how do Christians respond to claims against Christianity by former ministers who have converted to Islam

[Aydan]

I just watched this video by a former Christian minister by the name of Dr. Gerald Dirks who left the ministry and converted to Islam. I have seen other stories similar to this and my question is what is the best way for Christians to refute these arguments made by former Christians?
Here’s the video I’m talking about
youtube.com/watch?v=dOZSrPF5GNo

 

[DebChris]

I did not watch the video all the way through.
With any discussion, I begin with what we do share in common. I acknowledge that we are indeed called to submit to God. Islam means submission to God. Whether Christian, Jew, or Muslim, our lineage goes back to Abraham.
The former minister’s religious upbringing and education were outlined at the beginning of the video. That is as far as I went.
We know, from the Bible that St. Paul likewise had a strong Pharisee upbringing. He knew the Scriptures backward and forward.
It is only when Jesus intervened in Paul’s life that Paul converted to Christianity. It is the personal relationship with our Lord and Savior that strengthened him through all he endured.
I have read the account of a Muslim who converted from Islam to Christianity. He recounted a story from the Koran is which every newborn is touched by Satan. It is easy to see the parallel between this story and Original sin. There is only one person who was not touched, and that was Jesus. It was during one of the daily prayer times that this person saw a vision of Jesus and converted to Christianity.
I trust Jesus to work on this man’s heart. While he may have great knowledge of both Islam and Christianity, he has not opened his heart to the possibility of a personal relationship with our Lord.
It is this personal relationship with a Loving God that is the difference, and a major stumbling block for many, between the Faith of a Christian and those who follow other religions.

 

[Byzantine_Wolf]

I have found many people who leave their former faith and are then put forth as kind of “role models” never fully understood their former faith to begin with. One famous example is Yusuf Estes, a Protestant turned Muslim whose conversion story has so many theological problems that I wouldn’t have been amazed if he had converted to Taoism. Another example is Imam Farrakhan Qasim, who is so ignorant of his former faith that I feel sorry for any Muslims who take him as a serious source of information.

This doesn’t mean that all converts don’t do some research or thinking, but many of the famous ones who become celebrities are, for those who did their research, very poor examples.

 

[promethius]

I just watched this video by a former Christian minister by the name of Dr. Gerald Dirks who left the ministry and converted to Islam. I have seen other stories similar to this and my question is what is the best way for Christians to refute these arguments made by former Christians?
Here’s the video I’m talking about
youtube.com/watch?v=dOZSrPF5GNo

From the catholic perspective, whatever protestant ministers convert are of no concern to us. Should a priest convert, then we still stand by our deposit of faith in the magisterial authority of the church… in other words, truth is not contained in one man, so we should not be overly dismayed when one falls from catholic truth (except insofar as such a fall is hurtful to God, who desires all His children be part of His church)

 

[DebChris]

I have found many people who leave their former faith and are then put forth as kind of “role models” never fully understood their former faith to begin with. One famous example is Yusuf Estes, a Protestant turned Muslim whose conversion story has so many theological problems that I wouldn’t have been amazed if he had converted to Taoism. Another example is Imam Farrakhan Qasim, who is so ignorant of his former faith that I feel sorry for any Muslims who take him as a serious source of information.

This doesn’t mean that all converts don’t do some research or thinking, but many of the famous ones who become celebrities are, for those who did their research, very poor examples.

I would agree. A discussion with Catholics who have left the Church, for example, very often shows lapses in catechesis.
The video may point to an intellectual knowledge of the Christian faith, but did the minister truly understand it?
In the little I listened to, he was talking about the potlucks and other community gatherings of his youth. He also talked about his perfect attendance in Sunday school.
He had all the classes, but how full was his prayer life?
Again, I did not watch the entire video so my next question may be already be answered.
Was he attracted to Islam because of the structured prayer life of Muslims?
Could he have been equally attracted to the prayer life of the Greek Orthodox and Roman Catholics?
Give him credit for wanting to submit his life to God, and let God lead him to a true understanding of the sacrifice of the cross.

 

[katy_kt]

I have yet to watch the video, but I have seem many other conversion stories of ministers to Islam. In all those videos, I wonder whether they lack knowledge about their previous faith and ignoring many of Christianities explanation. In many for their talks against Christian beliefs, they seem to ignore the dual nature of Jesus and the understanding of many Christians as to why God became man. They should be well aware about a Christian explanation to many of their questions, but instead of tackling them, they use the same arguments many other Muslim apologists.

 

[Aydan]

Well I have watched both videos I did not post the second half of the video here because he just goes on to say that he was in an atypical Christian for many years who was doing the components of Islam i.e. the five daily prayers and he also believed that Mohammed was the final messenger of God he just did not want to make it official and become Muslim. But I’m not so much interested in that part of it I was wondering how to be as Catholics and Christians respond to his claims about the early church and the biblical text being incomplete. He did not address his prayer life as a Christian other than to say he prayed and read the Bible daily.

I would agree. A discussion with Catholics who have left the Church, for example, very often shows lapses in catechesis.
The video may point to an intellectual knowledge of the Christian faith, but did the minister truly understand it?
In the little I listened to, he was talking about the potlucks and other community gatherings of his youth. He also talked about his perfect attendance in Sunday school.
He had all the classes, but how full was his prayer life?
Again, I did not watch the entire video so my next question may be already be answered.
Was he attracted to Islam because of the structured prayer life of Muslims?
Could he have been equally attracted to the prayer life of the Greek Orthodox and Roman Catholics?
Give him credit for wanting to submit his life to God, and let God lead him to a true understanding of the sacrifice of the cross.

 

[Aydan]

From the catholic perspective, whatever protestant ministers convert are of no concern to us. Should a priest convert, then we still stand by our deposit of faith in the magisterial authority of the church… in other words, truth is not contained in one man, so we should not be overly dismayed when one falls from catholic truth (except insofar as such a fall is hurtful to God, who desires all His children be part of His church)

I see what you’re saying and I understand it but I must disagree with you on one thing. I think this is very important to Catholics let me tell you why. I was raised with no religion at all despite being baptized Catholic as a baby at 23 I began a quest to find God I always believed in God but I had no idea who Jesus really was and I was really attracted to Islam because again I had very little knowledge of Christian theology. My friend reached out to me several times and she is a devout Catholic and finally she invited me to church and that’s when I found out who Jesus really is but if she had not been willing to reach out to me I wouldn’t be Catholic right now and I would’ve probably become Muslim. Therefore I think it is important to know how to refute this case it comes up when we are talking to someone.

 

[katy_kt]

Here is my critique of the first 15 minutes.

The video begins how many of the other similar Islamic conversion story begins - pointing out how knowledgeable and involved that person was in his ministry. Then Dr. Dirks brings up the changes to the biblical texts that he says questions his faith on various topic with includes the crucifixion of Jesus. Now I would love to see these old ancient text changes that he was alluding to, especially the one that creates doubts about the crucifixion of Jesus.

Then he goes into the topic of the ‘early Christian church’ and talks of the ‘Jerusalem Church’ which he said was run by the disciples but, according to him, due to political reasons the other branches were lost and scriptures destroyed. He claims that Pauline Christianity survived from the breath of Christianity that existed during those time.

At this point I question why the apostles seem to have failed to teach the teachings of Jesus and somehow gave way for Paul to take control of Christianity. Given that there were 11 other apostles, some went to further lands than Paul (like St. Thomas to India), it’s strange that Paul’s ‘version’ of Christianity beats the other 11. We also still have reliable scriptures written by the disciples of the apostles (other than Paul’s) which support many of the Christian beliefs.

He ends with how what he had learned influenced him and many others to leave the seminary because the inconsistencies were impossible to look past. He said that “almost any good biblical scholar” comes to the same conclusion as him, when they study the scriptures, which belittles the hard work that many scholars who haven’t left the faith. Given what he said, the speaker should question the other ministers to converted to Islam and ask them why seemed to either not have been taught scriptural changes and history that Dr. Dirks was taught, or able to overlook it and become preachers.

 

[planten]

From DebChris: I have read the account of a Muslim who converted from Islam to Christianity. He recounted a story from the Koran is which every newborn is touched by Satan. It is easy to see the parallel between this story and Original sin. There is only one person who was not touched, and that was Jesus.

**My reply is not directly related to the conversion of Ministers to Islam. It concerns one Muslim’s conversion to christianity for the reasons given in post shown above.

That was a gross misunderstanding of the Muslim. The reality is that there is nothing in Quran to state that every newborn is touched by Satan. That matter is in a Hadith. It goes like this:

The prophet Muhammad said:
There is never a newborn who is not touched (smacked) by the Shaitan (Satan) after his birth and he cries out loudly, except Jesus and his mother (Mary).**

Not every one understands the meaning of the above saying. It states that every newborn is smacked by the Satan at his birth. And the newborn cries out loudly. But only Jesus and his Mother are saved from the touch or smack of the Satan.

The saying is 100 % true. Even the Muslims do not understand the meaning of that saying and that poor Muslim became a victim of misunderstanding and became a christian. There was no need to convert on the basis of that Good Hadith.
I leave it to the christians to understand and interpret that hadith. Do they believe that to be true, and in what sense please?

 

[katy_kt]

Therefore I think it is important to know how to refute this case it comes up when we are talking to someone.

I agree that it is essential to know how to refute arguments made against our faith. In the videos that you gave, it is hard to refute anything, because he hasn’t brought forth any evidences. For example, he talks of how the original text questions about the crucifixion, but he never talks about the original text - what is it, what did it say. Therefore, it is hard to refute this video because the main speaker doesn’t give us anything to refute. All we can do is say he is got this or that wrong.

The best action that anyone who questions Christianity (or anything else) should do is ask and research for themselves. Ask and if they don’t answer find someone who will. The greatest challenge we have is that many do not do this, if the speaker displays credentials that make him seem knowledgeable, many would just believe him.

 

[bpbasilphx]

By quoting former Moslems, including imams, who have become Christians.