My incredible discovery of the faith

A Catholic lady finds ultimate answer in Islam when confronted with and having run out of questions related to the existence and the nature of God. Here she narrates her what she termed as incredible journey to Islam.

I became a Muslim at the age of 67, and I thank God that He has blessed me to become a believer in Islam.
I was raised in a strict Roman Catholic home, the middle daughter of three children. After my father passed away, my mother would go to work in a local hospital to support us. But with this new-found responsibility, my mother was no longer able to oversee our upbringing although she had sent us to a Catholic school.
I would spend time with my friends at the local cafes. It was there that I met a very nice Muslim man (later to become my husband). When I told my mother that I was in love and wanted to get married, she warned that we were from different background and that we would eventually have problems. At 20, I could not imagine that we would have any problems in our marriage. I was so deep in love and felt so happy that someone would be taking care of me. My husband was not a very religious man at that time, and deep down I felt that I would be able to get him to convert to Catholicism.
Everything seemed to be going along so perfectly for the next several years. We were happy and not once did culture or religion ever cause us any problems. God blessed us with a son and a daughter. We went along with our lives and I even began taking my children to church with me. Initially, my husband never prevented me from attending weekly Sunday mass, but later he spoke to me about his not wanting the children to attend church. Frankly, I was angry and upset.
“But why not,” I objected.
I really could not understand the harm in taking them to church. Up until this point, we had never even discussed religion. In fact, I had never even questioned that there could even be a different religion than Catholicism. I was born a Catholic and thought that Catholicism was the right religion. For explanations that I can’t even put a finger on, it seemed like from this day on, so many problems were now evident. We argued all the time about everything and everyone. Now, little things became a big deal. Religion became an arguing point between us. The differences in our cultures became something to argue about. We argued about in-laws and most unfortunately, we argued on the upbringing of our children.
The only peace and harmony that was now between us was the wisdom, sincerity, concern and love my father-in-law had for our marriage. He loved his son and grandchildren, and also genuinely loved me as a daughter. He was a very religious and devout Muslim and was a very wise man.
My little acquaintance with Islam was through my father-in law, who would pray his every prayer, fasted during the month of Ramadan, and was very generous to the poor. I could feel his connection to God. In fact, my father-in-law was so kind to the needy that every day after coming home from the afternoon prayer at the mosque, he would invite any needy person home to eat lunch with. This was every single day. Up until his death at the age of 95, he had continued with this habit.
My father-in-law tried desperately to help us find a solution. He warned his son to allow me room to practice my religion, but it was no longer about religion anymore.
I felt frustrated and desired to take a break. We separated. Although I desperately wanted my children to live with me, we both felt that it would be better for the children to be raised by their father. He was in a much better position, financially, to raise them and give them many comforts. How I longed for them every night. I moved back with my mother and continued seeing my children every weekend. My ex-husband would drop off our children on Friday afternoons and pick them up early Sunday mornings. Although this arrangement hurt, it was better than nothing.
Each night before going to bed, I would read from the Bible. When my children were visiting me, I would read them a passage regardless of whether my children understood or not. After reading a passage, one night I would seek help from Jesus, the next night from the angels, the next night from the different saints, the next night from the Virgin Mary.
But then one night we had no one else to ask, I had run out of Saints. So I said, “Now we’re going to ask God.” My son said, “OK, now who is God?” I said, “He’s the one who created you, who created me. He is forever our neighbor.” So he was pondering, he was thinking about those words. To my explanation, I rubbed my cross again. I said ‘now thank God.”
He looked at the cross and said “Mamma, who is this?” I said “This is God. He’s the son of God.” He said, “You just told me a minute ago that God is forever. How come this one is dead?” I never, never in my whole life realized that fact.
He asked me where this god came from. And I said, he came from the womb of Mary, of the Virgin Mary. He said, “Oh, so he was born sometime before.” I said, “Well, yes.” But then he said ‘But you told me that he’s forever. He never dies and he’s never born. My son, who was now about eight, asked me directly, “Mama, why don’t you just ask God for help?” I was surprised and stunned and remember feeling a bit shocked that he would question my religion. I told him that I also ask God. Little did I know that this son of mine would grow up to be a constant thorn in my side, always reminding me about the need to worship the One, true God. Thank God.

To be continued next week

Courtesy: islamicbulletin.org