Good Evening ladies & gentlemen!
My account here is 2 years old so I believe an introduction is well overdue
I'm currently trying to set up Birmingham's first Ex-Muslim group so be sure to drop by here and get in touch with me NOW:
http://www.councilofexmuslims.com/index.php?topic=24585.msg698250;boardseen#new And so for my story.
Three key events stand out in my religious phase. The first was having this tape find itself into my hands. Yes, this was back in the day when cassettes were still being used. You will recognize it as the genesis of the conspiracy theories of what I now call Islamic supremacists:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mrXbPQbyLDg&feature=youtube_gdata_player The second was a dream that I had. Some men who looked a lot like Pakistani policemen but imagined they were Egyptian or something were going to kill me. I then realised in my dream that I was about to die and had not been a good Muslim. What if I went to hell?
Finally, Khilafah magazine ended up in my hands. For those of you who don't know Khilafah magazine is the official magazine of hizb-ut-tahrir, an Islamic supremacist movement who are very active in the UK.
This started me on a phase that whilst short, would have a profound impact on the way I saw myself in the universe. At the end of this, the whole edifice of religion would come crashing down around me and I would unexpectedly find myself an atheist.
During this phase, I found myself trying to convert friends (I fucking cringe), I made them listen to the shadows cassette, I told them about the Khilafah and how we had to establish this system in order to prepare the world for the coming of the Dajjal (Islamic anti-christ), we needed this alliance of Islamic states to attack Israel and free the Palestinians, we had to awaken people from their ignorant ways and spread the deen of Islam. I fucking cringe every time I think about it.
But there's a problem. No one around me seemed interested in this stuff. My older siblings who had handed me this Islamic supremacist material in the form of the From the Shadows cassette and Khilafah magazine weren't seeming to get the message. I was the one going through the religious phase. Not them.
The question eventually arose on things like listening to music, covering your ankles, praying 5 times a day, keeping non-muslim friends etc I felt very guilty as I wasn't doing all I could to be a good Muslim. I remember starting a journal of sorts, lost now, where I said my goal was to move to a Muslim country where being a good Muslim would be much easier amongst my "own" people. Did everyone have to be that devout to enter paradise? To me, the answer seemed to be yes. Wasn't the name of the faith submission?
There a problem here. Worrying about myself was one thing. But worrying about those I care about being harmed is something else entirely. This would prove to be the downfall of Islam in my world.
Hell. Those who don't believe will go to hell. That was what the Islamic supremacists had taught me.
Allah however, is all knowing, wise. He is omniscient and omnipotent. This means he knows who is going to hell before he even created the entire universe. But he created the universe anyway. And it's not as if he couldn't have changed the rules or created a universe without a hell: he need only say it is, and it is.
And so it occurred to me that people I knew and cared about, even only on a superficial level would end up in hell. I tried a thought experiment: what if my brother went to hell? Allah was merciful right? S'long as I was a good Muslim, I could convince him to stop burning my brother and bring him up to paradise right? If I pleaded to Allah for 15 minutes, maybe my brother would only burn for 15 minutes. Or maybe I could convince him after 10 minutes. But then if Allah knows what I will say, then why not just being him up? In fact, if he knows this will all happen, why go through this in the first place? The edifice was about crumble.
Every time I considered this immoral, I thought of hell. To me, hell was a real place where real people would go to burn forever for not submitting themselves to the will of their Lord. This happened over and over: "This is wrong! But hell...". I was genuinely afraid of hell. And if I went to hell, I wouldn't even be able to plead for the souls of my loved ones.
Then something occurred to me, a revolutionary thought: what if this was the purpose of hell? What if hell was designed to yank me back from reasoned thought? To keep me afraid, to keep me in a prison of my own making? "What if...". My world came crashing down around me. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up. I could feel cold sweat. Everything. Fell. Into. Place. All of a sudden, all of my questions, all the possible answers suddenly made sense. But there's still a chance this is true right? My conclusion was unequivocal: either God exists and he's an asshole or...
He does not exist.
There was nobody around back then. No Ex-Muslims. I was the only Ex-muslim in the world. Not literally but that's genuinely the way I felt. I wish I knew there were people like me out there. But little old me couldn't have known that. And thus I remained the only Ex-muslim in the world for a very long time.
Which brings me full circle and should tell you why I do this, why I want to set up the Birmingham chapter and why I've been so active behind the scenes in the Ex-muslim community: because no one should ever feel that there isn't somebody they can connect with. And that's why on September 21st, I'll be arranging an event that brings together Ex-Muslims from across the UK. And it will be held in the second city
If you're in the Birmingham/West Midlands area, PM me. If you know somebody who is, PM me:
http://www.councilofexmuslims.com/index.php?topic=24585.msg698250;boardseen#new The London Ex-muslim community is thriving:
And we in Birmingham should be too.
Forward unto dawn.
Topic: Attention Birmingham, UK Ex-Muslims!