Muslim conversion to Christianity. Where do they end up?

[jimkhong]

Also I would consider it is now time to forget about the complexities of religion but for us to all to try to obtain a goal to which can be found in Each of them. Love, Unity and Tolerance. Can this be achieved? I think so, but it would only be a stepping stone on the way to us all working together in a future most likely not that far away, with One God.

AAh, for the religion of John Lennon

I look forward to the death of nationalism of all kinds including religious nationalism. You Bahais seems to be free from it so far.

I believe the human race is destined to reach the stars one day. I can’t imagine that we will be going as Catholics, Protestants, or Muslims; or Americans, Russians or Chinese. Surely we will be going as humans?

 

[mamlukman]

I would love to see these videos. Do you have the links?

No, but they are all things I’ve watched in the last 6 months. It’s easy to do a search on, say, “Indonesia” + “Christianity” + “converts” and of course as you watch one video, similar videos pop up in a list on the right. Or search on Google and then click “videos.”

You can also go to Muslim web sites such as Islamic Research Foundation Inter.
irfi.org/articles4/articles_5001_6000/why%20muslims%20in%20the%20west%20leave%20islam%20and%20what%20can%20we%20do%20about%20ithtml.htm

Mission Islam, etc. and with a little poking around you can find these concerns and proposed solutions.

There are also a few “former Muslim” web sites such as formermuslimsunited.org or exmna.org (ex-Muslims of North America) or ex-muslim.org.uk or exmuslimblogs.com (The Ex-Muslim) etc. They often cross-reference each other. They are a mixture of converts who have left Islam and born Muslims who have left Islam. If you read enough, you will find common threads in their stories–for example that they were not told the whole story when they converted, and after their conversion they were told they had to do x; and then told they had to do y; and then told they had to do z; etc. And a lot of them (50% by some estimates) finally woke up and said “enough.” This fits with the pattern established by Muhammad himself and the instructions he gave the first Muslim missionary, Mus‘ab ibn 'Umair. (Do a search to find M’s instructions…)

I will add that Catholic presence in the youtube world is hovering around 0, at least as far as countering Islam. Since the battlefield for converts is now the internet (converts themselves say this is the first place they go for information), it is inexplicable to me. I suspect it is at least partially due to a misplaced one-sided ecumenicism. Evangelicals, particularly David Wood, are very active. My personal experience has been the same: After a sermon on evangelizing non-Catholics, I wrote to the priest asking for some guidance or insight concerning converts–I was politely told he didn’t want to get involved. I wrote the the person in charge of converts for the diocese, and he replied that he was too concerned with Catholics converting to Evangelicalism to worry about them converting to Islam. So it seems that Catholics are losing the battle by default.

 

[mamlukman]

No, personally I find most of them are seeking a personal interpretation of the Quran instead of that imposed on them by their clerics. It normally starts with someone asking difficult questions from the Quran and got put off by the way the question was handled (or not handled) - often an unsatisfactory stock answer with a warning not to ask too many questions.

So, most of them are genuinely seeking the truth & not looking to ‘revert’ to an earlier faith.

Also, it is not so much a ‘Quran’ based reasoning but more a Muslim-based reasoning that is retained. For instance, initially reading the Bible in a rigid literalist manner; seeing the actions/law rather than the intention behind the actions/law.

This is fascinating because you are describing exactly what happens when Christians/Catholics convert to Islam! Almost word for word–just substitute “Bible” where you wrote “Quran.”

Watch some of the Muslim convert videos on youtube. You’ll see a common pattern emerge, esp. with Catholics–they are in a Catholic school and they have questions about the Trinity or the divinity of Jesus. They ask their teacher and/or a priest, and they are told “not to worry about it” or something of the sort–in other words, they are blown off. So–surprise!!!–they began to look for answers themselves, which of course, Muslims are only too happy to provide. Voila, they convert. All because no one bothered to take their–legitimate–questions seriously.

 

[theropod]

I would think that a Muslim upbringing would make it more difficult to accept icons, statues, crucifixes, etc. that you 'd find in a Catholic or Orthodox church. Islam is very iconoclastic. Many evangelical strains have similar aversions to images, so I would find them to be a more natural fit.