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SOPHIE JENKIN’S CONVERSION STORY
at convertstoislam.com/Stories/sophiejenkins.html
I was born into a lower middle-class English family, my mother was (and is) a housewife and my father worked at an electronics firm (he is now a lecturer in electronic engineering). My father came from a Catholic background, and my mother from a Protestant one. They had both shared a short spell in the Quaker church in the early 1970s but by the time I came along they were strong atheists and religion was never mentioned in our house, let alone practiced. My parents had decided that if we wanted to be religious when we grew up, they would support this.
From a young age I believed in God, despite not being brought up with this belief, but still I got the feeling that what they were teaching in the Christian school I went to was not right, somehow. I didn’t believe in Jesus or the Holy Spirit, it all seemed false but at school they told us this was the only right way, all other religions were wrong, so I was VERY confused. When you’re a small child you assume adults are always right with no
exceptions, what they say, goes. Still I could not let this go, so I probably quite wisely, decided to keep my belief in only one God private. I felt guilty for believing something that was ‘wrong’ I felt ashamed and I hoped and prayed that I would stop being a heretic soon. When I was young, I was exposed very much to the fear of ‘Islamic Fundamentalism’, especially with the Salman Rushdie affair at the front of people’s minds, I was very frightened of the Muslims in general. There were two Muslim children at my primary school, but they kept their beliefs to themselves, except for the fact that the younger child Ali refused to pray in Assembly.
I had always prayed for God to show me the right way, I always turned to God for help, there was no doubt in my mind that God existed. By the time I was 11 or 12 years old, and in high school I began to realise that perhaps my belief in one god wasn’t wrong. At this time I had not really heard of Islam, all I ‘knew’ about it, was that it was a violent religion that treated women like dirt. We were actually taught in SCHOOL that Islam was spread by the sword (in other words by violent and forceful means), that women in Islam were chattels symbolised by their dress, and that Muslims worshipped Mohammed (Salalah Alaihi Was Sallam). I was really disgusted, every time I saw a Muslim lady when shopping in Manchester (there are few Muslims in my area) I thought 'how can you do that to yourself?? I was really incensed. They did teach us one true thing though, that Muslims believe in only one God, which was something I honestly did not know before then…
at convertstoislam.com/Stories/sophiejenkins.html
I was born into a lower middle-class English family, my mother was (and is) a housewife and my father worked at an electronics firm (he is now a lecturer in electronic engineering). My father came from a Catholic background, and my mother from a Protestant one. They had both shared a short spell in the Quaker church in the early 1970s but by the time I came along they were strong atheists and religion was never mentioned in our house, let alone practiced. My parents had decided that if we wanted to be religious when we grew up, they would support this.
From a young age I believed in God, despite not being brought up with this belief, but still I got the feeling that what they were teaching in the Christian school I went to was not right, somehow. I didn’t believe in Jesus or the Holy Spirit, it all seemed false but at school they told us this was the only right way, all other religions were wrong, so I was VERY confused. When you’re a small child you assume adults are always right with no
exceptions, what they say, goes. Still I could not let this go, so I probably quite wisely, decided to keep my belief in only one God private. I felt guilty for believing something that was ‘wrong’ I felt ashamed and I hoped and prayed that I would stop being a heretic soon. When I was young, I was exposed very much to the fear of ‘Islamic Fundamentalism’, especially with the Salman Rushdie affair at the front of people’s minds, I was very frightened of the Muslims in general. There were two Muslim children at my primary school, but they kept their beliefs to themselves, except for the fact that the younger child Ali refused to pray in Assembly.
I had always prayed for God to show me the right way, I always turned to God for help, there was no doubt in my mind that God existed. By the time I was 11 or 12 years old, and in high school I began to realise that perhaps my belief in one god wasn’t wrong. At this time I had not really heard of Islam, all I ‘knew’ about it, was that it was a violent religion that treated women like dirt. We were actually taught in SCHOOL that Islam was spread by the sword (in other words by violent and forceful means), that women in Islam were chattels symbolised by their dress, and that Muslims worshipped Mohammed (Salalah Alaihi Was Sallam). I was really disgusted, every time I saw a Muslim lady when shopping in Manchester (there are few Muslims in my area) I thought 'how can you do that to yourself?? I was really incensed. They did teach us one true thing though, that Muslims believe in only one God, which was something I honestly did not know before then…
