NEW YORK (WOMENSENEWS)-- For Zainab Ismail, a Bronx-born Hispanic woman, the turning point came in March 2009 after a wedding ceremony at a Catholic church.

"For some unknown reason, obviously now I know it was Allah--God--putting that thought and feeling in my heart, I no longer wanted to be Catholic. I didn't know what I wanted to be but I no longer wanted to be Catholic," Ismail recalls.

Less than three months later, Ismail embraced Islam and converted in June 2009.

"As a Latina, you are raised, if you got it, to show it, to flaunt it as much as possible," says Ismail, 44, raised in a Puerto Rican Catholic family.

Now she shows very little of her skin. Instead she wears the hijab, the Islamic veil or headscarf.

Since the 9/11 tragedy, the Hispanic community in the United States has witnessed a significant rise in conversions to Islam, especially among women, says Imam Shamsi Ali, a Muslim scholar and imam of the 96th street mosque in Manhattan, on the border of the city's Upper East Side and Harlem. They are "mostly educated, young and professional women."

Although 9/11 incited bias and discrimination against Muslims, many non-Muslims, who some had never heard about Islam, also started to question the meaning of the religion, explains Ali.

The percentage of new female converts to Islam in the U.S. has increased 9 percent since 2000, from 32 percent to 41 percent, according to the 2011 U.S. Mosque Survey, which interviewed leaders at 524 mosques across the country. Latinos--men and women--accounted for 12 percent of all new converts in the United States in 2011.

In 2006, the number of Hispanic Muslims was estimated at about 200,000 by the American Muslim Council, which has not provided any new figures since then.

Ahmad Akhar, the Ibn Khaldun chair of Islamic studies at American University in Washington, D.C., gave several explanations for this increase in a 2011 story in Illume Mag on the rise of Hispanics converting to Islam in the United States. The most attractive part of Islam to Latinos seeking spirituality, he said, is its strict monotheistic orientation and structured belief system. Much more literature on Islam has been translated into Spanish in the United States, he added, which has made the religion more accessible to non-Arabic readers. By converting to Islam, some Latinos may also feel as if they're connecting to their Spanish roots, which are embedded for 800 years in Islamic history in Spain's southeast population centers of Granada, Cordova, Seville and Andalusia.

Over the next two decades the number of Muslims living in the United States will more than double, rising from 2.6 million in 2010 to 6.2 million in 2030, according to a study published by the Pew Research Center in 2011. The study also found that about 20 percent of the estimated 1.8 million Muslims currently in America, 18 and older, are converts.
Focus on Gender Equality

Imam Ali says that the strength of Islam for some female converts is linked to gender equality. "Islam came with the idea that all human beings are equal, including male and female," he said an interview at the Indonesian consulate in Manhattan. "Women have an important role in societies, not only at home."

He adds that it's important to differentiate between "what Muslims do in Muslim lands and what Islam is about," in response to some Westerners' ideas about traditional Muslim societies where gender roles are well defined and sharply divided.

Shortly before converting to Islam, Ismail described feeling a "lack of connection with God." At the time she was working as a fitness trainer and a fitness competitor.


http://womensenews.org/story/religio...wing-in-number
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إِذَا جَاءَ نَصْرُ اللهِ وَالْفَتْحُ ١
وَرَأَيْتَ الناسَ يَدْخُلُونَ فِي دِينِ اللهِ أَفْوَاجًا ٢
فَسَبحْ بِحَمْدِ رَبكَ وَاسْتَغْفِرْهُ إِنهُ كَانَ تَوابًا ٣

Artinya:
1. apabila telah datang pertolongan Allah dan kemenangan,
2. dan kamu Lihat manusia masuk agama Allah dengan berbondong-bondong,
3. Maka bertasbihlah dengan memuji Tuhanmu dan mohonlah ampun kepada-Nya. Sesungguhnya Dia adalah Maha Penerima taubat.

Firman Mu Maha Benar ya Allah yang memberi Hidayah keseluruh penjuru bumi ini Allahu Akbar