converting is when I would put in a practice or they would see a
practice that I was doing.
I would always reference Islam, I would always say, you know, Islam
says that I need to respect my family. I need to respect my
mother, I need to respect my father. And so that's very
important. And you know, the mother has extra importance in
Islam. And so this is all all important. And you don't have to
directly try to come
winds or impose. I know when we are new Muslims we want everyone
to,
to get a taste of this wonderful way of life. And so it's difficult
because a lot of times our family members I know in, in Latin
America is still relatively new. Even though Dawa has been
spreading, and we do see Islam growing at a very rapid pace in
Latin America, it's still kind of foreign. And for those that don't
know,
they, they oftentimes feel that if they can't
they can't
be Muslim, right? Because you are not Arab. And so Islam is for
everyone. I want to encourage everyone watching non Muslim
viewers to get to know if you have a Muslim member that has converted
or one of your family members is married to a Muslim get to know
them it's it's beautiful to actually interact to know the
culture
the different foods if they're from a different country. And so
we have people from we have a brother from Kenya.
hamdulillah welcome. And thank you for being here. If you have any
questions, Inshallah, please feel free to
to send them our way.
Let me see. I had a couple other ones that I just thought they were
important to address. Um,
so I am very interested in Islam. And I see many beautiful things in
the religion.
But what does Islam say about bad things happening to good people, I
believe there's an article for that.
And so the the best way that I can explain this, there's nothing bad
that happens to us.
And I'll talk from an individual point of view the world I mean, I
can I can't speak for the world itself. But when things are
happening to us on an individual basis, for example, I remember
when I embrace Islam, I was fired for implementing my hate my
headscarf my hijab. And so what seemed really, really bad. And it
seemed like I wasn't going to be able to provide for my family, as
a single parent actually became very good. With patience and a lot
of supplication, I ended up, you know, getting the job of my
dreams, which I'm doing today, which is conveying the message of
Islam and serving a law, God and His creation, I do a lot of
humanitarian work, I do activism, I do a lot of things that I'm
passionate about. So at the time, I thought it was wow, it was a
huge test. But we got to remember that Allah, Almighty God will
never send us a test in which we cannot handle.
God Himself promises us, you know, that success comes from Him. And
so when we put all of our trust in Him, and we get closer to Him,
then He will ultimately give us success in whatever it is that we
are trying to achieve, or trying to do.
I know tests seem like,
sometimes and less, but remember that your current situation is not
your final destination, this life is temporary, and it's not
forever, we all have an expiration date, and hamdulillah so we must
make the best of our time here. And so for Inshallah, for my non
Muslim
family, because we are all family, we all come from Adam and Eve, and
that's something that we should all remember
that we all have rights over one another. Our neighbors have rights
over us and so that's, that's another way for for my community
to remember to get to know your neighbors get to know one another.
Allah tells us in the Quran that He created us intonation in tribes
to get to know one another. So I'm going to go ahead and end on that
note, inshallah. I pray that this was beneficial to all of you. I
know it was certainly beneficial for me and I really enjoy
personally giving Dawa and getting to know other people. I do. A lot
of interfaith groups were able to learn from my Jewish
Sisters, Christian sisters, and so it's important very, very
important for us to get to know one another. If you have any other
questions, please feel free to put them in the comments and we'll get
to them. You're more than welcome to reach out to me. Until next
month. Thank you so much for being here. A Salaam Alaykum.
Warahmatullahi Wabarakatuh